BenAdeL: August 2007

Thursday, August 09, 2007

Giant floats carried by teams of scantily-clad men race through the streets of Fukuoka City at the epic Hakata Gion festival each summer. The competition is the climax of a two-week festival in which teams from different neighbourhoods build ornate floats (weighing about a ton each) and carry them round the city in a gruelling five-kilometre race.
Each float is elaborately decorated to represent elements of traditional Japanese life and carries a costumed rider on top. The teams have been competing against each other for generations (over 700 years to be precise) and rivalries are intense. The event is similar in this respect to Italy's famous Palio in the Tuscan town of Siena.

Drum beats fill the air, the crowds cheer and as the floats speed past, the riders can be seen whipping and urging on the runners below, who wear traditional loincloths and appear as a mass of bare bottoms and frantically running legs beneath the hefty floats. The race starts every year at dawn and although this is the coolest time of the day, the summer heat is still so intense in Fukuoka that water cannons are fired onto the race circuit to cool down the competitors (and of course to add to the atmosphere).

The streets are thronged with spectators, so get there early to mark out a ringside seat. Or why not stay up all night like most locals? Bars in the nearby Tenjin area are open until the early hours and you can also pay a visit to the Kushida Jinja Shinto Shrine - at the very heart of the festival. Lit up by lanterns, the shrine is a hive of activity throughout the night as competitors and their families come to pay their respects and pray for good luck in the forthcoming race