| | japan! i am in.
two weekends ago i think, mrs. kobayashi took nathan and i to her town to see their autumn festival. so different towns in japan do different things on different days for their autumn festival, but most have some sort of "mikoshi" -- an extremely heavy miniature house that sits atop wooden bars and lots of men carry around. supposedly a god is inside the house, and so the mikoshi is brought to the temple. or something. i don't really get it, but that's what happens. in matsuyama, there are mikoshi fights. the men carrying the mikoshi run at each other and try to knock the other team back. but these mikoshi weigh like, a ton. it takes maybe 20 men to carry one, and even with that many, they are struggling to stay up. every year, somewhere in japan a few men die from being crushed under the mikoshi. but i guess it's like the running of the bulls in spain...it just happens. anyway, in hojo, mrs. kobayashi's town, the mikoshis do not fight. instead, the mikoshi is thrown into the river?! i don't know why. but, all the men just counted down and threw the thing into the river...5 times. sometimes a man climbed on top, and jumped off just before the mikoshi hit the water. so it was very thrilling to watch, because there were many people who could have been killed at any time. but no one did. and also just imagine something that weighs 10 tons hitting the water. it's fun. and wet.
a few other interesting notes on japan
1) throwing things away is difficult. there is no real "garbage". things are either burnable, plastic, pet bottles, glass, metal, bulky, paper, or other nonburnable. there are special bags for the burnable garbage on which you must write your name and town section. so if you mess up, you get your garbage back! don't you dare put a plastic coke bottle in the burnable bag. or else it's, sorry please try again. you also have to wash basically everything before you throw it away. empty milk cartons must be washed, cut open, and brought back to the supermarket. all the garbage is collected on very specific days and times. you miss the day, oops, wait another month.
2) the bike and motorbike are nearly as popular as the car as a means of transport, at least in this area. jaywalking is very rare. and there's a bird chirping sound that plays when pedestrians can cross the street.
3) at night there are groups of teenagers who sit in circles with guitars and sing, right on the sidewalk. and almost everyone between the ages of 15 and 30 have really just the coolest sneakers you've ever seen.
today is the first cold day i've had here in japan. before today, it's been almost hot during the day. but now i'm freezing in my apartment.
well that's really it for now! |
| | Posted 10/23/2005 1:20 AM - 0 comments
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