19:30 ararived at Sendai the bigest city in the Tohoku region.
First stop – the AER building which offers a free city view at the 31.st floor. Althoough the observation platforms only faces to the (i believe it is ) the north and south side and was still worth coming by. From here i could see a long long roofed shopping street which i will come later to the conlcusion is filled with those tanabata streamers.
To be honest i was really underestimating the title of “biggest tanabata festival in Japan” – now i know why it is called like that. The whole shopping street, probably at least 1km in length, has those streamers hanging around. This really invites for a nice romantic stroll, eating out and having fun resulting in a small economy boost for the city i guess.
The tanabata festival is not a Sendai specific festival but is mostly held all over Japan around the 07th July (because of different calenders and moon settings in some cities it is held on the 07th August as in the case of Sendai). The legend around the star festival goes like this:
There once was a gifted weaver, named Orihime, who was very deligent in her work but also sad since she was occupied by her work she couldn’t find true love. Her father, Heaven’s emperor, was worried and arranged a meeting with Hikoboshi – a cow herder. It was love at first sight, however backfired immensiely since both lovers neglected their duties. In response to this Heaven’s emperor got angry and seperated those two lovers by the river in heaven. Orihime having no chance to see her lover again began again to weave all day. Seeing that the Heaven’s emperor changed his mind and allowed those two to meet each other, however only once a year on the 7th day of the 7th month ( as 7 being a lucky number).
This story translates into two stars – Altair and Vega – which according to the legend are seperated by the milky way and only meet once every year. At the festival people would write their wishes and hang them on a bamboo tree. Additionally streamers would be floating all around the fetival area. The long streamers representing the weaver’s threads and the decoration on the outside called “amakazari” represent a fisherman’s full net. (nippon.com, japansociety.org, Accessed: 23.10.219)
By the way Sendai is famous for Gyutan – grilled beeftongue – which originiated from here. So i went and tried. At first i lost my way to what seems to be an Izakaya bar and found a cozy family restaurant in the end. Perfect atmosphere.
23:15 departure from Sendai back home to Shinjuku station.