12:26 a.m, 17-July 09, Home.
The time has come again for this long-awaited exciting Japanese festival, Bon Odori 盆踊り, a festival to worship and honour the departed, hence the first word interpretation "Bon 盆". Japanese Buddhism ditto to the Chinese believes the "door" that separates the horizon in between the human and the deceased, open once a year to give freedom to the spirit to revisit their family. Of so many years of practicing, it has been assimilated into the Japanese and Chinese custom where family members gathers (reunion) at their beloved-deceased's graveyards with then a small 
feast ensues. During this day, it's a taboo to question the genuineness of the spirit and the "door" existence, fearing bad omen will imminent to those who question, ya know stubborn and trying to be cute young kids nowadays love to query and make lots of disturbing and unnecessary 
statements especially from scientific perspective :). In return, the adults, in order to appease the kids, fear is instilled frequently into them, haha :p.In respectful to the cultural beliefs, it has become a practical from generation to generation. This festival sometimes will associate with dancing, thus the final word connotation "Odori 踊り" to hype up the festival. Bon Odori 盆踊り, in short, a dance for the "watching" spirits as an entertainment not only for the departed but the living as well :).
View all pictures in a slide show manner. Click here.
33rd Bon Odori's flier
Huh? The name changed drastically to Kompleks Sukan Negara? See the difference of last year picture taken, below. Hmmm perhaps to nationalise the name from wholly English to national language?
Last year 2008, Panasonic Sports Complex entrance
As always, tones of people visited this auspicious event!
Audiences awaiting the opening ceremony to commence joyfully
The drums for performance - upclose
Drummers, burning desire and couldn't afford to disappoint the audiences, to unleash their months of hardwork practice, bowed silently awaits the clock to strike 7:00 p.m sharp!
7:00 p.m struck, performers hit the drums in paramountcy, donned in their Yukata 浴衣 with a Japanese word (祭) printed, means festival
Continuous courage of drum hitting
Similar to last year, audience joins hand-in-hand, emulating the stage dancers
Everyone was emulating merrily!Not forgetting - time to eat!
Cute Yakult's illustration banner, a yogurt-alike beverages
Not only myself but other visitors to salvage the foods and beverages booths!
Futomaki, sushi, mochi, unagi and etc, you name it, they have it!
Caterer, grilling the scrumptious unagi to serve pilling up thousand of customers
Enticing ice-cream!
Pleasant Yakitori (skewered chicken) as well!
Cute Yokomon ice-cream, I see them heavily promoting whenever there is a Japanese function
Hmmm! A new booth for this year, Sushi King!
Incredible! The whole concept of belt conveyance was installed! Yes, you got me right, the belt is moving the sushi's plates as though you are dining in their restaurant!
I'm still amazed with the belt conveyance idea brought to outdoor and installed there and then!
The only difference is that you have to stand while eating rather than sitting on cushiony sofa!
Well, reluctant to stand? You can purchase the nicely packed sushi for your later consumption :)
Japanese myriad of Omiyage (souvenir) for your selection
Poo poo indicator by Doraemon :p
Mobile toilets at your dispense by Toi Toi. Funny name, indeed!
A tank to collect and transport the feces? Yikes :)!
Visitors resting, chatting, leisuring, enjoying, cracked jokes and many more delightfully :)
Plenty more visitors at staired seats
A slight difference on 33rd Bon Odori. Additional performance besides drumming - Soran Bushi (ソーラン節) (fisherman's song and dance in Japan, click on the link to get the Lyrics @ Wikipedia :p)
Other additional dances, Malaysian mixed cultural dance. Malay, Chinese and Indian danceAesthetic pictures taken:
Children on right, pro-actively and fearlessly posing for picture taking
However, the left was clueless :). Their parent had to say "thank you, thank you very much, thank you for your kindness, we have to make a move", where everyone was storming to take pictures of their children :p
The end of 33rd Bon Odori :)As usual, we hastenly rush out of our life before the whole ceremony ends officially lest traffic jam. Thanks again to divinefang for his DSLR camera, if not we wouldn't get such a nice quality pictures :p. I'm kinda disappointed this time of not having the opportunity to video shoot their performance especially the well done Soran Bushi! I will be well prepare on next Bon Odori. However, you can view examples of Soran Bushi's in YouTube (below):
Another video:
That's all folks, extremely tire right now (2:04 a.m), time for bed. Will retouch this blog on the following day.
Another video:
That's all folks, extremely tire right now (2:04 a.m), time for bed. Will retouch this blog on the following day.
Go to: 32nd Bon Odori (盆踊り) festival 2008 blog.
Non related statement.
Often the test of courage is not to die but to live - Vittorio Alfieri.
