Just Another Day

I know this has probably happened to you a hundred times. You're sitting on your couch on a Sunday morning eating oatmeal, listening to CNN and typing an employee review on your laptop, and suddenly a -cho parade comes by your house to honor you. Ho hum.

Another amazing day in Japan! It's a neighborhood celebration, I think it has something to do with the changing of the seasons, and this cute group came by to say hello! They actually were going to each house in the neighborhood (I think to bring blessings and good luck?) and they *changed* their parade route when they saw me standing on my porch. They came right in front of my house, paused and asked my name, and then the main dude shouted "Miss K1mbeary" three times into a bull horn and they all chanted something and hoisted the float up and down. There was lots of cheering and big smiles. Every person sang out "Herro!" as they passed by, and put their two fingers up in the peace-sign (meaning friendship or happiness here). It's amazing, isn't it?

I watched them go to other houses and then grabbed my camera and waited until I could hear them circling back around to my area. I ran to the end of the block and snapped a few photos and got another round of herro's. I just love stuff like this. This is one of the types of things that makes Japan different from any other place that I've been in the world. I can hear the taiko drummers as I type this, so apparently the celebration isn't over.

I don't know why Blogger is suddenly putting my pictures at the left of the post and making them small, so you'll have to click on it to really see what's going on. And when you do that, feel free to be totally jealous of my neighborhood, too. Can you believe I live here? How great is my life?