Jenfifi's travel blogs:
- Peru: Trekking the Salkantay Trail to Machu... 2008
- Tour de Europa 2007-BAR TRIP! 2007
- Hawaii! 2007
- Korea! 2007
- Spring Break 2007- Kuala Lumpur, Malaysia 2007
- Spring Break 2007 - Singapore, Singapore 2007
- Spring Break 2007- Tanjung Pinang and Palau... 2007
- Spring Break 2007- Bangkok, Thailand 2007
- A semester abroad... 2007
- 10 days in China for business and... 2006
- Cleveland, July 2006 2006
- 4th of July 2006 in Chicago, IL 2006
- Summer of 2006 in New York City... 2006
- Mom, Aunt Sandy, and I do Paris. 2006
- Carnival Cruise through to Colon Panama, Belize... 2006
- New Years trip 2005-2006, Quebec City, Quebec 2005
- Couples Ocho Rios, Jamaica: December of 2005 2005
- An SA trip to remember! 2002
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Sumo wrestling and Shinjuku
Entry 5 of 112 | show all | print this entry |
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Saturday morning we slept in a bit and then headed out to meet our group for SUMO WRESTLING! This was very cool. We arrived at Ryogoku station after buying a 30,000 yen declining balance subway card and passed the Ebi museum of Japanese history which we decided to come back to.
The National sumo tournaments happened twice a year for two week straight with matched from 8am until the evening every day. When we first arrived in the giant arena Jen was surprised at how big it was, seating several thousand people with a stage for the wrestlers in the middle covered by a decorate pagoda roof and several scrolls. The qualifying matches were first and many seats were still empty. The good seats are down on he floor where people sit on cushions and many buy tickets a year in advance. The most striking thing is the amount of posturing and ritual that occurs before each and every match.
There are several rounds of the wrestlers facing off and squatting, and then walking away again while they smack at their own stomachs and grunt. They also throw salt on the ring a lot to purify it.
Between each match there is a ceremonial slow sweeping of the ring before the next two enter. You can get a radio for a 2,000 yen refundable deposit and commentating is available in English. We ate some vending which was supposed to be sushi but was some king of cooked mackerel on rice that wasn't too bad. Chris got some of his favorite chicken on a stick and we had some soft ice cream as well! When the championship match was ready to go the seats were full and the crowd was rowdy. This was a good match with lots of theatrics.
When sumo was over we got back on the train and decided to check out the Shinjuku district which is also young and trendy like Shibuya and known for having lots of department stores.
We hit the Odakyu department store because Jen needed a new black purse and some gloves. This place is huge, 6 giant floors of both designer and on sale shopping with food in the basement as usual in Japanese department stores. The missions were accomplished after quite a while in this store. We wandered around Shinjuku for what seemed like forever looking for a place where Jen could get sushi and Chris could get noodles of meat on a stick. We thought we had found a place but when the waitress came Chris hadn't even looked at the English menu yet and we couldn't seem to communicate to her that we wanted one minute, please. The more we tried the more upset and confused she got so Chris just ordered some shrimp appetizer. The shrimp that came were very small and had their head son which grossed him out. Jen ate her sashimi and Chris headed for McDonalds afterward! (Afternote: Chotto matta onegashaimasu = one minute please). We walked around a bit more and found an amusing English pub with lots of Westerners. They have a lot of things called beer cocktails here and Jen had something that seemed to be half beer and half mango juice which was delicious! We headed home via train by 11:30 so as not to miss the last one. After a few transfers we made it to our home station Hiro-o, on time. Unfortunately it is still about a 15 minute walk from Hiro-o to our apartment and we made one last stop at an intriguing little place on our street. Clearly not a tourist place since the jukebox practically stopped as we walked in as did all conversation. When this happens you just have to plug on and hope they don't tell you they are full, which they did not. The bartender spoke English and we sat for a while and enjoyed the jazz that was playing. Finally, we headed home to bed.
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| 5. | Sumo wrestling and Shinjuku - Tokyo, Japan Jan 13, 2007 (  5 ) |
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