Shiozawa summer festival

The admin girl in the school office was taking part in the mikoshi (portable shrine) parade and invited me to go and support her. That's her, first one on the right...really cheerful and friendly girl. She and her friends were like the cheerleaders for the men carrying the mikoshi. Their job was to blow whistles and deafen everyone. (and as you can probably guess by now, I've forgotten her name and am too embarrassed to ask for the fourth time)

As with all summer festivals, it was packed with people and food and games stalls. It was sooo hot!
The very popular fishing stall. Pay some money and catch as many fish as you can until the scoop, which is made of some biscuity material, gets soggy and gives way. You can keep the fish you caught.

Amateur rock band contest. It was awful...or maybe I'm just getting old ;P Anyway, the fact that there was hardly an audience indicates the quality of the performance. A lot of my pai-kia kids from my visit school was there.

Walked past a shrine that had tons of people queuing up to pray

Different types of mikoshis were being paraded around

This one had barrels of sake on it

One barrel of sake and some flowery decoration

This other one had three young, nubile girls perched on it and a barrel of sake

And finally, the mother of all mikoshis. Too heavy to be carried on the shoulders. Had to be dragged by about 20 people. It was a series of floats. The first float was a stage with curtains and young dancing girls dressed up in kimonos. The second float was the band that accompanied the stage.

Once in a while, they will stop and draw the curtains and the girls will dance.