ラッセラー! ラッセラー! Here's my post on ねぶた!

Hey hey everybody!

It's still summer vacation, so I have office days all this week. Which means.... time for a prompt update! Friday night was a work party. It was a really good time with my co-workers, dinner followed by karaoke. Thankfully it didn't go terribly late, and I wasn't hurting *too* much the next morning from all the umeshuu (plum wine) that I had to drink (it's like CANDY!). I met newly arrived Kyle and we drove down to the shinkansen station to meet up with Jenny and her friend who was due to arrive at 8 am.

Off we went to Aomori city for a day of adventure and to jump in the Nebuta Festival parade!



One of the places we visited was the Apple center were we found some... interesting ice cream flavors. No one bought the corn one, but we did pick up these two:

The pumpkin one was kinda disappointing, actually. Didn't really taste all that pumpkin-y. However, the spinach one did, in fact, taste like spinach. Especially once it started to melt a little. Weeeeird. I almost want to pick up one of the garlic ones that I've seen at the grocery store in town... but, they're kinda pricey for just a little cup of ice cream.

Next, we wandered through some different shops to see what kind of nebuta related souvenirs we could find. There were some displays of floats at different locations around town, and Jenny's friend Mitsuo acted as tour guide so we didn't get terribly lost while wandering around. We went for lunch at a restaurant called レストランテPiccolo (Restorante Piccolo) and enjoyed some pasta. I had their Gorgonzola pasta, and it was deeeeeeeelicious. They also serve pizza and bake their dough in a wood burning oven. We got a sample of their bread served with the salad part of our lunch sets.

After lunch, we set out in search of the yukata-rental shop. Thankfully Mitsuo knew where it was, and got us there no problem. We suited up quickly, even though it was pretty early (the parade wasn't going to start until after sunset, and that was around 7 or so), but we might as well get our money's worth of from the rental fee. The ladies who were helping to dress us were quite efficient and got us dolled up quite quickly. The lady helping me asked me if I wanted the it to be long or 'mini'... it was a nice warm day, so I opted for the latter... but while I wandered around later, it seemed that mine was the shortest of all. Oh well. I was nice and cool and had no trouble walking around due to tapered-lower-yukata-related-issues (it made for challenging running last year when I was in the Shichinohe parade).

Once properly attired, we went back to the float-parking-lot for some more photo ops. I am quite used to being stared at, I mean, I'm 170 cm tall (that's 5'7"), my eyebrow and nose are pierced (I don't wear them while working or at school-related-events... usually), my hair is two different colours. Hell, I usually had unnaturally coloured hair in Canada and asymmetrical/funky hair cuts (which I miss... so much.) ... but... there were a few times when we caught folks just... snapping our pictures all paparazzi-style. It was a little unnerving at some points, but some folks had the courtesy to ask first.

Julia was a good sport and wore the traditional flower hat when we posed for the professional photographer. However, none of us wanted to pay $10 for the postcard. Just a little too steep, as nice of a picture as it was. Eventually we ended up grabbing a spot to sit and watch a street performer at the square where other JETs were going to meet up before the parade started. He attracted quite the crowd of kids with his card tricks, juggling, plate spinning, and balloons. Here he is starting to make a motorcycle outta balloons.

I snapped this pic for the lovely
Leslie, but I thought everyone
should bask in the Hello Kitty yukata.

Eventually it was show time! The floats were neat by day, but really cool at night. We were all ready to jump along and shout "ラッセラー!" (rasseraa!). The floats depict various things: scenes from myths, Chinese and Japanese gods and here and there some sponsor's mascots. Anyone can participate in the parade and be a haneto dancer as long as they have the right threads. We rented ours for under ￥3000 (~$30.00) for the day, but the tabi (socks) and sandals would have been extra. You can also buy little bags to keep your personal belongings in while you jump. I just used the boss one Cara made me with rainbow skullz. (I wonder why people were staring at me. Hahahahaha.) Our rental did not include the wild hats, either, but, I was okay with that. It was still really neat to see other folks sporting them while we took part in jumping and shouting along in the call-answer chant. Oh! There were also carts filled with water and sake that were in different places in the parade. You could just go up and get a ladle full o' booze as you caught your breath. Good job, Japan!

EDIT: YouTube to the rescue!
For your viewing pleasure...