{"id":195,"date":"2006-05-18T22:01:16","date_gmt":"2006-05-18T13:01:16","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/regex.info\/blog\/2006-05-18\/195"},"modified":"2010-05-03T23:41:53","modified_gmt":"2010-05-03T14:41:53","slug":"kyotos-aoi-maturi-festival","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/regex.info\/blog\/2006-05-18\/195","title":{"rendered":"Kyoto’s “Aoi Matsuri” Festival"},"content":{"rendered":"\n\n

Monday saw the Aoi Matsuri<\/b> festival here in Kyoto.<\/p>\n\n\n

<\/a><\/div>\n\n\n

“Aoi Matsuri” is \u8475\u796d<\/span> — Aoi<\/i> means “hollyhock<\/a>” (a kind<\/span> of flower), and\nmatsuri<\/i> means both “source of great traffic\ncongestion” and “festival”.<\/p>\n\n

This particular festival, held on May 15th<\/sup> ever year, dates\nback about 1,000 years, making it the oldest festival still held today.\nIt's a “festival”, though, only in the sense of the hoopla\nsurrounding it is festive — it's really more of an\n“event”.<\/p>\n\n

People dressed in period costumes leave the imperial palace and walk a\npath<\/span> to some shrines a few<\/span> kilometers away. People line the path to see the\ncostumes and such.<\/p>\n\n

For example, this gentleman is a security<\/span> guard:<\/p>\n\n

<\/a><\/div>\n\n

These people are, uh, carrying something.<\/p>\n\n

<\/a><\/div>\n\n\n\n\n

Looking at this satellite\nmap of the Imperial Palace<\/a> in Kyoto, it's centered on the main\nprocessionway within the palace grounds. They walk south, out onto the\nstreet, following the street east and then north up the right side of the\npalace grounds, then on north somewhere to some shrines<\/p>\n\n

As each small group walks down the initial wide processionway, they stop\nin front of big grandstands set up, and some old guy talks about them a\nbit.<\/span> It's very slow<\/span>. The acoustics<\/span> aren't great, nor, apparently, is my\nJapanese, so the only thing I understood<\/span> the whole time was the bit about\nthe security guards (shown above). Still, it was a pleasant<\/span> day and\nenjoyable just to watch them and the hubbub for a while.<\/span><\/p>\n\n

This kid had a great<\/span> view of the proceedings:<\/p>\n\n

<\/a><\/div>\n\n

There were all kinds of different costumes, and various\n“things” of unknown (to me) function. As one example<\/span>, here's\nsomething that looks like a big<\/span> umbrella, although I doubt<\/span> that's what it\nactually is:<\/p>\n\n

<\/a><\/div>\n\n

This cart, obviously for someone very important (the emperor?):<\/p>\n\n

<\/a><\/div>\n\n

The cart was drawn by a dozen men. They're out of the picture to the\nleft, but you can see some more — I like<\/span> this view of it because of the\ngroup of yellow-hat-wearing preschoolers watching on the right, which I\nthought<\/span> were cute. Although you can't see the cart-pulling men, you can see\na few<\/span> of the buzzing important-looking attendants (priests?) following (one\nof whom is holding a walkie<\/span>-talkie, which the Japanese apparently had working\nat the time).<\/p>\n\n

The flowers surrounding the cart, I was told<\/span>, are the hollyhock. At the time<\/span>, I assumed<\/span> they were the violet-colored ones hanging around the edge,\nbut now I wonder<\/span> if they're the yellow ones. Not that it<\/span> really matters —\nI don't<\/span> know much about flowers (except that they're pretty, which is\nsufficient for me).<\/p>\n\n

Here's a closeup:<\/p>\n\n

<\/a><\/div>\n\n

\n\nOn my way home, I passed<\/span> them walking north on Kawaramachi Street (the\nright side of the palace grounds). I thought<\/span> it was nicer to see them\nwithin the grounds, rather than on the street amongst the traffic. But the juxtaposition<\/span> of modern and ancient can be interesting as well. Here's a picture Nils\ntook<\/a> while they passed on a street<\/span> further on north.\n\n<\/p>\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Monday saw the Aoi Matsuri<\/b> festival here in Kyoto.<\/p>

\"Aoi Matsuri\" is \u8475\u796d -- Aoi means \"hollyhock\" (a kind of flower), and matsuri means both \"source of great traffic congestion\" and \"festival\".<\/p>

This particular festival, held on May 15th ever year, dates back about 1,000 years, making it the oldest festival still held today. It's a \"festival\", though, only in the sense of the hoopla surrounding it is festive -- it's really more of an \"event\".<\/p>

People dressed in period costumes leave the imperial palace and walk a path to some shrines a few kilometers away. People line the path [...]","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[2,6],"tags":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/regex.info\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/195"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/regex.info\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/regex.info\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/regex.info\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/regex.info\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=195"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/regex.info\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/195\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/regex.info\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=195"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/regex.info\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=195"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/regex.info\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=195"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}