This weekend we had a unique and wonderful opportunity to go visit the family of one of Greg's friends, Yoshino-san, from work. We were invited to join his family at their home and have the most wonderful Japanese lunch prepared by his mother. His mother is an outstanding chef, and does an incredible job of preparing seasonal dishes, like bamboo rice. It was a feast fit for an emperor and we were the lucky ones to enjoy it.
After lunch we went into to town for the festival, in which Yoshino-san's family was participating. It was a really cool festival. There are twelve different "floats" that represent different parts of town. The floats are pulled around by long ropes by the towns people, and they play competing music to the other floats from around town. So each time the float that is being pulled around comes across a float from another part of town, the music gets really load and the two floats play competing music with competing rhythms in a mock musical battle to which people in masks dance and make threatening gestures to the other floats masked beast. It's really quite something to watch. So we had the pleasure of pulling one of the floats, and a rather excited man insisted on Dylan riding the float. That didn't go over so well, but they became friends none the less.
After the festival we said our goodbyes and hopped the train back to Tokyo. We're anxious to make a return trip to Ome, and hope that we can again spend some time in the mountain home of our friends the Yoshino-sans.
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