The Parade.

With the lantern event finished at 9-ish of the Friday night, the next day was entirely devoted to the Hyakumangoku Matsuri Parade (百万石まつり). Hyakuman (百万) is a million, goku (石) is a measurement of rice production. Here’s the really short Wiki entry:

“The festival commemorates the entry of Lord Maeda Toshiie into Kanazawa Castle in 1583. The highlight of the festival is the Hyakumangoku Parade, which begins on the second Saturday in June.The Hyakumangoku Parade reenacts the entrance of Lord Maeda Toshiie and his entourage into Kanazawa. The participants are dressed in 16th-century period costumes and parade around several city blocks.”


What I especially liked about this parade is that, unlike the western parades or the New York thanksgiving parade, there was a story behind it. In this case it is the reenactment of a 16th century event, so the parade was truly very rich in history. And probably also because I like to see people dressed up in the pretty Japanese costumes and kimonos much more than the flamboyant gaudy and quite random American costumes.

Well, like every parade, it is divided in different successive processions.

The first group were the music bands, occasionally accompanied by middle and high school acrobatic - cheerleaders. The members of these music bands are usually Kanazawa employers of hospitals, post offices or fire departments. Then came a car with three Misses Kanazawa (whom, me and Helen, out of female jealousy, did not regard as that too pretty).
After the 3 Misses waved their hands to us, began the real fun – the historic parade - with the priests, the King’s acrobats, vassals and many other people whose historical meaning I could not guess (neither could my host mother). At some point came a very tall cart on top of which 4 children of around 4 years of age were seated. My host mother shared with me that they were supposed to be the King’s children (the little princes and princesses), and to be able to play that role they had to pass a very competitive audition. My god, all for 90 minutes of hand-waving ride.


There was also a separate cart for the queen, while her maids followed behind, wearing their beautiful kimonos (whose pictures I was able to take before the march) and finally, at the very end, came the king on the horse followed by his army. The king’s role, as well as the queen’s, were given to famous Kanazawa actors. The king came on a horse, and since we sat right at the edge of the pathwalk (meaning directly facing the parade), we also experienced all the smells coming of from the horse. There was a designated man who followed the horse and collected its left-overs. That is the part I would rather not do of all the things in the parade.

My host father was one of the King’s troops, so I got to take pictures with him right before the parade, in the train station, where they all assembled and from where they proceeded. I also thus got to know some of his firemen colleague-friends, whom I would later that day end up drinking with.