A heady mix of festivals and fireworks

Monday was a public holiday over here (not that it mattered to me since I have Mondays off anyway). I don't know the reason for the holiday but there was a festival on at Nagoya Port with fireworks and the whole shebang. So I decided to head on down that way for the day.

Pat and I got there late afternoonish and walked around. It was lovely. The aquarium is there and it's huge. Apparently Nagoya Port is THE place to bring a girl on a first date. You get major points for doing so.

When I told Mads about my going to a festival she asked me about the music that was going to be there. I had to explain that it wasn't a MUISC festival it was just a festival. It wasn't until I got to the festival that I realised that basically all of the festivals in Melbourne are orientated around live music (sigh...I miss good live music). But this festival was just a celebration of summer. Which is as good a reason as any.

There was the usual festival stalls lining the street. Except it was probably 15 times the size of the Queenscliffe stall markets. Most of the stalls were selling food. There was the usual festival food: cotton candy, french fries, shaven ice, toffee apples, sausages on a stick, baked potatoes. Then there was the more Japanese stuff: grilled squid on a stick, mini watermelons, takoyaki (octupus balls), okonomiyaki (vegetable pancake thingy), ramen (noodles), Doraemon shaped donut things, choc-dipped bananas, rice crackers. There were also the usual array of masks, lighty flashy things, and stuffed animals for sale. There were also a couple stall selling live mini goldfish and hermit crabs. Random.

I have never seen so many yukatas (summer kimono) in the one place. Men, women and children of all ages were wearing them. They are apparently THE thing to wear to summer festivals. They were so pretty. And I'm sure the photos I took won't do any justice to them.

There was also a crazy parade. I don't know exactly what it was for but some overzealous crowd controllers shoved us back as carts with drums and traditional Japanese harp players rolled by. They also had street walkers accompanying the carts. There was a huge drum attached to the back of each cart and a person would run behind the cart bashing at this drum with all their might (in rhythm). The street walkers would clap sticks, wave fans and yell accordingly. There was also an inordinate number of skinny hal-naked men running around trying to excite the crowds further. I still find it funny that the Japanese have very different views when it comes to nudity in public (for men anyway). They even have naked men festivals. Ha.

I also met a whole load of new people. So I met up with Nat (my girl from training), her co-worker Joel, and his friends Judy and Dwight. They in turn introduced me to Eric (a Taiwanese/American) very funny guy. Jean, a nice Torontonian girl. Joseph a ginger guy from Adelaide: he was so smashed it was funny. He asked me four times how long I'd been in Japan. Then told me that he had a problem with my being from Melbourne (what is it about Melbourne that makes everyone out of Melbourne hate us so much), but it was okay because I seemes like a cool chick. Ha...Hiro was a Japanese teacher that actually lives near me. And also a guy called Derek English. So his name and his job description are the same: English sensei (English teacher). hehehehe.

We all sat around the park and watched the fireworks. These fireworks were absolutely brilliant. They were the most amazing fireworks I've ever seen. They were so complicated and colourful. There were technicolour fishes, stars, supernovas, watermelons and mushrooms flying through the sky that night. It was beautiful and they lasted for ages. We were reminiscing about fireworks and all the happy memories they brought. Most of the Americans said it reminded them of the 4th of July (American Indepence Day). Judy (the Brit) and I were just buh?

But the fireworks made me think of that night we were up at the lake and we wandered out to the point in the dark and we sang songs under the gorgeous stars and satellites. Oh the good times.

The trains to get out of the festival were crazy packed. There were lines leading down the street just to get into the subway. So we all just walked to the next subway stop. When we got down there it was so packed we had to wait for the next train. This was hardly a hardship since the next one was maybe a two minute wait. But we all had to pile in. Forget sardines. We were a bag of jellybeans left out in the sun for too long then packed into a tiny tin to melt into each other.

I became intimately acquainted with more than my fair share of armpits on that ride. It's a good thing that Japanese people really don't seem to sweat or smell. I did get stepped on. Of course the girl who stepped on me was wearing her traditional heavy wooden sandals so she well and truly clomped my toe. Oh well, it was an experience. But at least it's not something I have to deal with on a daily basis as I would if I was in Tokyo.

Photo credits: Natalie Borda