Shiny Shrines

~Hi everyone! Just one more week to go over here, and then it's Obon, a week-long holiday/festival (yes, another festival). Over the coming week, I'll be sharing the many pictures and videos I took of Nagaoka's 100th Anniversary festival and the fireworks. As promised, here are the remaining pictures from the portable shrine parade:

^ See the kid at left-center? He was ecstatic to be the center of attention. Or at least, he thought he was the center of attention. I think more people were looking at the girls behind him.

^ Perhaps the most impressive shrine in the entire parade, with many lanterns attached to the top. Although I can't read the kanji, they were nevertheless impressive:

The lower part of the shrine had illuminated artwork on each side, which was very beautiful. Here are some closeup images:

There were hundreds of people holding the shrines up and moving up and down the street. Each "shrine group" had a number of support personnel attached to it:

^ Behind each shrine was a cart carrying ice and drinks. By "drinks", I of course mean beer, or biru in Japanese (a phonetic rendering of the word 'beer').

^ The Japanese obsession with cleanliness extends to trash disposal (more on that in a later post), so each beer-wagon was followed by a garbage cart. How efficient.

The next day, there was yet another portable shrine parade during the daytime festivities. Here's a picture that I am quite pleased with:

Below is a short video clip of the day parade in action. [ Mom, you have to CLICK on the "blurry picture" to make the video play! ]



That's all for now. If I have time tomorrow, I'll post some fireworks pictures! ~Oyasumi.