6. How long we carry Mikoshi

Yotsuya has a very big street, so we usually carry Mikoshi on roadway with police man. We carry normal Mikoshi just in Yotsuya and it takes about 5hours. It doesn't mean you have to keep carrying it 5 hours. There are many people in our town, so we carry it by rotation. When we carry special mikoshi we carry it to next city Shinjyuku. All 18 town's people carry it, because that is so long way from Yotsuya to Shinjyuku on foot. We divide the way for each 18 town's people to carry.

5. Special festival every other year

Every other year there is special Mikoshi and all the people from different town get together for carrying this one mikoshi. Special mikoshi is bigger than normal mikoshi that we carry it every year and it is also heavier. In the rule of Yotsuya Katsugi we are not supposed to shake mikoshi, but for special Mikoshi shaking it is probably impossible.6. Yotsuya have a very big street, so we usually carry Mikoshi on roadway with police man. We only carry it around in Yotsuya for normal mikoshi, but if it is for special mikoshi we carry it to next city Shinjyuku. We have rotation to carry it, because that is so long way to carry it.

4. Why we carry Mikoshi? (What's for?)

We have this festival for invocation to keep our life great and all family member's health. We also thank for Kami (It means sort of God in Japan.) This festival started because a long time ago there is the Plague that is sort of sickness and it killed a lot of people. Matsuri is very traditional even in Japan and each city has the original version. I’ve not joined any other matsuri , so I have no information for other city, but It would be so fun to know origin of Matsuri in different city.

3. Yotsuya katsugi (How to carry Mikoshi in Yotsuya)

Yotsuya Katsugi is the way of carrying the Mikoshi.　I guess there are a lot of Matsuri in Japan, so we can imagine how to carry Mikoshi, but we have special way of carrying mikoshi and when you see it you can tell the differences between Yotsuya Katsugi and others. I think the big difference is we don’t shake Mikoshi so hard and we don’t get big steps with Mikoshi. The way of carrying Mikoshi well is needed all the people carry it in same rhythm (timing). If you are a little bit taller than others you might need to square your height to others.

2.Special Cloth for Matsuri

←tabi(shoes)
←maekake

2. Special Cloth for Matsuri
Whan we carry Mikoshi we wear special cloth. Especially Happi is very important to show which town you live in Yotsuya. Without wearing Happi you can’t join in carry the Mikoshi, but don’t worry it doesn’t mean that people who don’t live in Yotsuya can’t join this festival. We can share or lend you Happi. There are special pants and shirts and tabi which are shoes. This special pants and tabi are very hard to wear when you try it on first time. These are picture of them. If you want to be real Japanese who love Matsuri there is one more item to wear which called maekake. It has pocket close to your stomach, so it is very useful to put in stuff you carry. Carrying your stuff with your bag might give you a expression “ Oh it is too crowded…”

1. What's Yotsuya Matsuri?

Yotsuya Matsuri is very exciting event in Yotsuya. It is once a year and many people who live in Yotsuya get together and carry a mikoshi. There are 18 towns in Yotsuya. They all have different Mikoshi, so the confidence in each town gets stronger after carrying mikoshi together every year. In those year we have many foreigner who is very interested in Japanese culture and try to carry mikoshi together.

Here is a picture of Mikoshi.

Japanese Summer Festival "Matsuri"

There are many traditional events in Japan. Especially summer festival might be very interesting for visitors from the different country. In Japanese a festival is called "Matsuri". I've been joining matsuri about 20 years. For this festival speaking Japanese is not very important, so a lot of people feel Japanese very much and enjoy it even though you can't speak Japanese very much.

There are many Summer Festivals in Japan, but I would like to introduce the festival in Yotsuya which is a town very close to Shinjyuku (Tokyo). Many people think that Shinjyuku is a big city, but there is still Japanese tradition and good culture.

There are 6 Topics that I will explain about

1.What's Yotsuya Matsuri like?

2.Special Cloth for Matsuri

3.Yotsuya Katsugi(how to carry mikoshi)

4.Why we carry Mikoshi(What’s it for?)

5.Special festivals every other year

6. How far we carry a Mikoshi?

My Part time job

My part time job is telephone appointer for NTT.
It's becoming very common part time job in japan nawadays.
I don't like this job very much, but I beleive it is very usufull for practising how to explain the things well.
There are many kinds of people work there, because the compamy pay us a lot eventhough I have no much time to work. It's 1200 yen for hour. I have many friend who is actor and musucian in there and I am having many experiences to join their event.

Tired

It is raining today...I hate to walk with my umbrella.
I've better not to wear mini-scart today...It is too cold. Oh shame on me!!

My first blog

I am getting so tired these days, becase I have no holiday...
4 days of week I go to school and 3 days of week I have my 8 hours part-time job.
Mostly My part time job makes me so tired I guess.