My matsuri

This time of year, late summer/early fall, is a very popular time in Japan for festivals. These festivals, known as matsuri, are celebrated in different ways depending on where you go, but many of them include the carrying of portable shrines around neighborhoods. This weekend, I got to take part in a small matsuri and help carry a shrine. This is not an activity that gaijin normally have the chance to take part in, but my friend Eimilly is dating someone from the neighborhood, so he invited her and she invited me. It was an amazing experience, but one I do not want to repeat any time soon!

I woke up early, or earlier than I'd have prefered on a Sunday, since I had to be in Naka-meguro, where the festival was being held, by 10 am and it takes me an hour to get there. When I arrived, however, I discovered that the first hour or two was really just a time for socializing in front of the little restaurant where everyone was meeting to get ready. Jenn, her sister, and her brother-in-law also came to take part in the festival and while we were all standing around waiting for things to get going we were introduced to lots of people and offered enormous amounts of fruit. At one point we were led by some people to a blue tarp that was laid on the ground and instructed to sit, which turned out to be a little awkward since no one else came to sit with us. Eventually we got up and of course immediately after doing so everyone else went to sit down because it was time to eat some special sticky rice with red beans that is traditionally served on special occasions. Shortly after eating the rice, Eimilly and I were summoned to go get changed. We went to the back of the restaurant and had various items of clothing thrust at us by the mama-san. The traditional clothes included happi, a lightweight cotton jacket that wraps around like a robe, a sash called an obi, and a strange pair of white shorts that were impossible to put on without assistance. We were definitely "assisted" though, I felt like a doll being dressed by a little kid as multiple women tugged, pulled, and tied my shirt and shorts. The shorts seemed to have been specifically made to sag in the butt but be tight everywhere else and based on the women's actions they needed to sag in just the right way. After what seemed like ages of being manhandled by the mama-san, Eimilly and I finally emerged from the restaurant in our clothes and two toed sandles called tabi. A moment later though we were called back into the restaurant to have our hair done by the mama-san. After experiencing how rough she was while dressing us I was not particularly thrilled to know she was about to get hold of my hair. I became even less enthused as I watched her do Eimilly's hair first, in addition to nearly brushing her scalp off, she also latherd Eimilly's hair with 3 giant fist fulls of palmaid. Now, Eimilly has short straight hair, so that's pretty easy to work with, but anyone who has ever witnessed the long curly nightmare that is my hair, knows that it is NOT easy to work with. When I sat down in the chair and took my hair down all the girls in the room oohed and ahhed over it, and even the mama-san seemed surprised, but that didn't stop her. After a moment of thought she got to work and remarkably after 5 minutes, a handful of bobbypins, and a disgusting amount of palmaid my hair was good to go. She tied on a headband and that was it! Eimilly and I went and presented ourselves to Jenn and her family who sadly did not end up taking part in the festivities because they had tickets to see sumo later in the day, but they did get to see us all dressed up and take lots of pictures! (Don't worry, I will post the photos soon)

Finally our whole group walked across the street to where the shrine was being kept. I hadn't realized until then that there were actually other groups meeting us from adjoining neigborhoods, so over all it was quite a significant amount of people. After a few minutes we all gathered around the mikoshi, our portable shrine. When I say "portable" please don't equate that with being "easily carried" because moving this thing was anything but easy. It was not that big, maybe the size of an oven, but it was made of gold and supported by long crisscrossed beams, so it was insanely heavy. According to Eimilly's boyfriend it weighed about 2 tons, that is possibly incorrect, but I don't think he was too far off. We all found spots to carry the shrine from, then we lifted it up and we were off, chanting and marching our way down the narrow streets. We chanted different words, I couldn't hear all of them and sometimes they changed, but a lot of times it just sounded like SA SA SA, so that's what I said. I was told that at most matsuri people chant WASHOI, but we didn't for some reason. After a few minutes we made our first stop, since it was such strenuous work carrying the shrine we would stop periodically to be provided with food and, more importanly for most, beer. I felt ok at the first few stops, but it didn't take long before my shoulders were ready to fall off. As we walked down the streets we would sway the shrine back and forth, but whenever we passed a business we would stop and wildly bounce the shrine up and down in front of the building to bring good luck and prosperity to the business. This was great fun, but it was difficult to avoid having the large beams smash into my shoulders as the shrine bounced around. I also tried to help support the weight of the shrine by resting it on my shoulder, but I could only do this for minutes at a time since it was so heavy and also killed my shoulders. The parading of the shrine went on for 4 or 5 hours and despite the pain and exhaustion it was really an amazing experience. I have never seen people be more spirited and enthusiastic about doing something together, even at the very end not a single person seemed to lose enery or motivation, they were all so extremely positive and focused.

After the festival was over a group of us went to a local onsen to clean off. It was nothing like the lovely onsen I visited in my area, this one was indoors, old, and crappy. After washing off in the shower area Eimilly and I climbed into the tubs. A moment later an old woman approached us and in Japanese started interrogating us about whether we had washed off properly before getting in the tubs. As I have mentioned before, cleanliness is extremely important when bathing in onsen and apparently the woman proved that point. After asking Eimilly (who speaks much better Japanese than me) three times if we had washed off she decided we were clean. Eimilly and I ended up only staying in the water for a very short time because it was so hot, hotter than my local onsen I think. After getting dressed we headed back to the restaurant where we'd all met in the morning and had a big end of festival meal. All the food and drinks were free and eveyone was extremely friendly. I finished the night by meeting back up with Jenn and going out for karaoke, so all in all it was a very tiring, but very spectacular day!