Hanabi

Since Avi didn't actually make it to the fireworks festival, I took it upon myself to write the next entry.
Every year we look forward to the Tsuchiura Hanabi Taikai (Fireworks Competition) It's a huge event. Actually, I think it might be the largest fireworks display in Japan. Thousands of people flood around the Sakura river, fighting for the best place to have a picnic and check out the action.
To start, Mik and I were throwing around a few plans. We knew we wanted to BBQ, but we also had to work until 5pm that day. We also had decided to ride our bicycles to the event. Mik said that last year it took him about 15 minutes to reach the event, but for some reason, it took nearly an hour on this particular day. Don't forget we had to BBQ, so Mik had the grill in a plastic bag in his bike basket. What a sight to see.
So the plan was to hook up with some friends who had gotten there early and have a nice peaceful BBQ while watching the spectacle. But oh no, that wasn't the case.
See, it's more crowded than you could imagine. We are talking 3 square kilometers of wall to wall people. After parking the bikes, we set off on foot with the BBQ grill and random bottles of wine and a lot of beer. To make a very long story short, it took forever for Mik and I to find our friends. And when Mik finally found them, he lost me for another 15 minutes. It was not a very relaxing experience up to that point.
Well, I finally found Mik and friends and we settled in to watch the show which had now been going on overhead for an hour. Our friends had a really nice spot and that's where we took this little video. Pretty cool huh? Since it was so crowded, we were not able to BBQ. That made us a little sad since we lugged the grill with us through the whole ordeal. We decided to wait until the crowd cleared away and re-positioned ourselves near the river bank and had a great BBQ while watching all the traffic flee the scene.
At the end of the night, it was time to go home by bicycle, uphill the entire way, with the grill and all left over party supplies. It was a journey that I will never forget. What a great adventure. Next year I will take my van for sure.

Jon