Monday, August 15, 2005



The main summer festival of the year was this weekend, and boy was it fun! Lots of amazing performances of traditional Okinawan Dance, music and martial arts. I got drafted by the Taiko team to hold their big flag while they performed so I got to wear their costume which was nice. It meant I didn't get any pictures of their performance but it was worth it. They were super impressive, a very energetic performance, I can't wait to learn how to do taiko drumming. So as always there was lots of eating and drinking afterwards until the wee hours. The festival was over both Saturday and Sunday and as the Taiko group weren't performing on the Sunday I got to relax and watch all the other performances. There was this one chap who did a variety of performance, a dance with a fan and one with a flower which were nice, but he also did some martial arts. Wow, they were just breath-taking, the one that most impressed me involved him using two razor sharp (he demonstrated this by slicing some bamboo) nun chucks and breakneck speed, I have no idea how he didn't cut off his own head or at least remove an ear. He also turned out to be a very happy friendly drunk too. During the daytime on both days I chilled out at the beach, oh I finally got snorkelling equipment! Ah yes, I saw a shark! Yup that’s right, I was snorkelling on Saturday just scooting along the edge of the reef and I saw a shark, I am guessing it was about four feet long, but very slender so it wasn't that scary. It was so beautiful! I wish Id been able to follow it more but it disappeared into the blue and I didn't feel like following it away from the reef. This is after Nick telling me people never, ever saw sharks here! Harrumph.

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