Obon in Nagasaki and Tsushima

This blog post is going way back. Way, way back to August 2009. Oh, and then jumping forward to August 2010. Yes, my blog time-travels. What of it.

I like August in Tsushima not only for the awesome swimming (well, until the jellies come) but also for an unofficially official 3-day holiday (it's not on the calendar as a national holiday but pretty much everyone gets days off): Obon. I suppose I have to call it a "festival of the dead," although to me that phrase conjures images of Johnny Quest running about Mexico with killers dressed up in skeleton outfits on his heels. Obon is basically a time when Japanese people honor their ancestors/dead family members, go home to clean up the family grave, etc. Oh, and there are many special rituals for family members who have died in the past year, too.

In August 2009, I was lucky enough to be invited to celebrate Obon with one of my friends and her family. My friend's father had died in the past year, so the family was performing many of the special Obon rituals. Oh, and her family is from Nagasaki city, which has its own unique twist on some of the rituals.

For families who have lost members in the past year, during Obon of course the family gathers together. Many aquaintences come to visit, too, or at the very least send lavish gifts in honor of the deceased. These gifts are placed in front of the family's altar in their home, usually with a picture of the recently-deceased family member:

(note the boxes of gifts, always edible items or o-miyage, stacked to the left, with candle and incense set up below the altar for visiting friends to use. my friend's deceased father's picture is to the right with a big basket of fruit underneath).

I never had the chance to meet my friend's father, but I thought their arrangement was very touching. They put his glasses beside the picture.

Here's another part of the Obon altar set-up: colorful lanterns with revolving lights or images inside.

While it's hard to call Obon a 'festival' because of the western positive connotations, that's kind of what it was. Because Obon comes long after the family member dies (if, for instance, someone were to die close to Obon, it would probably be postponed until the following year), it's not incredibly sad like western funerals are. Obon really is a chance to remember the person and the good times you had together.

...which makes the following pictures a little more understandable, I hope.

The first Obon activity I got to participate in was sort of like a grave-side party. We all went to the family grave with a bunch of Japanese firecrackers (which are of much more powerful stock that what you can legally obtain in the US... they're also a traditional part of Obon activities) and lit them up.

(I look happy in this picture, but that's only because I don't know that when lit, the thing I'm holding on a string will spin around and emit streams of fire and sparks. That part was terrifying).

...after that, I stuck to regular sparklers....

...and let the family handle the bad-boy firecrackers.

While our celebration came around mid-day, the grave was decked-out with lanterns that had their family's crest.

...which we later took down and with us the next day (always August 15th) to the main Nagasaki City Obon event, Shoro Nagashi. It was an incredible day. Shoro Nagashi is basically a parade of boat-floats that families buy and decorate to represent the passing of their family members. In the olden days, the 'parade' was more of a procession to the water, where the boats would be released. Now, in order to prevent pollution (and the filling up of Nagasaki bay), the boat-floats are collected afterwards and taken to be ceremonially burned. This procession happens in many places, but it's special in Nagasaki because everyone uses very loud Chinese firecrackers; the "BANG!"s are constantly going as the boat-floats process down the street. Seriously, it sounds like there's a gang war going on.

First, we picked up the family's boat-float (it's on wheels, thankfully) and decorated it with the family's-crested lanterns.

While the male members of the family get to wear cool outfits, the ladies are limited to this specific polka-dotted headband (tied in a special way with the knot in front).

....but because I'm a foreigner and it would probably be my only chance, my friend's family insisted that I try on the guys' outfit and hold their lantern. The guys also get tabi-sock-boots, but I stuck with my sandals.

Here are the guys in all their glory.

...you can see it's more of a procession than a parade. Traffic doesn't stop in the city, since the float-boats are making their runs down to the bay all day. So yeah, we had to stop for buses.

...although we didn't always stop for red lights! ^^ J-walking ancestor-boat procession, I guess? ...let's be thankful that most of the cops were down near the bay, directing congested float-boat traffic.

We took to the sidewalks or the streets, depending on what was more passable. It's no-rules and every-boat-float-for-itself at Shoro Nagashi!

Some of the other floats were way bigger than ours. I bet they were way more expensive, too.

My friends' family holds in his hands three packs of what makes Nagasaki city's Shoro Nagashi so wonderful....

The Chinese-style firecrackers!

Here's one in mid-explosion. Note that it looks like a small pack of dynamite. It's certainly as loud.

The closer we got to Nagasaki's bay, the louder it got and the more littered the streets became with the remnants of the firecrackers. I was told that sanitation workers stay up all night to get the streets clean for the next morning's traffic.

Wheee! You've got to watch your toes with Chinese firecrackers in the road! I love that this was legal.

And here the police forces are. They really were directing traffic. Kind of.

The family's crest on the back of the happi/jacket.

I loved the big floats with pictures of Buddha.

At the end of our procession-run. Did I mention that it's HOT in Nagasaki in mid-August? Seriously sweating all the way, with the pavement just radiating heat.

There were many dump-trucks waiting at the end of the procession to take charge of the floats (just in case anyone had any ideas about sneaking theirs into the water). The side of the truck says, "Making Nagasaki Beautiful."

Close-up of a family-crested-lantern.

Many ancestoral float-boats lined up, waiting for disposal.

The gang afterwards: hot, sweaty, and ready for onsen (and a fancy dinner!)

...we all went to a very fancy Nagasaki restaurant above the city. It was dark by the time everyone had onsenned, and we could see Nagasaki's city lights dotting the hills and reflecting off of the bay.

Flash-forward to Obon in August 2010 with the very different rural-Tsushima style celebration! ...I went with one of my student's families to watch the (*cough* illegal *cough*) mini-processional boat launches in Oura, a few villages over. Tsushima doesn't have a processional/parade like Nagasaki does; there weren't any Chinese firecrackers to be seen anywhere. But they do still hold to the traditional let's-put-our-ancestral-boat-into-the-ocean-and-shove-it-off event.

Here's an ancestral boat ready for launch. Its lanterns are lit, it's being sent out at dark (away from the eyes of the pesky police who would seek to stop its launch), and it's full of goodies for the ancestors.

This is the same boat, viewed from the rear. Note the whole pineapple.

This was someone else's boat that drifted towards our bank of the river-that-turns-into-a-bay. It's bigger, has more lanterns, and sports something that looks like.. tinsel?

After the boat-launch, it was sparkler-time! Here is the power of Japanese fire-crackers:

...it's like a fire extinguisher but in reverse. ^^ This is something you definete don't want to be holding the wrong end of!

And thus ends my Obon adventures to date.

Yufuin onsening and kagura

Last weekend I went to an onsen resort-town, Yufuin, with my Japanese friend Tomoka. Because she has to work normal Japanese working hours (which means late, 6 or 7 PM every night), we got up wicked early on Saturday and took the first flight to the mainland.

The view was pretty nice-- I can never get enough of misty mountains!

And then after getting to the mainland, it was a 2-hour train ride from Fukuoka. The express train we took was pretty cool, though. It was called "Yufuin no mori" and decorated on the inside like an olde 1800's car (minus the compartments), with plush seats and classy curtains. A train stewardess came around with hats (like the one that was part of her uniform) and a sign to take a free commemorative photo.

Much chatting (and growing excitement) later, we arrived! And, it turns out, we'd come on the same day as the local kagura troope's monthly performance! (Kagura, if you'll remember, is the style of sacred Shinto dance performed for the gods' entertainment; I saw some kagura based on mythical tales in Takachiho. The two Chinese characters that make up the Japanese word 'kagura' are 'god' and 'fun').

...some of the local kagura troope members were waiting, in fact, at the train station to greet the new arrivals.

..the snake was quite interactive and even tried to bite my arm. Its eyes flashed, too. I rather liked the princess with the fan, but as it turned out, the above characters were part of many different local shrine stories that have been turned into kagura performances, which the local troope rotates through (a different performance each month). Of the above characters, the one being performed that evening only involved the snake.

But back to the evening kagura performance later-- first, it was onto the town! Here's the view coming out of the train station (of course there's a mountain in the background, it's Kyushu! :)




While town was interesting, it got wearisome rather quickly. Yufuin is most famous for its hot springs, which bring in many tourists. The streets between the train station and the onsen are literally packed with stores catering to them (for anyone who's been, think the road up to Kiyomizu-dera). The focus was on consumerism and consumption. Because the area has some pastureland and cows (a rarity in Japan), Yufuin is famous for its milk-based products, like soft ice cream, gelato, and pudding. (Note the dessert theme). There are, in fact, no less than 4 different pudding stores in town. There were many jam and honey stores, too, and countless cafes with all manner of cakes and sweets. I saw about 4 coroque stalls (with cows about, the hamburger mixed into the coroques are famous, too). Yufuin's glasswork is also, apparently, famous, so there were many blown glass, glass figurine, and stained glass stores as well.

Yufuin's other claim to fame (as if it needed another one) is a "lake" which is considered very beautiful with morning mist. I laughed when I saw it-- no one from Maine would ever call it a lake, it's very much of pond-size-- but it did boast some well-fed fowl.


After the tour about town, it was time for some onsen (which was, after all, the reason we were there)! ...when we were picking a place to stay, there were somewhat limited options; busy weekend, I guess. While the service and food was seriously lacking, as was the onsen-ny atmosphere (our room was more apartment-like, with a motel-style door, than a traditional ryokan), the onsens themselves were okay. I wanted to stay somewhere with an outdoor bath, and we had four to choose from. Way relaxing.

After onsenning and dinner, it was back to town for kagura! First, though, the local community troupe (13 elderly men with a mean age of 65) sang a couple of "I love Yufuin"-style songs. It could've been awful, but they had the most adorable choreography to go along with it, including a single-file round wave:


I found out later that many of the troupe members own onsens in town. Well, I suppose it was that or a pudding shop.

There was only one kagura story, but it was quite long. With the dances and a mini-introduction to the play (a cleverly-designed ploy to cover a costume change), the whole spiel ran a little over an hour. And, for most of it, the poor musician members of the group kept up a fast-paced kagura beat.



This particular kagura performance is based on a local Shinto shrine's legend. Basically, the shrine has been plagued for years by an evil serpent-demon, which requires an offering of a maiden each year. This year, however, the people want to put an end to the offerings (which always result in the girl being eaten by the snake). With the help of a god/warrior, they come up with a plot.

Here's the first character to enter, plodding along with his two (divining-rod-style?) sticks. Let's call him "Ojiisan #1" ("Grandfather #1).


And here we have Ojiisan #2, sitting beside this year's maiden (remember that kagura always has an all-male cast).

After all three introductory characters are settled on stage, the maiden performs a dance that could either be for purification purposes or "woe-is-me-who-will-soon-be-eaten-by-a-snake." There was a lot of wistful upper-body gyration and what appears to my untrained western eye as "oh, won't some big strong warrior help me?" poses.



She did have two purification implements in her hands, though, so it could've been just that, too.

And then, lo and behold, upon the scene comes a warrior! (I didn't get the whole plot summary in the beginning; I think Tomoka said this was a god-warrior).

He looked more like a demon to me but, for being that ugly, was certainly quite dashing.

After his long introductory dance-sequence (lots of fast twirls and bouncing around the stage, which left the elderly actor panting into his microphone afterwards), the warrior-god, ojiisans, and maiden confer. He says he'll help to kill the evil snake-demon if they will prepare sake to intoxicate the beast first. So the ojiisans strain under the burden of carrying a big bucket of sake to set before the maiden.

This was clearly meant to be a comic interlude before the shit hits the fan. While both ojiisans have difficulty with their burden (a few trips and near-spills), ojiisan #2 in front is clearly the weaker of the two and eventually stumbles....

...spilling some of the sake and prompting ojiisan #1 to call upon an audience member to take over for him. More hilarity ensues when ojiisan #1 manages to stumble many times, forcing the untrained audience member to compensate in order to not spill more of the sake.

Eventually the burden is placed in front of the maiden, the audience member is sent back to his seat, and the snake appears on the scene. It at first ignores the sake and goes straight for the maiden's arm....

...but eventually succumbs and drinks the sake.

I love the "That was sooooo --not-- the shrine maiden I ordered" slightly confused (and way drunk) expression afterwards:

...and the snake-demon reluctantly sinks into a drunken doze.

At which point, of course, the warrior-god reappears on the scene, unsheathed knife in hand....

...but, as it turns out, he's a bit of a coward. I mean, first he insists that the maiden gets the snake drunk first, and then he tiptoes around listening for snores before attacking?

..checking both sides, of course, in slow kagura-ritualized steps.

...and then, the attack?? Actually, no. There were many false-starts, almost-attacks (again to that ritualized beat), as the audience edges forward on their seats, wondering if it's going to really happen this time... and, of course, finally it does.

... a couple of times...

...before the snake, which isn't fully out of its faculties because some of the sake was spilt, starts to retaliate.

...and the show turns into a show-down.

(I'll try to upload a video of the climax/plot-complication sequence; it comes right about now in the plot).

Eventually, of course, the snake has a very long death-scene, its length unfurled across the entire stage.

..with much hacking-away by our warrior-god...

...and cutting the snake in two length-wise.

And as all happy-endings go, the guy gets the girl and drags her offstage. The end!

After the show was over, the performers came back out unmasked.

Here's the snake next to the maiden:

After all the bows, it was back to the onsen for one last dip before bed.

We got up relatively early the next morning to see the 'lake' in its fully foggy glory. There's a cute little shrine across the pond from the viewing platform which looked quite cool with the fog.

...and a building with a traditional thatched-roof in the other direction...

Here's a wider-view:

Later that day, as we were making our way back through the touristy shops to the train station, I spotted this line of jizo-Buddha statues. So cute!

This was my favorite.

I love his jauntily-tipped hat.

Oh, and on the way out we picked up some Yufuin pudding, too. Yummy!

But we saved real lunch for the Hard Rock Cafe in Fukuoka. Tomoka had never been before, and I just had to introduce her. While I've been there many (many!) times, I've never taken pictures of the musical-artefacts inside. I thought U.B. might like their Kiss collection:

All in all, a very nice weekend away ^^