Thursday, October 25, 2007

Harajuku on a lazy Saturday


I was just bumbling around Harajuku on Saturday. I had never visited the shrine there in Yoyogi park so i decided to go have a look. Its such a beautiful park and the shrine is amazing. Its so quiet there. you dont feel like you are in Tokyo at all. I happened to be there while a wedding ceremony was being held. It was beautiful. I dont know much about the traditional Japanese wedding. The wedding party was marching around the grounds of the shrine and then the took photos on the side of the building and then finally disappeared into one of the restricted courtyards.






After that I bought a box of Pretz and a C.C.Lemon and sat down to watch the circus by the overpass by Harajuku station. This is where all the teenagers come in their crazy costumes and sit around and get their pictures taken. Saturday is not really the day for this. Sunday is when all the major cos players are out, but Saturday was interesting enough. I sat next to this man who did not face the crowds of people, but instead faced the street and put on a rockabilly lip singing performance. Even when a group of Scottish tourist decided to be his backup dancers and twirled onto his imaginary stage doing a Scottish folk dance, he still did not turn around to face the crowds of people now watching, but continued to sing (scream) into the street as cars merged onto the overpass. It was very strange.

There where quite a lot of performers and painters and this man dressed in a pink heart costume.

Undokai "GO SHIRO KUMI!"


Lets go shiro kumi lets go!!

I got to participate in one of my gakkos undokai (sports festival). Its kinda like field day but way more intense. The whole school is divided into two teams. White and Red. I was on the white team (*we won, by the way!!! YEAH!) The kids participate in a series of races and games. Some of which are a bit scary and very dangerous!! Then the grades do dances. The 1st and 2nd graders did a dance with pompoms to some Jpop tune. The 3rd and 4th graders did a dance with wooden sticks from Okinawa. And the 5th and 6th graders did a marching band thing, with color guard and all. I also ran in one of the races!! I ran my butt off. It was called "Lets Run" or something like that. The kids run up and grab a card. Each card has a teacher or students name on it. Then the kid racing has to run and find that person and they have to both run across the finish line together. I laughed so hard i think it slowed me and my partner down. I also lead one of the games. I called out a color or a fruit to the 3rd graders and they had to run up and grab the right ball and then do like a spoon and egg race with it. Anyway, I had a great time.

Visit my Picsa gallary for more pics, I have tons of cute ones.
http://picasaweb.google.com/Marjoriebyrd/Undokai