Nebuta Festival
A Must See Event
The Nebuta Festival held in August every year in Aomori City, Japan attracts 3.5 million visitors. It is the largest festival in Japan.
The festival has been designated nationally as an intangible cultural asset. It consists 20 or more large floats with heights of 5 meters representing samurai warriors and many smaller floats which parade down the streets of Aomori. Dancing is also a major part of the festival.
Dancing For Everyone
It is 100 times more fun to dance in the festival than just to stand by and watch.
The best part of the festival is that ANYONE who wants to can join in the dancing.
The dancers are called haneto and haneto dance clothing can be
purchased in the local department stores or even rented from some stores.
The floats can be as tall as 5 meters.
Float of a Japanese demon.
Many people join the dancing.
The haneto dancers in the festival chant over and over RASSE-RA. However in the past this chant used to be RASSE. The clothing for the haneto dancers are also evolving. Recently many of the dancers have been wearing all black clothing and thus are called karasu haneto which means "crow" haneto. Even Tokyo DisneyLand has recently added their own float into the festival.
Disney's Float
button to listen.