At the end of the summer several years ago, I went to see “Owara Kaze no Bon” festival for the first time. I found so many hints about town promotion as well as I was captured by its beauty.

Above all, it is very remarkable that both junior-high and high school boys and girls play a main roll in the dancing and also in town promotion for two nights in a row. This can be found nowhere else in the whole country.

This year, AWAODORI dance in Tokushima is getting focused because of the two movies about AWAODORI made and being made this year including “Bizan”. Tokushima prefecture is now so excited. But AWAODORI is a dancing festival participated mainly by grown-ups, therefore seems to be less attractive than “Kaze no Bon” festival in beauty and youth.

The “Kaze no Bon” dance is quieter and more somber. They go dancing throughout the town to the tune of Chinese fiddle and shamisen (a three stringed musical instrument). They dance in dark compared to AWAODORI dancing during daytime. This darkness emphasizes the dancers’ beauty of their youth, and it affects you more deeply.

There is a strict principle in “Kaze no Bon” that those junior-high and high school students must retire from the stage when they turn 24 or 25 years old. They give their roll to the younger generation and begin to support them from behind the scenes.

I guess this spectacular beauty of youth is the reason that attracts five thousand buses from all over the country every year to see this festival. They said they start practicing for the next year as soon as the festival ends. All the kids repeat hard practices three times a week in school or the community. As a result, there is neither dropout students nor overweight children in the town.

Also, this area is well known for its good-looking boys and girls. There seems to be a natural system to produce beautiful boys and girls in this town, which is, as they become used to taken pictures through the festival, their self-consciousness grows stronger and they become actually beautiful as a result. I’ve heard that those good-looking children who spend this kind of adolescence are little likely to leave the town to go to the city. A majority of them stay in this town. This is one of the most wonderful town promotions I’ve ever known.

If the adults can produce and lead this kind of cultural performing art, I feel that the children can grow to be sound adult of considerable intelligence without wandering from the right path.

I strongly recommend that you go see these beautiful students and young people around twenty if you have never seen “Kaze no Bon” yet.

“Owara Kaze no Bon”

http://www.city.toyama.toyama.jp/yatsuo/nourin/owara/