Tanabata in Sendai

I wanted to buy spoons today.

Last week, I held a dessert party in my room and now, mysteriously one of my spoons went missing. On Friday, I made a batch of Mango Pudding to give to the secretaries at the International Exchange Center (because they're so nice and I felt bad after telling them of all the dessert parties I've been doing and never had the chance to invite them out [yes, the international students invite the secretaries out to events!]). I gave them a container of mango pudding and included a spoon for them to dish it out to their colleagues in the office. I won't be back into the office for atleast a month... and I gave them my last spoon.

The Tanabata festival for Sendai (cf. wikipedia description here) started on Saturday and I would finally have time to see the festival on Sunday. I needed to buy spoons and hit the gym to check if my automatic bank payments worked for my monthly gym subscription. I headed out this morning at about 11:00 am to make my way out there.

I walked around the main arcade where the Tanabata festivities were being held. There were people everywhere walking around and looking at the decorations. To the left, you'll see the streamers hung for the Tanabata festival. From what I've read, they represent "woven threads," for what reason however, I am not sure. I tried asking some Japanese people and even they didn't know off hand.

Alot of people were out wearking Yukatas and Jimbeis (Summer Kimonos for women and men, respectively) so it was rather nice seeing everyone in such festive spirits. Along the street were lots of vendors selling food, beer, toys, shoes, etc. I saw a place that were selling really cheap sandals that I wanted to buy, since they're good for rainy days and my feet won't be soaking wet the whole day if I were to wear them. I didn't stop to buy them because I had other things on my mind, like finding some food to eat.


I walked and walked and eventually found a kaiten-sushi restaurant (one of those conveyor belt sushi restaurants) but they were remarkably busy, but I really wanted to eat in one. The line ups were really long and I didn't feel like waiting so I kept walking looking for other sushi restaurants. I walked another km to the train station to find a place to eat there; big mistake, I should have known that all the restaurants there would be extra busy. Sendai is famous, nationally for their Tanabata festival so everyone comming to see the festival came by train and stopped off to eat at the restaurants in the station.

A little disappointed, I at first decided to skip lunch and go for a walk instead. Close by the station was the tallest building in Sendai, otherwise known as the "Aeru" building. I headed to the roof of the building to the observation deck to take a look at the city from up above. The view from above is spectaular and I enjoy going there from time to time. I have yet to go there at night to see the city lights (it's summer and it gets dark after the building closes).

After hitting the observation deck, I checked out the restraunt right by the observation deck (one of those nice posh restraunts) and I was in luck, they had a lunch set for only $25, well I wasn't complaining for a 6 course lunch.

The picture to the left here is the waiting room while they prep up the table for customers. The only sad part was that I went alone. It was a spur of the moment kind of thing... though I'm not sure if I was friends that they would be willing to shell out $25 for a lunch, but it was worth it.


I ran into friends right after lunch hanging outside of the train station, what luck. I tagged along to catch some coffee with them.

This is what happens when you have 13 people crowding into a coffee shop. We were also evil and asked for separate bills and hung around for a long time and made other people wait for us before we had to leave.










The group had to split up and I had to meet up with a Phillipino friend since we arranged to check out the Tanabata festival when it started. The city had the roads blocked off and groups of performers took to the streets entertaining different sections of visitors along the way. We got to see marching bands (way too many of them), a dance squad, Japanese firefighters doing stunts on a really tall ladder and cheerleaders. Unfortunately I had to leave the event a little early to check the automatic transfer with the gym. Ended up leaving an hour before the parade was over. Oh well... but it gets better.

Unfortunately I didn't have pictures for the last part, but I headed home after checking things with the gym. The automatc payment did go through and I was in dire need of a shower and had a stack of laundry to do. I hit the local convenience store to get some change for the washing machines when I heard drumming in the courtyard of a University near by. I had to go and check it out.

It turns out they too were doing a little festival up there. They had a stage, an intimate sort of thing with only about 30 people. They had a few performers and musicians entertaining to Japanese music. They broke out the beer and snacks and we had a picnic in the courtyard. It was all free, these people are amazingly friendly. The floor opened up and I joined everyone dancing around the stage doing some kind of Japanese folk dance :) When I do come back to Canada, I have something new to try when I go clubbing!

The really cool part of this group of people was that there were tons of old people out there having fun and hell, old people know how to party better than the young ones! I had a great time listening to these guys crack out the microphone and started singing. They started rotating through people and there were a few international students out there whom I've never met from China and they sung just beautifully. I on the other hand had to fall back onto "If you're happy and you know it..."

I was a little embarrased when I was going up to the stage... not because I had to sing, but because Canada has so little history compared to the Japanese. These old guys were singing all sorts of folk songs and they sounded terrific. But hey, Canada is like a baby compared to asian nations, we're only in the ball park of 200 years old as opposed to Asia that is thousands of years old? Well atleast they enjoyed my singing, I was greeted by the "grannies" and "grampas" who poured me a few glasses of beer after. I even got 2 boxes of tissue paper as going away presents (they were giving them out for some reason).

So finally I got home and did my laundry... and still, I'm without a spoon. Maybe something interesting will happen the next time I try to buy a spoon.

Quote of the Evening

"Not wearing a shirt either?"
"It's too damn hot to be wearing anything!"