Natsu Matsuri
Trip Start
Jul 22, 2006
1
12
59
Trip End
Aug 15, 2010
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Tokyo, Japan
Saturday, July 28, 2007
and not particularly rainy this year, seems to have come to an end,
just in time for festival season. After the past month, during
which temperatures stayed in the mid-20s and the humidity was
reasonable, I was wondering if we'd ever get back to the stickiness I
experienced last summer. I needn't have worried, as last week the
air regained that steam-bath-like quality we all know and love.
As I write this, at 5 in the afternoon, simply sitting in my apartment
in front of my open window is enough to have not just a healthy sheen
of perspiration, but actual DROPS OF SWEAT forming on my body. It
means more laundry, because clothes get damp and stretched out of shape
so fast. It means carrying around little face wipes to freshen up
after the incredible exertion of walking all of the ten minutes to the
subway station. It means that food, even in the fridge, spoils
quicker than one would expect.
In all seriousness, I don't mind the humidity, I even enjoy it to a
certain extent. It's the perfect excuse to down endless glasses
of iced tea, eat ice cream and shaved ice, a popular summer treat
'round these parts. Summer is also yukata season, and you see the
colourful cotton kimono all over town, especially when there's a
festival going on.
Tonight, for instance, is my neighbourhood's fireworks show. My
upstairs neighbour came by a few days ago to warn me about it.
I'd noticed that someone had put tape down on the street in front of my
door, delineating a large rectangle. It seems that a group had
staked their claim and my front stoop is their firework-watching
turf. I didn't understand the full explanation (it was in
Japanese) so I'm not sure if he was warning me that there would be a
lot of people partying on the street right outside my place and that I
wouldn't be able to go in or out of my apartment, or if he was
reassuring me that none of them would try to come in. We shall
see.
And just because it's all festivals, all the time, around here, some
pictures from another one. A few weeks ago, a friend and I
accidentally stumbled upon a morning glory festival. A major
boulevard was closed to traffic and flower sellers had set up shop
along one side of the street, their potted wares beneath blue tarps to
protect them from the sun. Along the other side were the food
vendors and in between, the festival goers.
Later on the same day, we came across what seemed to be a preschool or
daycare song and dance recital. The children were all dressed up
in yukata (both boys and girls) or jinbei (boys) and performed a couple
of numbers while their mothers watched and filmed. It seems that
children's dances are universal; I recognised many of the movements I
used to teach the little girls in my ballet class, such as the Hold
Hands And Shuffle In A Circle, the Clap Your Hands, the Crouch Down And
Jump Up, the Flex Your Left Foot Then Your Right and that all-time
favourite, the Look Around In Confusion And Try To Do What Everyone
Else Is Doing.
