Aomori Nebuta Matsuri

There could be no better ending to the Invincible Summer than a summer festival. Not just any summer festival, but one of the biggest festivals in our region, the Aomori Nebuta festival.

Waiting to start the parade

Summer festivals are some of the biggest, and loudest, festivals in Japan. There is always a lot of chanting, drums, and dancing. Last year we went to Akita for the Kanto Festival, where participants balance long bamboo poles on their backs with an offering to the gods on top. Since this was our last August in Japan, I knew I had to see the Aomori nebutas before leaving.

Taking a break & letting the crowd see the float

A nebuta is a float, often depicting a warrior figure, though there are also floats for neighborhoods and companies. The red samurais are on all kinds of products in our region. The floats are built out of paper and take almost the entire year to make.

I think this was for Aomori City because it has the aquarium with a dolphin show.

Another big part of the festival is the taiko drums and the haneto dancers. The drums keep the beat for the entire parade, and the crowd chants "Rassera" along to it. Rassera doesn't translate well to English, but it is meant to shake off the sleepiness of summer. Honestly, it sounded a lot like a personal cheer: RAH SARAH!

Taiko drums - they are LOUD!

The last big part of the Aomori Nebuta festival is the haneto dancers. Anyone can be a haneto dancer, even Americans, as long as the proper outfit is worn. Participants can either buy or rent the costumes in advance, and use a handy website, instructing them on how to put it together. We decided it would be better to take in the experience from the sidelines.

I've never had so much hat envy in my entire life.

Once the parade started dying down, we searched for something to eat. Usually festivals have a ton of food booths, but we couldn't find them at this one. We did; however, find a CoCo's Curry, aka the mothership, on the way back to the car.

How every street looks in our area.

After a lovely dinner at CoCo's, we stopped by a Lawsons for our road soda chu-hi. And yes, it is legal to have open containers in Japan, so I'm probably never going to move.

About 10 minutes away from home, we saw a man on a bicycle swerving in and out of the road. The car in front of us safely passed him, and as we were getting ready to do the same, he hit the curb and tumbled over the front of the bike. Shocked, we stopped the car and debated about what we should do.

Thankfully, we had already finished our chu-his, though not that it really mattered since our driver was sober. We approached the man and he was very disoriented. One of the girls in our group gathered his things, which were all over the road. None of us speak a lot of Japanese, but luckily one of the words our TV programming has taught us is ambulance. Thanks, AFN! So we asked him if he wanted an ambulance, or kyukyusha (sounds like Q-Q sha). He violently shook his head no, so we attempted to get a Japanese person to stop and help him.

Eventually, we got a tour bus to stop, and one of the men on board knew enough English to talk to us. He ended up calling an ambulance and the police and told us to wait. Once the police finally got there, they asked the man from the tour bus what happened. I'm not sure what he said, but the police took out a flashlight and started looking at our bumper. The bicyclist started pointing at us, and then it clicked that he told them we hit him!

Sneaky pic of them getting our info. Nice knowing ya, Anna!

Thankfully, one of the girls in the group had a Japanese co-worker she could call, so she told him what happened and he explained it to the cops. After standing on the side of the road for what felt like forever, they let us go. Such an eventful night and the perfect end to the Invincible Summer!