Her mother is lifted onto the shoulders of a team member, and handed the kite's cord. "It is difficult," he says, "to get the kite up to a good height and avoid getting caught in the other strings." When the kite is flying well, the daughter is perched onto her father's shoulders. "Each neighborhood," Ichiro tells me, while the kite begins to climb, "is allowed to have only one kite in the air at any time." Even so, the air is full of cords arcing downward. In this fashion, the kite, the team of flyers, and the family make a procession out to the field. Their first-born girl's name has been painted in the lower corner of this kite, and she is held in the position of honor. They attach a symbolic braid of red and white cloth to the main string, then lift the kite onto their shoulders, holding it like a canopy while the family who sponsored its construction gather beneath. Ichiro and his team have carefully laid one flat on the ground to adjust its bow and guide strings. Here, collections of two to three meter square kites, emblazoned with symbols identifying the neighborhood which it is from, are stacked against the side of every tent. Traditionally, it was the first son's birth that was honored, but nowadays the birth of a daughter is cause enough to celebrate.Ī journey of celebration begins in the camp of rectangular, white tents pitched beside the field. That remains the heart of the festival to this day: the raising of kites to celebrate the birth of a family's first child. When a first son was born to him, Iiwo raised a kite to celebrate. Legend has it that in Japan's feudal era Hikuma castle stood in the place where Hamamatsu is today, and Iiwo Buzen-no-kami was its lord. Hamamatsu festival has been through changes reaching back much further than Michiyo's or Kinta's memories, further even than Hamamatsu city herself. "Traffic accident," he chuckles."Now," Kinta observes, "there a lot more rules, and the police are always watching." He holds up a hand to show the pinky is missing its first joint, the classic mark of the Yakuza. Michyo obligingly slips off his upper garments to display his tattoo covered torso. "They used to fight with the kites and people would" he shadowboxes for a moment, "People would fight and they would take off their clothes." Michiyo, a Japanese gentleman with a long white beard, squats beside the field with his friend, Kinta, who says things used to be different. They float so serenely that, after a few minutes, it is hard to escape the feeling I am standing on some ocean floor, gazing up at gentle creatures browsing at the surface. Teams dash back and forth, pulling in, then releasing, the cords that trail after dozens of two meter square kites as they charge into the air. When the thud of the opening fireworks rolls like cannon fire over the flat grassy field at the foot of the dune, I am ready for the fight to begin. Not far away, in the cool shadows of the Hamamatsu Festival Museum, the fallen of years past - charred ends of kite strings - rest next to plaques that illustrate techniques for capturing your opponent's stirng and burning through it with the heat of friction.Įverything I have heard or read about this festival, before arriving in Hamamatsu, described it as a three-day-long, pitched battle among giant kites. Each group has its own drum and bugle corps, and the air is thick with rumble and blast. They are uniformed in happi coats, and fly their colors above. Knots of excited men and women huddle around devices like engines of war. Hamamatsu Festival: Alan Wiren sees the "The Children's Battle" 浜松祭ĭuring the first week of May, the Great Sand Dune in Hamamatsu is transformed into an ancient battlefield.
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