Summer Festival In The Neighborhood

In my previous post, I shared about the lanterns I saw in my neighborhood and wondered if I should be attending the festival or not. That night, my partner and I went out and luckily, my partner's mood was fine that we were able to check out the festival.

The festival happened at Tenso Shrine, just a few minutes walk from home. To be honest, I wasn't sure of the Japanese reading of the festival name and when I asked my partner to read the kanji for me, he said he wasn't sure of the reading as well. So yeah, let's just say it's a festival for now.

When we arrived, there were lots of people already but they were busy in the yatai (屋台) corner. Yatai in English means shop stand which is basically what you see selling food and other items at festivals in Japan. The crowd was heavily focused on filling up their tummies, which was understandable because it was already almost 7 PM - dinner time.

The prices of the food were surprisingly so cheap! In big festivals, you'd probably be seeing a minimum of 400 yen (or 2.7 USD) for a food item. Since this festival was local, and not so huge, the lowest price I saw was 150 yen (or 1 USD). There was a 100 yen (or .68 USD) food item I think but it was already sold out so I wasn't able to confirm properly. This was surprising because this is still Tokyo - where everything is expensive.

We were hungry so our first order of business was to eat. While we were falling in line and waiting for our turn, we were checking the food they were selling. There were so many kinds: yakisoba (fried noodles), yakitori (grilled chicken skewers), karaage (fried chicken), and a lot more. You would probably see the popular and typical Japanese festival foods here.

We couldn't decide on what to buy because my partner wanted to try them all. 😂 In the end, we got small yakisoba, 4 sticks of yakitori, 2 sticks of (a small) frankfurt, and karaage. We wanted to buy fried potatoes too but maybe we were already ordering too much for both of us. 😂

Because the vicinity is small, you'd have to eat standing or sitting on the edge of the road.

The other stalls were for kids. There was a game corner where you could try your luck and get a prize. And there's a cotton candy corner too! Too bad there was no catching fish or getting balloons but well, this was understandable - it's a small festival.

After eating, the taiko drum blasted. That's the cue for the start of the dancing. I figured this festival was a Bon Odori festival because of the dancing, encircling the small stage. There were old ladies and an old man gracefully swinging to every beat. The steps of the Bon Odori dance were actually very easy, and repetitive. For sure, after careful observation, you would already get it. If you're wondering if I joined them, nope, I didn't but I wanted to.

I remember attending Nakano's Bon Odori Festival, a large festival in Nakano City. There were so many people and there were so many performers. Of course, the public participated in the dance (including me!) not just in the Bon Odori music but also in modern songs. Actually this Tenso Shrine is located in Nakano City but it's really a local festival. It's nothing like the performers of the large Nakano Bon Odori Festival. Still, it's so intimate. I could feel they knew each other.

There would be breaks in between. And when it's breaktime, the old ladies would be served water. It was such a heartwarming and cute act. That's why I didn't want to join the dance. I'm such an introvert in this kind of situation.

We got tickets in exchange for buying the food items in the yatai. We were looking at how to exchange them but it was closed at that time. We figured we wouldn't be able to exchange it at other times or the next day and guess what, we didn't. It's just here sitting at home. LOL We didn't have time to come back.

Yesterday was a Monday and the lanterns and the traces of the festival were already gone. It was so fast. It felt like that weekend in the festival was just a dream.

Thanks for reading!
See you around! じゃあ、またね！

^{All photos are taken using my phone unless stated otherwise.}