Tokyo holds many festivals (matsuri) throughout the year. Major festivals include the Sanno Festival at Hie Shrine, and the Sanja Festival at Asakusa Shrine. The Kanda Matsuri in Tokyo is held every two years in May. The festival features a parade with elaborately decorated floats and thousands of people. Annually on the last Saturday of July, an enormous fireworks display is held over the Sumida River and it attracts over 1 million viewers. Once cherry blossoms, or sakura, bloom in spring, many residents gather in parks such as Ueno Park, Inokashira Park, and the Shinjuku Gyoen National Garden for picnics under the cherry trees.
- This list is incomplete; you can help by expanding it.
Famous quotes containing the words festivals and/or tokyo:
“Why wont they let a year die without bringing in a new one on the instant, cant they use birth control on time? I want an interregnum. The stupid years patter on with unrelenting feet, never stopping—rising to little monotonous peaks in our imaginations at festivals like New Year’s and Easter and Christmas—But, goodness, why need they do it?”
—John Dos Passos (1896–1970)
“Eclecticism is the degree zero of contemporary general culture: one listens to reggae, watches a western, eats McDonald’s food for lunch and local cuisine for dinner, wears Paris perfume in Tokyo and “retro” clothes in Hong Kong; knowledge is a matter for TV games. It is easy to find a public for eclectic works.”
—Jean François Lyotard (b. 1924)