I know what you're thinking, "Ooh, a festival that celebrates some sticks that grow really really fast in sub-tropical forests. Big deal. Wood is dumb." I admit to thinking the same thing (especially the "wood is dumb" part) the first time I reluctantly hopped on a train with my friend Candy Wong three years ago to see it. I was going just because I really like festival food stalls and wanted some yakitori, but damn was I blown away. Here's the setup: every year on the first weekend of November the coastal city of Usuki decorates is historical downtown area with tens of thousands of sections of sliced bamboo cylinders containing a candle. Some streets are merely lined with the cylinders while other streets, temples, parks and residences have elaborate constructs, patterns and themes. Now, when I say "historical" in reference to this part of Usuki I mean it's still got old cobblestone paths, rice storehouses and samurai villas. Even on a normal day in downtown Usuki without the candlelit streets one still feels like they've entered 17th century Japan.
I've seen a lot of festivals in Japan, from Gion to Kagura, Sakura to ones celebrating a town's derelict train roundhouse (Kusu's Kikankou festival). I've seen videos online of fire festivals in central Japan where hillsides are ignited in controlled burns to create messages in kanji and festivals where men ride logs down steep hills. Usuki's Takeyoi trumps them all for beauty, hands down. My Fuji FinePix also recognizes the absurd brilliance of the event, I think, because it's so awed it can't seem to TAKE A GODDAMN PROPER PICTURE OF A SINGLE DAMN THING AT NIGHT!!! For me though the best pictures are in the mind, and believe me, you'll never ever forget what you see here. Now if I could only find a USB cable that fits in my ears so I can upload those images to the computer...
--Matt
PS: Yes, there IS a lowrider scene in Japan! I've seen them in Beppu, one in Kusu (a red Monte Carlo) and now this one in Usuki.
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