In Which My Weekend Is Discussed
Sep. 13th, 2004 03:51 pm![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
akujunkanBackwards to forwards, as it so happens, but I'm feeling all postmodern today, so bear with.
Anyhow, Saturday was one of those days that reminds why I like living in Japan in the first place. I'd gone out to the hidden park to study for 一級, which is slowly devouring my life, when I began to hear the sound of taiko drums on the breeze.
I figured something was going on at a nearby cemetary and didn't pay much heed. Then I heard them again. And again. And again, for well over an hour. Then I heard the sound of fue, which is not so much of a Buddhist/cemetary thing as much as a Shinto/festival thing, so I hopped on my bike and headed down the road to see if I could figure out what was going on.
I kept losing the sound of the drums and flutes, which was intermittent to begin with, every time the wind changed, so it took me a bit of time to locate their source. What I ran across was several boys dressed in straw sandles and brightly colored hapi standing at the mouth of a street in a middle class residential neighborhood, directing traffic. Then I saw a couple of men in traditional kimono heading into a house, and heard the drums again. I figured it might be a wedding, and that it would be rude to intrude, so I started off down the street.
Luck was on my side, because I ran into a cross street where about six or seven people were dancing with one of those dragons outfits, followed by three middle aged men with fue; a taiko drummer pushing his drum down the street on a wheely table, casks of water and paper cups hung on its side; and several other supplicants with one of those fuda-bedecked trees. They were all wearing the same hapi, with slight variations.
Then I noticed a couple of young boys (they couldn't have been over seven years old) taking turns dancing in front of the dragon with these flowered headdresses on. The dragon wound down the road to an apartment complex where everyone stopped. Several dozen spectators gathered, then the dragon danced into and out of the apartment building, clacking its jaws at the kimino'ed official standing in the doorway, who read something I couldn't hear off of a piece of paper. The kid and the dragon did a dance, the musicians played, and then the entire troupe headed across the street to the next house.
By this time I realised that I was watching something similar to a mummer's parade, and not a wedding at all. The dragon went to each house, the headdress kids riled it up, it charged inside, and the official came back out with a ceremonial envelope, which I immediately recongised as the sort people use to gift money. One of the coolest bits came when two teenage boys took turns twirling real, bladed weapons in this ornate 'fighting the dragon' dance.
I must have watched this for a good hour. The same sequence was repeated at each house - troupe goes down the road;, official heads inside; the kids dance; the dragon clacks and snaps at the man, who reads the names of the household members and receives money from them. The the teenagers fight the dragon, which dies; the kids dance to revive it, and the whole shebang heads across the street to the next house. The procession actually came right up to where I was standing, so I got to see it firsthand. The dancers were hot and tired, but having a good time harranguing one another. ("Dammit! This dragon is too long!" and "You sure are a sucky dancer, Taro!") Also, please let me add that Japanese men certainly do look fine in traditional kimono.
There was a lot of cheering and whooping at each house, laughter every time the ceremony was interrupted to let cars drive down the street, and kids running around having a good time immitating the swordfight segment of the ceremony.
Just as I was about ready to leave I was approached by an old man. (It should be mentioned at this point that I was as interesting to most of the spectators and performers as they were to me.) Anyway, he struck up a conversation and actually sort of jumped into the air when I answered him in Japanese.
I ended up being invited into his house for tea, then cakes, then coffee. He brought his wife over, then a neighboring lady, her daughter and the daughter's boyfriend.
It was like show and tell time for this guy - I got to see his foma phone, his books about Italy, his Butsudan and so forth. He and his wife were absolute dolls, as was the neighborhood lady, who had her daughter conduct me to the nearby neighborhood jinja for Omairi.
I spent a good two or three hours talking to these people about Japan, America, Malaysia, Italy, music, and the festival.
The festival, as it turns out is Oshishimai - The Lion Dance. It's done in thanks for a good harvest, and is a fairly unusual survival, even in my ken, which is the backwater of the backwater. (There's a very famous shishimai a few towns over, but I missed it as I was on a date. So it's extremely cool that I got to see this one.)
At any rate, I made friends with all the people there, and will hopefully go hang out in K-town with the daughter, who is darling. ("Do you want to see a Japanese dog?" she asked me. The 'Japanese dog' turned out to be a rotweiler puppy.)
So yeah, Japan can be very, very cool at times.
That will be all.
Anyhow, Saturday was one of those days that reminds why I like living in Japan in the first place. I'd gone out to the hidden park to study for 一級, which is slowly devouring my life, when I began to hear the sound of taiko drums on the breeze.
I figured something was going on at a nearby cemetary and didn't pay much heed. Then I heard them again. And again. And again, for well over an hour. Then I heard the sound of fue, which is not so much of a Buddhist/cemetary thing as much as a Shinto/festival thing, so I hopped on my bike and headed down the road to see if I could figure out what was going on.
I kept losing the sound of the drums and flutes, which was intermittent to begin with, every time the wind changed, so it took me a bit of time to locate their source. What I ran across was several boys dressed in straw sandles and brightly colored hapi standing at the mouth of a street in a middle class residential neighborhood, directing traffic. Then I saw a couple of men in traditional kimono heading into a house, and heard the drums again. I figured it might be a wedding, and that it would be rude to intrude, so I started off down the street.
Luck was on my side, because I ran into a cross street where about six or seven people were dancing with one of those dragons outfits, followed by three middle aged men with fue; a taiko drummer pushing his drum down the street on a wheely table, casks of water and paper cups hung on its side; and several other supplicants with one of those fuda-bedecked trees. They were all wearing the same hapi, with slight variations.
Then I noticed a couple of young boys (they couldn't have been over seven years old) taking turns dancing in front of the dragon with these flowered headdresses on. The dragon wound down the road to an apartment complex where everyone stopped. Several dozen spectators gathered, then the dragon danced into and out of the apartment building, clacking its jaws at the kimino'ed official standing in the doorway, who read something I couldn't hear off of a piece of paper. The kid and the dragon did a dance, the musicians played, and then the entire troupe headed across the street to the next house.
By this time I realised that I was watching something similar to a mummer's parade, and not a wedding at all. The dragon went to each house, the headdress kids riled it up, it charged inside, and the official came back out with a ceremonial envelope, which I immediately recongised as the sort people use to gift money. One of the coolest bits came when two teenage boys took turns twirling real, bladed weapons in this ornate 'fighting the dragon' dance.
I must have watched this for a good hour. The same sequence was repeated at each house - troupe goes down the road;, official heads inside; the kids dance; the dragon clacks and snaps at the man, who reads the names of the household members and receives money from them. The the teenagers fight the dragon, which dies; the kids dance to revive it, and the whole shebang heads across the street to the next house. The procession actually came right up to where I was standing, so I got to see it firsthand. The dancers were hot and tired, but having a good time harranguing one another. ("Dammit! This dragon is too long!" and "You sure are a sucky dancer, Taro!") Also, please let me add that Japanese men certainly do look fine in traditional kimono.
There was a lot of cheering and whooping at each house, laughter every time the ceremony was interrupted to let cars drive down the street, and kids running around having a good time immitating the swordfight segment of the ceremony.
Just as I was about ready to leave I was approached by an old man. (It should be mentioned at this point that I was as interesting to most of the spectators and performers as they were to me.) Anyway, he struck up a conversation and actually sort of jumped into the air when I answered him in Japanese.
I ended up being invited into his house for tea, then cakes, then coffee. He brought his wife over, then a neighboring lady, her daughter and the daughter's boyfriend.
It was like show and tell time for this guy - I got to see his foma phone, his books about Italy, his Butsudan and so forth. He and his wife were absolute dolls, as was the neighborhood lady, who had her daughter conduct me to the nearby neighborhood jinja for Omairi.
I spent a good two or three hours talking to these people about Japan, America, Malaysia, Italy, music, and the festival.
The festival, as it turns out is Oshishimai - The Lion Dance. It's done in thanks for a good harvest, and is a fairly unusual survival, even in my ken, which is the backwater of the backwater. (There's a very famous shishimai a few towns over, but I missed it as I was on a date. So it's extremely cool that I got to see this one.)
At any rate, I made friends with all the people there, and will hopefully go hang out in K-town with the daughter, who is darling. ("Do you want to see a Japanese dog?" she asked me. The 'Japanese dog' turned out to be a rotweiler puppy.)
So yeah, Japan can be very, very cool at times.
That will be all.