Yamakasa Festival! (Mass Buttcheeks!)

So in Kyuushuu, there is this festival that takes place this time of the month called the Yamakasa.

The Yamakasa are these Big float like things which probably weigh a lot. Basically a bunch of men wearing their Fundoshi (Loin cloth) pushing this massive heavy float while the people of the public throw buckets of water onto them :S.

Heres some videos to make it a little easier to picture.

So that's basically what The Yamakasa is I think. Im not sure if they race or not but they might be timed and see who was fastest. I don't know the reason why they run in their loincloths and why people throw water at them but it was interesting to watch XD. Each Float is to represent 1 community of the area. Before all of this running there is also a gathering of lots of old people, who I believe would be the leader of each community and some ceremony is held, all the leaders also give out some speech to provide all the runners with morale support I suppose. Then each community marches off their float to some area. Then once they are ready, there is a count down and people push the float as fast as they can down a set path. During the push the people are rotated kind of like a relay race, It is just hard to see cause its just a bunch of men and butt cheeks moving around, but yeah there would be lots of practise and training involved too.

WOOT BUTTCHEEKS!

久しぶり～

It's been a while!

I'm sorry it's been a while since I've posted anything XD.

Recently Ive pretty much settled into life and all that jazz, so apart from going off into the Tenjin Fukuoka for random stuff, haven't done anything really extravagant. 

So instead, Until then Ill just write some posts about Japan life and some activities that I've taken an interest too and regularly do. So Incoming Posts about:

• The Japanese Tea Ceremony! Or "The way of the Tea" （茶道）　
• Japanese Archery! Also called "Way of the Bow"（弓道）
• Everyone loves it, AKB48～～
•  

Look forward to it!

Golden Week!!!

So Golden week is just a bunch of consecutive holidays in Japan.

On golden week we decided to go to Fukuoka and stay for a night. We went on the 3rd of May into Fukuoka, It was pretty crowded on these days because there was a Festival going on called something like the Dontaku Festival or w/e.

These are just a couple of the performances going on.

Pretty much did shopping and wandering during the day,

and at Night we want to visit the Yatai, (Street Stalls thingys).

This was some Ramen got from one of the Yatai.

Then went to a net cafe for the night cause it wasnt too pricy, forgot to take photos XD.

After about 3 hours of sleep, next morning was Mos burger for breakfast, and damn burger was tiny, loaded with sauce and so hard to eat.

After that was just more shopping at a place called Marinoa City

We took a break the day after to prepare for the Epic day to come!

Next Day We went for a Trip to Mount Aso!, an Active Volcano.

Pictures will probably speak for themselves here soo.

 Just a couple of Pit stops before reaching the Mountain, since the trip took about 2hours and a bit.

Some Special bridge that would`ve costed 500yen to walk across so we decided to be cheap.

 Woot Smoke and bad Air no asthmatics allowed.







Nother view, might be able to see water from here.

 Just more Rocks.

 Group Photos

Just had to upload this cause it was cool XD.

I LOVE RAAAMENNNN

Just some more pictures of Ramen !

 Some Random Mascot thing that seemed like it wanted a picture.

 Nother Air shot ^^

Had to take a picture of this, 

I dont know whos car this is but took a photo anyways.

Pretty Hectic XD

To end the night off, we went to an ONSEN!!(Spa

(No pictures for obvious reasons)

Started off pretty embarrassing because had to go full naked etc but it just became natural.

 Although that aside, procedures of entering the onsen consist of,

before entering you have to have a shower seperate from the onsen

and then once you enter it feels soooo gooooooood. Usually there are various baths with different temperatures.

A fairly hot one, very hot one, an extremely cold one, A Sauna and also most onsens will have the natural outside one, where you are outside under the sky etc. This one had one but was not that exposed to the sky. 

Anyways, Onsen felt awesome !!~!~!~!

以上です！

またね～＾＾

The Next Weekend We didnt want to do anything that big so we decided to just go on a small adventure to a nearby area. We boarded the Train and got off at a random station. So our adventure took us to a place called Tentou (天道) which uses the characters for Sky and Road.

 We found a park like mountain ish area which seemed to have some interesting stuff so we headed that way. This was something located at the start of the path.

 Some more cool statues.

 Just a picture of the steep path leading towards.......

 This Tiny little hut like thing at the top of the mountain.

 And this post which hopes for peace on earth.

 Just some pictures of the view from the top.

 Some pretty pictures of sakura filling up the path.

 More Trees.

 Just

me

standing

taking

a

photo

.

 

 Plus

Nic

.

 There was also a slide up here too,  although it was closed off it was pretty cool. I believe it wouldve been a faster way down than walking back.



Plus a few more pics on facebook if want some more.

Dazaifu!

Last Weekend(14th) we decided to go to Dazaifu Tenmanguu、Which is one of the Shrines i think. It was pretty interesting they had a lot of stuff that i didnt understand hahaha.

 There was the main Shrine where most people would go to, and then around that are many many smaller ones.


We went to the main Shrine, tossed in some money and prayed. We went shopping in the local area for a bit and there was some pretty interesting things. We ate some food that was well-known in the area it was called Umegaemochi Which was just some mashed plum thing inside Mochi, regardless it was really nice XD.

(Photos, soon).

This Particular Grave is something like Graveyard of the Pens. Writers and Artists seem to come here to throw away their pens/ brushes I believe. Notice the Tombstone even has a Paintbrush on top.

This is the Main part where people come to toss money in and pray and there are a couple of shops that sell lucky charms on the sides too.

←This is the Entrance to the main Shrine.

Some mass gathering of Koi Fishy.

Grabbing the Horns seems to be what people do to this statue thingy.

Day Before Yesterday we went to get go Internet and a Phone so we would atleast have a form of Contact. So we got this portable Wifi which is pretty cool but at home its a bit dodgy because it requires placing the wifi next to the window.


The day After(Yesterday) We went Hanami (Flower Viewing), Although the weather was perfect it was a bit late cause the previous days the weather was a lil sucky so there wasnt a lot of Flowers left to see.

 Just some Trees at the Area we went for Hanami




 

 Hanami seemed like a simple picnic at first, but it is actually fairly Ceremonial. We all kinda sat around in a circle like in this picture and like many things started off with Introductions. I got slightly yelled at when i tried to drink from my cup first because we haven:t officially begun yet, so yeah it was quite the formal gathering.

 Here is one of the Bento things we brought to Hanami.

Thanks Duy for this trick, people were pretty amazed when I pulled it out XD.