Click on any of the pictures to embiggen!
Sunday, July 11, 2010
Cherry Blossoms in Hirosaki: The Official Introduction
Alright, so the reason for that long-winded name is that this is going to be a multi-post topic, so bear with me. The next few posts are going to be photo-dumps (since I took so many pictures I literally cannot put them all up any other way), so I'm going to take the opportunity to provide some back story for the coming deluge of photos now. So, without further ado, let the long-awaited for cherry blossom post commence! *drum roll*
In late April, I went with a whole bunch of people (including Laura and her brother, pictured above) over to Hirosaki, a city on the other side of the ken (a ken is like a state, easiest way to think of it), to go look at cherry blossoms. Why go that far away just to look at blooming trees? Because Hirosaki Castle, located in Hirosaki city, is hundreds and hundreds of years old, and has hundreds and hundreds of cherry trees planted around it, and hundreds and hundreds and HUNDREDS of people from all over Japan go there every year just to partake in it. Thousands of people really. It's a HUGE festival, I don't think I've ever seen so many people in one place before ever. It was exceptionally beautiful, and I think I understand now why the Japanese love cherry blossoms so much. They certainly are pretty enough on their own to warrant admiration, but throw in the fact that after a long, cold, white winter, pretty bits of pink start blossoming everywhere.... Well, let's just say that I really appreciate spring now. It was worth the two hour drive each way, and so much more. And now, I hope these pictures will convey some of the beauty I witnessed to you. The next few posts will literally just be tons of pictures, no words. Maybe it will help you pretend you were there with me. :) Enjoy!
Sunday, June 20, 2010
Things I Love About Japan
I can find Totoro photo opportunities at random summer festivals. Viva la Totoro!
Engrish of the Week
Although I should probably change the titles of these posts to 'Engrish of Whenever I Can Find It/Feel Like Posting It', but that's too much of a mouthful. Today's Engrish is brought to you by a used clothes store in Towada. Enjoy!
YOUR BRAINS ASK CLUSION
Surface Express
DON'T LOSE OF YOURSELF
Surface Express
DON'T LOSE OF YOURSELF
Towada Horse Archery Festival, sans the Horse Archery....
So, there were actually quite a few things we did that windy day in April beyond watch archery competitions (see previous post). It actually was an unusual day, in that there were two entirely different festivals going on at the same time, relatively close to each other. The one I was mostly interested in was the horse festival. However, upon arriving and seeing the main road closed off and Japanese people literally dancing in the streets, well.... I had to investigate. And take videos! Unfortunately there were only two that turned out okay, due to 1. the festival was starting to wind down, 2. the wind was obscene and was interfering with the dance troops, and 3. I couldn't get close due to the amount of people, especially old people, who decided to sit on the sides of the road specifically to impede my video taking prowess. Ah well. Please enjoy the videos at the bottom of the post, such as they are. I tried my best, I'll make sure to go to this festival earlier next year so I see more of the dance troops, since some were truly amazing!
....And also, we found a giant ant statue. Whoo for the giant ant statue!
Towada Horse Archery Festival
A while ago I went to this festival with Aaron, Jade, and her oldest daughter Reo. This actually happened back in early April, but again, I fail at updating this in a timely manner. Oh well, I'm here now, so hush, it'll be alright. ^-^
The title of this post is fairly self-explanatory, but let me add a little bit more detail and history to that one sentence description. Towada city is about 45 minutes away by car, and has a long history, as does most of this area actually, for breeding spectacular war horses many hundreds of years ago. Unfortunately, this awesome history has since turned into a more.... epicurean one, as Towada is now renowned in the area for their delicious horse meat. While that is unfortunate, there is still at least one tie to the good old days: The Towada Horse Archery Festival.
At this festival, people from all around Japan come and dress in traditional clothing, and while riding their horse down a straight track (with no hands!), compete by shooting a wooden bow and arrow into three separate targets. This festival dates back from the war horse era, where warriors often engaged in this type of event for fun and training. Nowadays it's been spruced up a bit, with the traditional festival stalls selling food and sweets, and pony rides for the kiddies. The picture above is Reo partaking of that particular service, while the picture below is of her participating in another cool little event: children's horse archery practice. Pity the horses were of the stationary variety, I'm pretty sure she could've handled the moving kind.
The coolest part of the day was definitely the actual horse races though. I couldn't get any clear pictures of them, since they were moving so fast, so I had to resort to taking videos. I apologize for the plentitude of them below, as well as the white noise (it was incredibly windy that day) but I assure you they are quite worth watching. They are all different riders, but the videos only show the third target, since that is where I was standing. Be aware that they already shot at two separate targets before they even got to me. We did other things on this day too, but that is for the next post, as I'm out of space with this one. Without further ado, I present the following videos, in no particular order. Enjoy!
Subscribe to:
Posts (Atom)