Mikoshi Parade - part two

Blue Street really is blue. Painted shards of stone mix with the cement under our feet. The traffic posts are blue, and the awnings. At intervals along the sidewalk bronze statues sit on park benches. It is a holiday and a Sunday but all the shops are open to welcome the parade crowd.
We smell the fish market before we can see it. It stinks of shallow pools.

We cross the street, working our way toward the French bakery. Inside Japanese women wear their best imitation of French peasant girl outfits. We each grab a tray and a set of tongs. Heather picks up a curry donut. I am not nearly so adventurous – I’ll stick to my sugared twisty, thanks.

While sitting at the long table in the center of a tiny dining space we notice the two metal trashcans set into the counter. One is labeled “Burnable Dust,” the other, “Non-burnable Dust.” We laugh quietly and elbow each other.

“What is that about?” Heather asks.
“Maybe they mean dustbin,” I say. It always makes me smile to see the contortions caused by translation.

Back outside, we head toward the train station. We heard that was where the parade would begin. Along the way we try not to stare at the men wearing Happi coats so short they might as well be walking around in a tee-shirt and underwear. This sudden lack of modesty confuses, and to be honest, embarrasses us. Even some of the Japanese women seem a little taken aback. I watch an older Japanese woman stop and stare until her thirty-something daughter pulls her along.

In front of the train station, our first Mikoshi crouches like a dragon well aware of its splendid scales. A Mikoshi is a portable shrine. During the parade it will walk through the streets on the shoulders of a few dozen Japanese people. Now it waits surrounded by police men who will let you duck under the ropes and take a picture if you show them your camera.

At the head of the parade a group of people bearing banners decorated with green kanji on a white background pick up the trash in the street. It makes sense. The Mikoshi parade celebrates the ancient Shinto gods and cleanliness is one of the most important tenants of the Shinto faith. It may have been the Japanese who first uttered the phrase, “cleanliness is next to godliness.”
After the cleaning crew the parade leader strides by carrying a long staff with a strange topper. It looks like two thin drums set at right angles and fused in the middle. He spins the staff like a child spins and umbrella and tassels spin out in all directions.

Finally, squads of men, women and children drag the Mikoshi forward on carts. The ropes they use are as thick as a child’s arm. I am wedged into the crowd. A group of older Japanese woman stands against the chains that divide the sidewalk from the street. The tops of their heads only come up as high as my nose. I can easily see over them. Behind me, a grandfather holds his grandson up on his shoulder for a better view.

The middle-age Japanese man to my left speaks competent English. We rely on him to explain the workings of the parade. Watching me take pictures he comments.

"This will take many picture."I nod.
He continues, "There are 74 Mikoshi."
"74?" I repeat, not certain I had understood correctly.
This time he nods. "Yes, 74.""Wow," I say.

We are standing in the staging area so we are able to watch as the Mikoshi are lifted off their carts and onto the shoulders of the carriers. Each squad follows the same ritual. It goes like this. A parade official waves at the squad leader to say it is okay to begin. The squad leader raises a pair of wooden clappers above his head and claps out a rhythm. The squad, and my Japanese man, clap along with him. When they’re done they lift the Mikoshi onto their shoulders and begin a shuffling little dance that causes them all to rise and fall on the same beats. The leader chants to keep time.

As the Mikoshi dance by, some leafed in gold, others festooned with red lanterns, I feel like an alien dropped onto earth with no road map and no dictionary. I have stepped through my T.V. screen and into the discovery channel. I am Carmen SanDiego and where in the world am I?

Crossing the sidewalk, in an attempt to reach a drugstore to buy some new batteries for my camera, is like fording a river. The crowd flows in two directions, compressed by the parade spectators and the vendor booths. I have to angle my approach if I want to reach my target without being swept to either side. Returning to my friends is equally challenging. Personal space is not something people in Japan think about. They don’t say excuse me. They think nothing of pushing through you to get where they are going. It’s not rude. It’s just part of the culture.

We leave before the parade is over. The noise and the crowds are getting to me. On the way, I stop to buy a chocolate covered banana. It comes on a stick and the chocolaty shell is covered with colorful sprinkles. It tastes amazing.

We also succumb to our curiosity and buy plastic cartons of Takoyaki to take home for lunch. Takoyaki is basically squid tentacles and quail eggs mixed with some sort of sauce and cooked inside a ball of dough. When I bite into one I can see the little suckers on the tentacles. It tastes good but the texture is like wet cornmeal. I can only eat two of the six.

Back in my apartment late that night I sort through my pictures and try to piece together a coherent story of the experience. The chants echo in my head and the colors swirl. I feel dizzy. How will I explain this to everyone back home? The vocabulary words alone will overwhelm them – mikoshi, happi, Shinto, takoyaki. I finally decided to write as little as possible and let the pictures tell the story. That didn’t work out as well as I had hoped, so here are the words.

I leave you today with the words of Dorothy when she steps out of her home and into the land of Oz. “I’ve a feeling we’re not in Kansas anymore.”