Kamezaki's Shiohi Matsuri *GW Days 1 & 2* (Day 1)!!

Saturday, May 3

After breakfast, we all left for Obaasan's house in Handa. On the car ride down, I played with Miyabi as well as played my DS a bit. Miyabi taught me how cars in Japan that's license plates are black with yellow numbers (instead of the usual yellow with black numbers) are called croakies! So every time we passed one, she'd shout "Croakie!" Lol.
When we got to Handa, we didn't go to Obaasan's house first like I thought we would. Instead, we went to this little town on the sea called Kamezaki. As we were driving around, looking for somewhere to park, we ran into family of Ken's, so we parked next to them. Then we got out and walked along the street to Ken's mother's sister's (the lady who was at Obaasan's house last time when they played with the rubber bands on their fingers with me) house. There were so many yatai set up along the street with yummy smelling festival food! Ken's aunt lived right on that street! So we ducked behind a yatai selling okonomiyaki, and boom, we were right in front of her house!

The sea wall. It was covered with pretty paintings!

Shrine we saw on the way

Her house was so nice!! It was all wood floors and ceilings and white walls inside. There were a lot of windows so it was nice and bright and a fan that kept it cool because it was really hot out today!
After we dropped our stuff and said "konnichiwa" to Ken's family (there were two women who were his cousins, each with their own children - two little girls, two little twin boys, and a baby boy and husbands), we went into a room with tatami floors. There was this huge fancy display with incense and an offering of oranges on it. Everyone knelt in front of it and Yuko told me to kneel in front of it, too. Then Ken started talking to it, saying that Miya was a ninensei (second year) now. So it must have been a little shrine thing to someone in the family who had died. It was really sad. Yuko told me I was supposed to close my eyes. But by then, we were done. Whoops.

Then we had lunch which consisted of the sushi and inarizushi we'd had at Obaasan's house last time, sashimi, and entire crabs! Nobody really said anything to me at lunch, except one guy asking if I drank (which Ken said I don't. Okay, thanks for answering for me, dude. Not cool...). But it was interesting watching Ken's family and all the little kids running around. Then Ken's uncle and the husband of one of his cousins came home. They had been working the festival, so they were wearing happi and head ties and stuff.

After we ate, Miyabi and Yuko went outside to show Maple to the little kids, because he wasn't allowed in and was tied up outside. Ken showed me a pamphlet about the matsuri. There was a tiny section in English talking about the history of the matsuri and it's five floats! Each float has a different symbol associated with it and a different name, which is really cool!
I told Ken how when I'd told some of my Japanese friends about the matsuri, they'd known it and told me it was a big, famous matsuri that they wished they could see!
When Ken left the table, I got bored and decided to go out to play with Maple too. Miya and Yuko were sitting out there on the front stoop, so I sat with them. There was a nice breeze blowing, so it felt nice. Yuko went inside after a bit, so I talked to Miyabi. I asked if she wanted to catch goldfish. She told me her mom won't let her bring goldfish home. So I asked if she wanted kakigori (because I really wanted some, lol. It's Japanese snow cones) and she said she didn't. We talked a bit more and then she went inside too.
She came back out a bit later and told me we were going to go get kakigori! For real?? Excited, I ran back in to get my hat and purse. When I got back out to the front porch, Yuko asked where I was going and I said I'd thought we were going to get kakigori. She said she was just going to go get Miya some. And then she was like, well, do you want to walk with us or stay here?
Well, I definitely didn't want to stay in the house where I felt awkward and no one talked to me... So I headed out with Miya and Yuko. On the way, Yuko let Miyabi play one of the yatai games, where Miya got a cup and could scoop out the little bouncy balls and bath toys. She was having trouble deciding where to scoop, but when I saw these cute bear water squirty things, pointed at them, and said "kuma!" (bear), she dove for those and ended up getting both of them and some bouncy balls. The white one actually was a bear, but the yellow one turned out to be a tiger. They were super cute!

I liked how there was also sushi squirty toys. I wanted those...

And then Miya got her kakigori. She got to go up and choose the flavors she wanted on it. I didn't get any... :(

 

Look at the cute cups it came in! The kanji says "matsuri"

This was a yatai selling crab on a stick, which is something you don't usually see at matsuri. It was special to this one!

We went home quickly and then headed out to see the current events of the festival. We walked down the street the way we'd came a bit, and then saw all the floats being pulled in from the ocean! Yuko said they'd already gone in the ocean. We'd missed it because we'd been stuck in traffic. Darn! I found out later when I saw the schedule in the pamphlet, that they'd been put in the ocean at 10 am that morning. Argh, so early!
But Yuko said we'd get to see it tomorrow!

Cute drain cover thing with the festival floats

First float coming in! This one is my favorite. It's symbol is a sakura flower

Sakura float!

The second float

Aaand the third float! The one Ken's uncle and cousin's husband pull

I liked this float because of the awesome tiger!

 

We headed back after our float, so I didn't get to see the other two. :( 

Also while we were watching them, this one guy asked to take a picture of me, and then did before I said anything. I guess because I'm American? At least I had my hat and sunglasses on!

The guys pulling the float had these colorful charms tied to them!

All the festival people have their float's symbol on their happi. The sakura people are the only ones without a kanji.

The sakura float has sakura flowers on the tassel!

 

The dude in the black's happi has a "West" kanji inside his sakura!

Front of the sakura float

Front of another float - Miyabi's favorite one

Cool dragon on this one

And this one has birds and butterflies on the tassel!

On our way back to the house, one of the older men hanging with Ken's family (I think he's just a family friend), bought Miyabi cotton candy. Then he bought cell phone straps for both Miyabi and me! It was so, so nice!!
He got Miyabi the happi of her favorite float, and I got the happi of the family's float - 力神車.

The kanji symbol for our float

Then Miyabi was tired so we went back to the house so she could take a nap. Yuko told me Ken was going back out to the matsuri, did I want to join him. She said she was going to stay with Miyabi. Did I want to join him? Was that even a question she needed to ask? Heck yes! I love matsuri and we'd already so much time eating lunch and sitting around. I wanted to see as much of it as I could!
So I went out with Ken to see more of the matsuri. Along the way, he told me various tidbits of information about the matsuri. And once, he even said a whole sentence in English when he explaining about the various gods of the shrines around the town. I was so shocked!

We walked the opposite direction of the way we'd come in because that was the way the floats had headed. We passed this shrine with a huge staircase!

Then we stopped in a little alleyway where the float I had yet to see had stopped to do a puppet show. And we stood there and watched the whole puppet show. Little boys were controlling the puppet's hands and feet from behind to make it look alive.
Ken told me this matsuri is for boys and men only. I remembered Yuko telling me at the last matsuri that women can't even touch these floats, because in Japanese culture women are thought of as dirty!

When that was over, we followed the floats all the way to the final stop for today. A shrine about a ten-fifteen minute walk from our house, on the street facing the sea wall.
On the way there, Ken and I ran into one of Ken's friends. While Ken was talking to him, these Americans walked by. I'd seen them earlier from a distance when we were watching the floats. This time, they saw me and shouted "hello!" So I just waved back. Then they called over, "Do you speak English?" And when I said I did, they came over. One was an old-ish guy with gray hair wearing an awesome Heineken shirt, but the part of the logo that says "Heineken" was replaced with "Drunkagain," haha. He was with this totally hot young guy and then two Japanese ladies. They all started talking to me, asking where I was from and stuff. The older guy was from New Jersey and the hot guy was from Boston. The hot one was kind of shy. And the Japanese ladies were friends of theirs. When I said Ken was my host father, Ken was saying goodbye to his friend. Now that his friend was gone, the older guy was all like, to Ken, "Hello, my name's Barry!" (or something like that) and stuck out his hand. Ken shook it and was all like, "Nice to meet you, my name is Kenji." It was cute! Then Ken talked to the Japanese ladies, asking where they were from. Barry, or whatever his name was, told me that he lives in Handa, and doesn't speak too much Japanese, and Luke(?) (I suck at names, guys), the hot guy, has been here for a year so far. I told them I'm not too great at Japanese either. Then they started talking about the Cowboys and the Houston Rockets. Barry was all like, "Who's that guy on the Rockets?" And I was like "Oh, Yao Ming. But he's Chinese." And then they said something and I realized Yao Ming's on the Spurs. So I said that and Barry was all like, "Ah, whatever, it doesn't matter!" haha. It was nice to talk to people fluent in English for once! They also asked if I drank and Ken said no, before I could answer and Barry was all like, ah, she's a teenager. NO I'M NOTTT!!!!!!!!!
Then we parted ways and Ken and I continued on to the shrine. We ran into another one of Ken's friends on the way! He was a little tipsy and had a bag full of beer. He and Ken were hugging each other and stuff and then Ken grabbed one of his beers from him. The guy saw me and was all like, "Ah, a gaijin!" And then asked if we were together, and Ken said yes. Then he asked Ken if he wanted to take a beer for his "tomodachi" (aka me). Ken said no, his tomodachi was good (why does he keep saying that?? He knows I've gone to nomihoudais! Do they think I'm gonna get all shitfaced and they'd have to take care of me or something? I mean, they saw me drink the chuhai at the last matsuri!).
Finally, we made it to the shrine. Ken and I stood there watching them pull the floats in. They kept shouting something that sounded like "yabai" (dangerous), so I asked Ken what it was. He taught me that they say "yama e" and "mawa e." "Mawa e" is "to the sea" and when that is shouted, they have to push the float towards the sea, and "yama e" is "to the mountain" and when that is shouted, they push towards the mountain. "Yama e" is what sounded like "yabai."

The shrine

Our float was the third one to come in. When it was pushed over by the other two floats, it hit the second float! Everyone was freaking out and waiting with baited breath for the matsuri guys to try to push it away from the second float. It didn't look like there was any damage.

They put a sakura tree on the sakura float!

 

Finally all the floats were there!

Float names from left to right:宮本車, 青龍車, 力神車, 神楽車, 花王車

Then they started decorating the floats.

First they put this wave painting on the second float

Then they covered it with a flower painting. And our float got a shell and waves

And theeen, the puppet shows started! First the one we'd already seen went. Then each of the other doll/puppet things did a dance. The rest were all controlled by hidden ropes, not people. The second one was a puppet dressed in green that flapped around long scrolls and at the end, dropped the scrolls!
The third, our float, was a puppet who started out with a white face, but then turned around and Ken told me, drank a lot of sake. When she turned back around, her face was red!
At one point, her red face accidentally fell off, lol. But they had a rope attached to it, so they quickly and really smoothly pulled it back up to her face!
The last two were kind of ordinary and boring. Just the puppets holding things, like bells, and moving around.

Second puppet with the scrolls

Our doll. I missed her with her red face!

We left after that because Ken and I were both really cold. It had gotten cool and windy and we hadn't brought our jackets.

They were setting up a cauldron on the first float!

On our way back, we ran into Yuko and Miya. Yuko had bought Miya a pink chocobanana (just what I'd been craving!) and she was eating that. They were all sad we were heading back, because now Miya was awake and ready to see the floats. Yuko asked if I wanted to come with them, but I was really cold, so Ken and I headed back.
We had sat in the house for literally two minutes, when Yuko called Ken to ask him to come because they were at the drugstore and Yuko wanted to buy medicine for all these flea bites Miya had gotten on her arm.
Ken asked if I wanted to come, so I said I would and I went to grab my sweater.
We found them at the drugstore. It was across from a Komeda coffee that had koinobori flying out front!

So pretty!

Ken went in with Miya to buy her medicine, and Yuko and I waited outside. Yuko asked me why I liked matsuri so much. I told her I liked the puppets, the yatai, the different kinds of happi, the dances, and the floats. Haha, so much!
When Ken and Miya came back, they'd bought little panda cookies as well! Miya gave me one.

They all had different faces!

The back of it

When we got to the shrine area, the tops of the floats were done being set up and the top shows were going on. So there were displays on both the bottom and top! Ken had tried to tell me that earlier, but I hadn't understood.
They were already on the second to last float, but it was okay, we'd get to see it again tomorrow!
So we watched the second to last and last displays. On the second to last, after the puppets rocked around in a boat, a big box came up. Miya kept saying stuff about "itachi." I know Itachi is a character in Naruto, but I couldn't for the life of me remember the meaning of the word!

 

Me, Miya, and Ken watching the show

And then when Yuko talked about a weasel, I finally remembered! "Itachi" means weasel! Yuko told me they were going to fling a weasel into the crowd! And she said if a non-matsuri person catches it, they apparently get a prize! So she told me I could go try to catch it if I wanted to. Of course I wanted to!!

I asked if it was a real weasel lol, but she said no.

So then they brought out the weasel in a little sling-shot/gun type of thing, so I ran up to catch it.

 

The weasel spun around for a while before being shot to the right of me. Oh well. A bunch of little boys in happi caught it and ran up to the floats with it. So I guess no one got a prize then.

Then it was the top of the sakura float's show! I really liked this one! A puppet came up and attached onto the trapezes around the tree. Then it moved from trapeze to trapeze by using its hands and feet. Like on the first one, it hung from its hands. Then it did a flip and attached its feet to the second one. Then it flipped and caught the third with its hands, and so on. So cool!

A second puppet joined the first one after a bit. Here's it swinging right in front of us!

 

When all the shows were over, lanterns were hung from the floats with the name of each float on them. And then the floats were pulled out, to be brought to their respective houses.

 

I was really tired at this point and just wanted to go home and sleep, but we followed our float all the way back to our house and then watched it be put in.

 

 Yay, all in! Finally we could go home! We got back to a dinner of more of that sushi and more crabs. I ate a crab, and it was good, but hard to take apart. There weren't any of those crab pliers like we have in America, so we had to use our hands and teeth. There were also kaki (oysters) on the table. I tried one and almost gagged it was so nasty. I hate American oysters, but these were worse because they were all liquidy and slimy. Ughhh.
Then obaasan brought out this pink jello she'd made for dessert. I was all excited because I love jello! Except it was super bland with a faint taste of dish soap. It was so bad, but I had to force it down. *shudders*

Then the last of Ken's cousins came home. He has three girl cousins who are all sisters. The one who came home was named Shizuka. She was the prettiest of the three and looked the youngest.
She was really talkative and talked to me a lot! She didn't mind speaking slowly or listening to my failed attempts at communication. She was so sweet! She thought it was really cool that I was interested in matsuri and sadou and other traditional Japanese things.
Then Ken's other cousin's husband (the one in the matsuri), started talking to me too. Apparently Mandy (you know, everyone's favorite host student) had been here last year and she and this guy had hit it off, so Yuko and Ken had wanted me to talk to him too. He was pretty fun to talk to, but Shizuka asked me more questions and made more conversation. It's funny that her name is Shizuka (quiet), when she's anything but!

After dinner, we were all super tired, so we said "oyasuminasai" to everyone and that we'd see them tomorrow and then we headed out. Ken had brought the car over and we all piled in to go to obaasan's house.
There, I was allowed to shower first and then we all got in the big room we shared last time and slept on futons again.