National holidays. Ahhhh. I love them. I have no clue why it was a national holiday like most of the other holidays I have had but I loved it none the less.

Imagine it. 15 little kids dressed up like Samurai. Adorable. Some were even carrying long wooden poles with sharp metal pointy objects on the end. (A brilliant idea, I might add. Giving 6 year old boys long poles with sharp metal pointy objects on the end.)

15 grown men carrying an amazing mini-temple that was golden and appeared to be incredibly heavy especially since they carried the mini-temple (like pharohs might have carried Cleopatra) up a mountain while swaying it back and forth and, at the same time, hopping and yelling. There was afterall a God inside. The swaying, hopping, and yelling was to drive away the devil. Coincidentally, there were 3 devils present - all wearing red masks with frowns and holding sticks that they would shake at various people.

The jesters were wearing white masks and people played tricks on them. Jon, Vineeth, and Antony even got in on the action. They ran in, stole the jester's box of goodies, and made their getaway. The jester didn't even know what happened. The crowd went wild. The decked out photographers - with 3 cameras and huge lenses per person, took advantage of the photo op. We started calling them the paparazzi.

The parade people had to get the mini-temple into the temple while the devils had to prevent them from doing so. They had to try again and again. Perhaps 20 times. The men's faces showed their pain and exhaustion. We cheered them on. I was worried they would drop the mini-temple. Luckily, they finally got in.

It was cool to see all the Shinto priests watching the festivities. Even the head priest (bishop) was present. He was wearing a huge black peacock hat thing. You could just tell he was the head honcho. It was a lot different from Sunday church.

The the dancers came out to celebrate their victory. They had a 30 foot pole with a large feather pom pom at the end that they had to throw across the court to one another. It looked like it was a real challenge to catch it. One obachan (old lady) got smacked on the head when the stick almost touched the ground.

It was all fun and games at the Niyodo festival.