Hello again! It is the end of week four of my stay in Japan, finally nearing the official end of summer.
Here in Hirakata, there is a special summer festival at the end of the summer to celebrate with fireworks and food stands while dressed in Yukata, a traditional Japanese article of clothing. Yukata are visually similar to a typical dress, with a wide band of cloth wrapped around one’s waist. They can come in all kinds of colors and designs, but more often than not are either blank cloth or decorated with a flower pattern.
This festival took place at the bank of the river which runs close to the city, and let me tell you, this fireworks festival was nothing like I’ve ever seen. In my hometown, we have a fireworks festival for the Fourth of July where many people from town congregate in a field to watch the fireworks, but that was nothing compared to the sheer size of the event held here.
After 30 minutes of walking down an empty highway and down onto the riverbank, the total number of people in attendance easily exceeded 200,000 people – many of whom were wearing Yukata – and over 10,000 fireworks were shot off. Though the event took about three hours, a good hour or so was waiting for the crowd control to allow the massive sea of people to leave in swathes of a few thousand to avoid overcrowding on the walk back into the heart of the city.
Briefly mentioned in the previous column were the sizes of the restaurants in and around the cities. As the buildings are so small in order to conserve space, many of these restaurants are small places holding only around 10 to 15 guests. The smaller size contributes to the particularly personal atmosphere of the place alongside the friendly owners and workers. Since these establishments are locally owned, oftentimes it is easy to strike up a conversation with the few on-staff workers, of which I have had a few.
One place that is frequented by a plethora of people, called “Aegis”, is one such place. This location has a cozy atmosphere with a full-sized vinyl record player near the front with shelves upon shelves of jazz and indie records from the owner’s extensive collection. I myself am a collector of vinyl records, and after a bit of back and forth, an employee recognized an album I am fond of, “Modal Soul” by Nujabes (a very good album I might add) which I have been searching for some time now.
Coincidentally, they were in possession of the very same album and were gracious enough to play it. Friendly interactions like this have happened all the time, particularly in restaurants and Karaoke establishments, in which the employees are having as good a time as some of the patrons, in some cases singing along to a song they might know.
The experiences I have had in Japan are something special, and I cannot wait for my next iteration, in which I will talk about an upcoming trip to Osaka Castle.
Collin Haberbosch can be contacted at
chaberbosch@kscequinox.com
