We missed you!

Last month was the Norfolk wine festival...always a wonderfully drunken good time. Last time we lived here, I missed it because I was studying for my LEED AP exam for work. Bad planning on my part. I did get to pick up Glenn and then escort him home as he puked out the side of my newish car, but that's a whole other story.

This year's festival was beautiful weather and made all the more fun by the return (to us and Norfolk) of our friends, Chris and Gizelle. We hadn't seen eachother since July 2010 until the beginning of this year.

I love having them so close! We missed you!

Also, side note, doesn't my hubby look gooooood in this pic? Yeah, I thought so too.

Yamato Awa Odori Festival

I am muchos behind on my blogging, but I was out of town all week in Taiwan! Here are a few pictures from the festival one town over that took place last Saturday. Nights like this are why I love Japan so much! The color, the friends, the culture, the dedication.

 

Hina Matsuri

Last Thursday, March 3th, was Hina Matsuri in Japan. It is better known as the Girls' Day Festival. During the month or few weeks leading up to the festival, collections of dolls known as hina dolls are put on display in homes where women live. Each granddaughter, daughter and mother has their own set of hina dolls be it big or small.

Here is a blurb from Wikipedia about the day:
The custom of displaying dolls began during the Heian period. Formerly, people believed the dolls possessed the power to contain bad spirits. Hinamatsuri traces its origins to an ancient Japanese custom called hina-nagashi ("doll floating"), in which straw hina dolls are set afloat on a boat and sent down a river to the sea, supposedly taking troubles or bad spirits with them. The Shimogamo Shrine celebrates the Nagashibina by floating these dolls between the Takano and Kamo Rivers to pray for the safety of children. People have stopped doing this now because of fishermen catching the dolls in their nets. They now send them out to sea, and when the spectators are gone they take the boats out of the water and bring them back to the temple and burn them.
The customary drink for the festival is shirozake, a sake made from fermented rice. A colored hina-arare, bite-sized crackers flavored with sugar or soy sauce depending on the region, and hishimochi, a diamond-shaped colored rice cake, are served. Chirashizushi (sushi rice flavored with sugar, vinegar, topped with raw fish and a variety of ingredients) is often eaten. A salt-based soup called ushiojiru containing clams still in the shell is also served. Clam shells in food are deemed the symbol of a united and peaceful couple, because a pair of clam shells fits perfectly, and no pair but the original pair can do so.
Families generally start to display the dolls in February and take them down immediately after the festival. Superstition says that leaving the dolls past March 4 will result in a late marriage for the daughter.

Last week, I attended a Girls' Day lunch at one of my student's family's house. We ate the traditional foods and they showed us their large display of hina dolls. It was a fun afternoon!

My student is Nanako, the 4 year old, and my friend Brittany teaches her Grandma and friend. Nanako's mother's hina dolls are displayed behind us.

 Here are pictures of some of the yummy food they made for us! Sashimi! Vegetables! Rice!

 Nabe! Champagne!

 Coffee and dessert! The strawberries are in season in Japan right now and they are amazing!

 Thanks for wonderful day!

Not America Safe: Fuji Fire Festival

I think I'm going to start a new series titled "Not America Safe". I don't know if it is the lawsuit-happy country that I am from or what, but Japan doesn't seem to care when things are not up to to the safety standards that a modern country expects. Or maybe just that Americans expect.

Example number one, the Fuji Fire Festival. This was an amazing festival with torch lined streets full of fire. Very cool, but what happens when the ashes from the top float down and light the bottom on fire? Well then you have a torch that topples over and fills the street with fire. It's cool, just walk your small child on the other side of the street, please. At least they did put the center of the festival next to the fire station. According to the bus guide, there has never been an incident or death at this festival in it's long history. That's impressive.

A little background from our tour guide:
"The Yoshida Fire Festival (Yoshida no Himatsuri) is held every year on Auguest 26th to appease the goddes of Mt. Fuji and to keep the volcano from erupting for another year. It also serves as the closing ceremony of the Fujisan summer climbing season. For this lively two day festival, named one of Japan's three most unique festival and celebrated for over 500 years, the entire community comes out to watch the burning of large "taimatsu" torches and the parade of two large Omikoshi (portable shrines) through the streets...

The festival starts at 2 pm on August 26th at the Fuji Sengen Shrine in Fujiyoshida city with the carrying of two large omikoshi portable shrines. The festival continues with the lighting of the torches starting at Kamiyoshida Community Center at 6 pm...the festival continues until 11 pm or midnight when the torches burn out. At 2 pm on the 27th the shrines are taken back to Sengen Shrine where the finale of the two day festival, a running of the shrines 7 times around a sacred rock, happens at 5 pm.

The origin of the festival is based on the story of the Goddess of Mt. Fuji...who becomes pregnant and is accused of having an affair by her deity husband. To prove her innocence, she locks herself in a room of the shrine and sets it afire. If the child lives, it will show her dubious husband that is is indeed his child because it could supernaturally endure the heat. According to the story, the goddess' child was born in the middle of the flames, which proved to her doubtful husband that he was indeed the father. The flames made by the taimatsu torches at the fire festival represent the fire started by the Goddess of Mt. Fuji to prove her innocence."

What's a festival without cotton candy, octopus and ice cream? Sounds like Japan to me.