Hirosaki Lantern Festival – A Cold Friday Night

 

 

These warm faces want to welcome you to a virtual tour of the the Annual Hirosaki Lantern Festival. Held the second weekend every February in the the ancient Hirosakijo Castle grounds.

I love this Castle. I can never do  it justice through pictures, but it has an ancient, yet timeless appeal  that captures the admiration of many. We met a man Friday night who told us he came up from Tokyo just to see the Castle’s small festival. (We were the only Americans we saw that night, so people were a little more interested to talk to us than usual… besides they needed a picture or two of Mina and Marie, ya know, the usual…. which makes me think, what are we going to do when we move back to the states and strangers don’t want to take our picture. I will probably miss that.)

  

It was a cold one! Yeesh. The girls wore pants, then footy pjs, then a snow suit and barely kept warm!

  

Here Marie takes in the fine sights. She was a great walker. I think the fairy wings helped.

       

And here is the part where my camera runs out of batteries and we use the Blackberry for pictures. Hmmm… that’s life isn’t it? A beautiful trip where your camera breaks and you have to make the best of it and pretend like it doesn’t bother you. That’s ok though. For those of you avid picture takers (who isn’t really) when you finally stop posing and clicking the camera you just have to soak it in and enjoy….

 

…until you see a giant Winnie the Pooh. Then break out the cell phone!

We walked until some festival volunteers handed us two lit lanterns that we could put anywhere in the park. And seeing as our lives are currently one long homage to all things Disney, we found this carving of Minnie Mouse to give worship to. The girls, with their electric Tinkerbell wings, stood in reverent silence as Daddy laid the lantern at the foot of the oversized head.

Later we found RAINBOW SNOW! An empty field of snow was lit up with fluorescent lights. It sounds simple, but it was really my favorite part. So pretty and a lot of fun to play in :) 

Lastly, a line of translucent paintings, lit from behind to create one large latern-like museum. I found a painting of a mother carrying a crying child. I joked, referring to it as “Me and Mina!” But then I saw this picture and it took my breathe away:

Japanese Mina! Really! The short full lips. The flat nose, and big turned down almond eyes. I love it.

Someday I hope to know the stories behind some of this art work. Someday.

Then later I found this lovely picture of a mother and daughter.

 

Instead of posting the one of the crying child I thought I would post this sweet one that reminds me of me and Marie. Mostly because of the ages (and it’s purdy), but also because the little girls looks like she is asking for something… maybe the ancient version of a barbie or something ;)

And the snow fell harder as we briskly walked back to our hotel.