Omotesando Harajuku Outdoor Omatsuri

Last weekend, Omotesando Harajuku held its outdoor festival beside Meiji temple and within Yoyogi park. Here are some photos from the walk up to the festivities, in front of the stage and in the park. We left after half a dozen performances but before it started to rain. Again, there were a lot of colourful yukata in view. It was a fun day with tonnes of colourful costumes. Most of these were blind shots with my arms extended way over my head, meaning that I had no idea what was in the viewfinder when I snapped the shot. I cropped most of the photos for more interesting views, but it was packed and very difficult to get a shot.

A very colourful dance troupe.

I believe these guys were from Hiroshima. Some very young dance members in the troupe!

I saw these guys walking to the stage on Omotesando street.

I don't remember much about this dance troupe as I spent most of the time trying to get a decent photo of them without all the heads getting in the way. I do remember thinking that their pants looked funny.

This was a very interesting dance troupe. I kept wondering if one of them would lose their hats.

Taken from the overpass bridge, where tonnes of signs explicitly tell you in Japanese that you can't take photos of the Omatsuri from the bridge. And in case you couldn't read Japanese, there was also a guy paid to stand on the bridge all afternoon to shoo troublesome tourists and photo opportunists like me away.

I snapped about 100 shots hoping to get one with the giant flag in action, no heads in the way and fun expressions on the dancers faces. This was the best I could get. Oh well. Next time, I'll do what the pros did and bring my own step ladder.

Every since my own misguided attempts at self-dressing in summer yukata and self-tying the obi bow, I've been obsessed with the double ribbon tie of the obi. Although, I think the next time I wear a Yukata, I will attempt the simple one bow style again and just aim for less wrinkles.

These girls were a very modern dance troupe. They danced to Japanese reggae. Never saw anything like it or heard lyrics quite like it before.

Look at 'em all shaking them things all in unison!

I never did get to see these guys dance. This was the dance troupe assembling in Yoyogi park and getting ready for their big dance number. I wonder how restrictive their movements would have been in all those yukata.

Hanabi Season

It's been a busy week and these summer sniffles aren't helping. From the end of July until this weekend, there are some big fireworks on display in and around town. I went on Thursday night to the one near Gaienmae and Aoyama icchome eki. It's in the triangle between Harajuku, Shibuya and Ropponggi ekis.

There were tonnes of women in the summer yukata and some men in the jinbe. I loved the little kids in their outfits too. One of my Japanese friends told me that I could not possibly go to a Hanabi festival without wearing a yukata. So I did. Wow. It's hard to breath in those things. Maybe because I put it on myself and was totally worried about the whole piece coming apart, it may have been done overly tight. Something about pulling too tightly on the obi (think large cumberband). More on Yukata in another post.

The fireworks was pretty crowded. We were slightly to the south and away from the main action streets, so it wasn't so bad until we headed back to Shibuya eki after the fireworks. We were lucky in that we dined near the area and walked up and down the streets looking for possibly good vantage points and just by chance happened to see a small bunch of people on a rooftop terrace. Okay --- roof being the roof of the 2nd floor of a larger office building so not an extremely high roof, but still it was an elevated view. When we went to check it out, it seems that it was not a private party at all, and that there were small groups of people up there. The nice part about it was the room to maneuver with my camera. There were tall hedges for privacy from the streets below, so we all had to stand with our backs to the wall of the giant office tower behind us. But the worse part about being there and trying to take photos was that there was a lady, who wore her long hair up high on the top of her head, Pebble Flintstone style, so some of my shots were obstructed by a large blob of hair. How rude is that? Why would you go to a fireworks display and wearing your hair up high knowing that everyone was going to look up? That completely goes against everything I'd learned in Japanese culture classes about the people here going out of their way to ensure that they aren't disturbing you.

Despite the Pebbles-wannabe being on the roof, I did manage to capture some awesome pics. I have posted a few of my faves.

Walking to Yoyogi Park

Last weekend, I was in Shibuya. We walked through Omotesando street and Harajuku to get to Yoyogi Park the long way. At one point, we climbed up to a pedestrian overpass to get to the other side of the street. This was the view looking northward. This is one of my favourite streets to walk on. You can't see the eclectic mix of small up-and-coming shops, high end brands, and down-right-tourist-trap stores from this photo, but basically this street will give you a mixed bag of clientele and personalities. I love walking on this street. When it's not so hot and humid, I'll have to head back there and take my time with the smaller nooks and crannies that I have yet to explore.