Cherry Chasing

It's Golden Week! Well, since this year all the consecutive holidays fall on a Saturday, Sunday, Monday and Tuesday, it's more like Pyrite Week in comparison with last year's week-long blowout. All the same, it's the start of festival season and Japan is going crazy after months of winter seclusion.

 

This weekend, for me, has been a whirlwind of activity. On Saturday, I rode the train to Hiraizumi to see the annual Spring Fujiwara Matsuri (not to be confused with the one in Autumn). There are kagura dances, flower viewing and even a strong-man race where contestants compete to carry a giant pile o' mochi the farthest.

But the highlight of the days long event is the Yoshitsune Eastern Flight Processional: a reenactment of the prince Yoshitsune and his retainers as they fled north, away from Yoshitsune's nasty big brother. Yoshitsune was welcomed with great pomp and open arms at Hiraizumi where he and his followers were given asylum in the Konjikido shrine at Chusonji. Every year, celebrities are cast to play the roles, usually with an attractive young male star playing the young prince. They parade to Motsuji where a greeting ceremony between Lord Hidehira and Yoshitsune is performed on the banks of the large pond.

Everyone wears beautiful traditional costumes and either ride horses, march or are drawn along by ox-driven carts!

All that excitement including mobs of people craning to see the procession and throngs of squealing fan-girls sometimes adds up to a bit much for the horses. I was pretty nervous for Yoshi, since his horse kept squealing along with the girls, and one of his mounted female retainers whose massive...gelding...got progressively more massive the more anxious he got.

On Sunday, it was time to head north. Last year, the weather was less than ideal so I vowed that come the spring 2014, I would see as many cherry blossoms as I could. I call it "桜の追及" (Sakura no Tsukiyu) also known as Pursuit of Cherry Blossoms. 

 

My cherry chasing started last month in Sendai, has continued to Kitakami and on Sunday it concluded at Hirosaki Castle in Aomori Prefecture. 

The castle was a fortress built in feudal Meiji Era Japan, completed around 1611. It was the seat of the Tsugaru clan until feudalism was abolished around 260 years later. 

The towers, gardens, eight bridges, five gates and moats are surrounded and enmeshed with around 2600 sakura trees. Once the park was dedicated a historical site in 1952, citizens of Hirosaki started donating trees to the park. The result is stunning.