JAPAN: Japan's phallic festival turning into new tourist destination for foreigners

Record ID: 465641

  • Title: JAPAN: Japan's phallic festival turning into new tourist destination for foreigners
  • Date: 13th April 2008
  • Summary: AUDIENCE
  • Embargoed: 28th April 2008 13:00
  • Keywords:
  • Location: Japan
  • Country: Japan
  • Topics: Religion
  • Reuters ID: LVAP0DT9I33ZGGWWXK2SXB4O1RC
  • Story Text: A three-century-old fertility festival at a Japanese shrine celebrates the coming of spring with raunchy symbols making their way down public streets.
    Nearly 30,000 people flocked to a small shrine outside of Tokyo Sunday (April 6) where huge phallus symbols emerged and went down public streets in an annual fertility festival.
    The Kanamara fertility festival with its trademark parades of portable phallic shrines is widely known not only to locals but also to foreigners, who made up nearly half this day's crowd.
    For centuries, local men and women have gathered for this festival to seek the blessings of fertility and protection from sexual diseases. In recent years, cross dressers and foreigners have started to join them.

    "Definitely, definitely more liberal in Japan. You wouldn't find a festival like this in the U.K. Maybe in secret somewhere, but nothing like this," said Angela Wheaton, 28, a visitor from the United Kingdom, holding a penis-shaped lollypop in her hand.
    Another European tourist, 25-year-old banker French banker Elizabeth Filipe, agreed.

    "There is nothing very similar. There is the gay parade in France and around the gay world, but nothing with a phallus or things like this. And people are not shy," she told Reuters.
    The festival began over three hundred years ago after prostitutes demanded protection from an epidemic of syphilis. Now the shrine says it is observed to help protect people from the AIDS virus and supports a campaign to alleviate the plight of its sufferers. The mystical core ceremonies date back to a time millennia ago when even Buddhism had not reached Japan.

    "I'd really like to have a baby. And before that, I need a boyfriend. I came here, hoping those wishes would come true," said Chiho HIroki, a 33-year-old computer engineer.
    Phallic worship is still common in Japan and can be seen observed in shrines through out the country especially at this time of the year.
    Kimiko Nakamura, head priestess of the Kanayama Shrine, said she sees an increasing number of foreigners visiting this festival every year.

    "There are people of all nationalities participating in this festival. In general, traditional Japanese festivals are not very accessible to foreigners, but this one is different. Anybody can blend in very easily so I think that's why many people visit here," Nakamura said.
    Worship of the male genitalia echoes ancient rituals that were performed all over the world in ancient pagan rites. In the western world, the advent of Christianity, which considered such celebrations as obscene, wiped out the rituals.
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