Sumida River Fireworks Festival
(Originally posted on adventurasia.freezope.org around 2003~2004)
Well I just got back after spending most of the afternoon + evening in Asakusa where the Sumida River Hanabi (Fireworks) Festival was held. Considered to be the largest fireworks display in Tokyo, with 20,000 shots, and lasting a spectacular 90 minutes.
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A few of us got together around 3:30 PM to find and secure a suitable location. After a bit of searching, we found a place, and put down the tarp + blanket. We then distributed some snacks and drinks for a nice little picnic. As the fireworks didn’t start until 7:10 PM, we killed time by playing some card games (Crazy Eight and Big 2) as well as Connect Four.
Around 6:00 PM some people started making announcements saying that the location that we wouldn’t be able to see any of the fireworks from the location that we had so happily camped out in. I thought it wasn’t very good that they made the announcement so late - they could have easily blocked off the area, or at least warned us in advance.
So we packed up all our belongings and proceeded to find another spot - easier said then done - as by that time, there were probably millions of people on the street. Well, maybe 10’s to 100’s of thousands of people. We ended up parking ourselves on the road (which by that time had been closed off to traffic) which was across the street from where we originally were.
The spot actually turned out quite nice as we were able to see both fireworks displays (although my neck is now sore from looking left to right) - the only bad thing is that there were quite a few traffic lights and power lines overhead where we were sitting - and as a result all of the photos contain either a powerline or a traffic lamp.
Filed under: Japan
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