JAPAN: Top sumo wrestler, Mongolian-born Hakuho, performs the traditional New Year rites at a shrine in Tokyo

Record ID: 466064

  • Title: JAPAN: Top sumo wrestler, Mongolian-born Hakuho, performs the traditional New Year rites at a shrine in Tokyo
  • Date: 9th January 2012
  • Summary: CHILD WATCHING PERFORMANCE
  • Embargoed: 24th January 2012 12:00
  • Keywords:
  • Location: Japan, Japan
  • Country: Japan
  • Topics: Quirky,People,Light / Amusing / Unusual / Quirky,Sports
  • Reuters ID: LVA369O6IS93MQW0H5GBT8IHMOK1
  • Story Text: Hundreds of sumo fans and visitors flocked to Tokyo's Meiji shrine to usher in the new year with a performance by top sumo wrestlers on Friday (January 6).
    Clad in nothing but a pink loin cloth in the depths of winter, Japan's top sumo wrestler, Mongolian-born Hakuho, led the traditional new year rites.
    Weighing in at 153-kilos (340 pounds) and standing 1.93 metres (6 ft 4 inches) tall, the wrestler is now the 69th grand champion of Japan's ancient sport, which some historians say dates back 2,000 years.
    Twenty-six-year-old Hakuho, which means "white phoenix" was born with the name Munkhbat Davaajargal, and made it to sumo's highest rank of Yokozuna in 2007.
    Professional sumo now has nearly 50 foreign-born wrestlers from more than a dozen countries ranging from Bulgaria to Brazil.
    The participation of foreigners has raised eyebrows in the conservative sumo world, with a Japanese wrestler denied the top spot since 2000.
    However, some fans said it was not the nationality of the sumo wrestler that counted.
    "He is a handsome man. And, he acts as a Japanese role model even though he is a foreign national. Great thinker as well. I can't admire him enough," retired teacher Takashi Aizawa said.
    The past year has seen the sport wracked by controversy, after a match-fixing scandal incriminated officials, coaches and wrestlers alike.
    But for one young fan among the hundreds of people that crowded the shrine, seeing a Yokozuna up-close was still a special moment.
    "It's more impressive to watch him in person, rather than on TV," school student Kazuki Okamura said.
    The rivalry between waves of foreign competitors -- the Hawaiians in the 1980s and the Mongolians in the 1990s -- and their Japanese counterparts has been credited with halting a decline in the sport's popularity.
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