Stoat - Where?

Last night was Hanabi, a fireworks festival that is held all over Japan. The festival is in two parts, with the second display coming next Saturday. The two displays are sponsored by rival local newspapers and it’s a kind of competition to see which can produce the best. I’m not sure how it affects the sales though I can’t imagine it does too much…

Anyway, the second display will have to be awesome if it wants to beat what was served up last night. The fireworks went on non-stop for 2 hours and it was probably the best display I’ve ever seen. It made the Bonfire Night events in England look paltry by comparison and even put Liverpool’s Millenium display to shame.

And this despite torrential rain. For a country that prides itself on weather prediction, they really couldn’t have picked a worse day. It was the only day this month that it’s rained properly, but boy did it rain. I got an awesome view of the display from my balcony but that wasn’t enough. I’d bought a yukatta and wasn’t going to waste the opportunity to put it on and look like an idiot. This is one of the times of year where lots of people wear their yukatta, so I figured I wouldn’t stand out too much… Well not much more than usual.

So down onto Nagara Bridge I went. And I got drenched, but it was worth it because the view was great, with the river and boats providing a great backdrop. And besides, the yukatta is practically a bathrobe, so I was dry again almost immediately after I got out of the rain. Photos of the night can be found here.

The honeymoon is over. All my illusions have been shattered. Someone nicked off with my bike yesterday, meaning I’m now forced to walk or talk the bus again. To be fair, it was my own fault as I left it unlocked for 6 hours in the middle of town, but still it’s a wake up call that all’s not perfect. Bike theft is one of the biggest problems, crime-wise and I’ve got almost zero chance of getting it back. Although it was registered I don’t expect the police to spend to much time looking for one pretty generic silver bike in a city of about 300,000…

I suppose, given that crime will always exist, that I would prefer to live in a society where that crime is mostly the stealing of unattended bikes, rather than breaking and entering or random assaults. Anyway, it’s just a reminder not to take things too carefully. You can get a used bike here for about ¥4000 so I’ll be back terrorising the streets in no time!