Explore everyday life in Japan
Wara, pronounced something like Wah-La, is the Japanese word for straw, and rather than be made from wheat, in Japan, it is often made by drying the tall stalks of rice after they have been cut during the annual harvest.
Many years ago, wara was used to make a wide variety of household goods and everyday items in Japan, from shoes to hats, from baskets to brooms, and in some cases, even roofs on houses. These days, however, wara doesn’t have as many practical uses.
To celebrate the historical usages of wara with members of younger generations and also to increase tourism while exposing visitors to some of the various crafting techniques that were involved with making traditional household wara goods, one small town on the Southern side of Niigata City called Uwamuro partnered with Musashino University of Art in Tokyo to create a Wara Art Festival.
Every year for the past ten years, during the first weekend of September, a two-day festival is held at Uwasekigata Park in the Southern Ward of Niigata City.
During these two days, local goods and produce are sold by a number of vendors whose tents line both sides of a walking path shaded by cherry trees. Not only that, but traditional singing and dancing is performed on an outdoor stage and those who are interested can try their hand at making a number of traditional wara goods and crafts.
A short walk from the area where the stage and vendors are, the real highlight of this festival awaits, five enormous sculptures that have been made from wara. These sculptures are positioned at five different locations throughout the park and are not only fun to look at, but are also great to pose with and sometimes even enter.
Following are a few pictures of these sculptures and the area that surrounds Uwasekigata Park.
Enjoy!!!
This is an ongoing series that will explore various aspects of daily life in Japan. My hope is that this series will not only reveal to its followers, image by image, what Japan looks like, but that it will also inform its followers about unique Japanese items and various cultural and societal practices. If you are interested in getting regular updates about life in Japan, please consider following me at @boxcarblue. If you have any questions about life in Japan, please don’t hesitate to ask. I will do my best to answer all of your questions.