Day Fifty One: Sanja Matsuri

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I wasn't planning to go to the Sanja Matsuri Festival today but it was so lovely when I woke up I decided what the hell, maybe I would go stand amongst piles of people in a huge crowd and see what Japanese festivals are all about. It was soooooo much better than I could have anticipated - true it was crowded but as I was by myself I managed to push my way through to the best spot to meet my friend Jane.

A note from Wikipedia:
The Sanja Matsuri ("Three Shrine Festival"), or the Sanja Festival, is one of the three great Shinto festivals in Tokyo, along with the Kanda Matsuri and Sannō Matsuri, and it is considered one of the wildest and largest. Its purpose is to honor Hinokuma Hamanari, Hinokuma Takenari and Hajino Nakatomo, the three men who established and founded Sensō-ji. The festival is held on the third weekend of every May at Asakusa Shrine. Its prominent parades revolve around three mikoshi (the three shrines referenced in the name Sanja), as well as traditional music and dancing. Over its three days, the festival attracts anywhere from 1.5 to 2 million locals and tourists every year.

It was awesome. We danced, somehow ducked under a police barricade with a bunch of Japanese people and danced our way to the temple, clapping and cheering with everyone else. There was loads of men running around in "festival costumes" which Jane and I call "Man Mini Kiminos" the Man Mini Kiminos are so short all day we could see mens butts wiggling about as they danced and clapped. Still though, for some reason people were more interested in taking photos of us, the dancing Gaijins, and at one point when we were posing with some of the Man Mini Kimino Men in front of a shrine I counted and there were six other cameras there, not including mine and Janes. I was finding it so strange, until Jane and I had our turn to take a photo of a gaijin. He was wearing a Man Mini Kimino with some kind of sumo underwear pulled waaaay up at the front and you could see his... uh... squished up man love parts. Truly, it gave western people all around the world reason to cringe. It was.... It was something I've never, ever seen before and hope to never see again. Jane and I were appalled, but we couldn't tell if the Japanese loved it or hated it. Either way, they got excited. Not as excited as me and Jane though, when we tried sesame flavoured ice cream. It was grey and grainy and sesamey and delicious.

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Photos

View from the Parade
The gold shrine being carried by the dancing, clapping people towards the temple.