JPG: Stories: Photo Essay: yakuza block party

yakuza block party

By Stephen Fulghum

11 Dec 2008

yakuza block party

After a fair trek through the back streets of Kyoto we arrived at our ryokan, signed in, and asked about local places to eat. "Well... you have to come to our neighborhood Bon festival on Saturday... there will be free food!" We had tried to miss the main Bon travel week in the middle of August when many Japanese head home for family reunions and, in the Buddhist tradition, to pray for the spirits of their ancestors at family altars. This one seemed a bit late. I expected a small, low-key neighborhood barbeque.

...so we arrived a half-hour late on Saturday and my proprietress, with some urgency, guided me through a growing crowd. At a table, staffed by several young men, she introduced me and acquired a long string of tickets for me, my wife and my son. Just in time, it seemed, before they were all out. Along the way we passed a large, immaculate altar with lanterns and flowers facing the street just outside of a large back lot where the festival was in full swing. Two faces smiled back at us from photographs above the altar. Well... one smiled.

The lines were already long at the food stalls so I chose to wander about with my camera and hope that my wife and son would share a bit of their take... sort of like Halloween at home. Everyone was there... from twenty-something's in high heels to dads with strollers and kids falling asleep in their laps... to moms... grandmothers... grandfathers... kids of all ages. The sign in the middle of them read, according to my kanji dictionary, "One Way Traffic". When you pass out free food and beer you need crowd control.

In the center of the lot was a large, raised stage with several men chanting to drums. It was a strong, regular chant that continued through the night. The men, priests I believe, would take turns with the chant and it never seemed to vary. In all it lasted for more than five hours. Early on a few people began to slowly move counterclockwise around the stage. Step and sway... clap your hands. Through the night their numbers grew... though only a few were in it for the duration. This was the dance... the Bon Odori.

There were few westerners about and most of us, I expected, were guests at the ryokan. One fellow seemed particularly at ease. He was Canadian, and had spent some time in the area. We passed him a bit later on the street and asked about the couple in the photographs above the altar. "That's the previous boss", he said. "Boss?" my wife asked. "Yes... the neighborhood Boss... this is all in his memory." I looked more closely... ah... yes... the yakuza... we had heard the suggestion from another guest who had chosen not to come. Dark glasses... even in death. At the end of the night, our friend said, the custom is to greet the new Boss and thank him for the party. If you are favored he might pass you an envelope with a 10,000 en note inside (about $100). That's not likely to be my case, however, he added.

No one seemed to mind my wandering about for photographs. Some would pose and flash the universal Japanese "V" sign for group photos. I was a guest, it seemed, and was afforded a fair bit of leeway as a gaijin. One young man came up and admired my camera, a huge Canon digital with an image-stabilized lens. He smiled, and spoke a fast string of Japanese that I couldn't begin to follow. He didn't seem to be one of the organizers. They were apparent... standing about, dressed in khaki pants and wearing white shirts with the logo of a sports club... just to see that all was going well. Some of the men behind the beer table, popping tabs, were a bit more obvious given the tattoos running up their arms. But all were friendly... or friendly enough.

And the food was really good. The best stall, with the longest line, was the one for unagi... freshwater eel. Kids with little fishing poles caught live eels from a tank... which were then placed in a bucket of ice... and passed to a fellow with a wonderful weathered face who must have dressed a million of them given his skill at it. Spike the head, cut the neck, strip one side, strip the spine from the other and rinse. They were then strung on spits... broiled over charcoal with a teriyaki-like sauce... and passed to the next person in a line that stretched down a long, dark side street. It was the local delicacy done right.

If the kids were not fishing for eels they were fishing for gumballs floating in a circulating tank. The trick was that they had to pick up the gumballs with a small ring that was bigger than any of them. The best technique was to jam a mix of small and large balls into the ring and dump them quickly into your bowl. It is an art form and some of the kids were getting expert advice from ex-kids.

... or they were playing pachinko in a long line of machines that seemed to be tuned for them to win. My friend, seeing my photographs on the camera, suggested with a touch of cynicism, "They want them used to winning." Sort of like "Here kid, have a cigarette" I thought. Still, the machines looked like fun and they got a lot of play time.

The kids were the kings and queens of the night. There were toys for them everywhere. This older fellow brought his own toy dog but to his side was a young man with a new toy 9mm pistol. I think it was a toy. Looking at the photo now he seems to be loading his clip.

I'm sure it was a toy.

And one line of kids, sitting along the garden wall of the big house next to the party lot, were particularly cute with their inflatable Pink Panther. I stepped up with my camera and one of the moms said, in perfect English, "He wants to take your picture." One of them showed me a big grin and flashed the "V". The others seemed not so sure. At that moment the young man who had spoken to me earlier about my camera, now a bit inebriated, stepped up on my left and began to speak again in urgent Japanese. He wasn't unfriendly but he was trying to tell me something important and I just wasn't getting it. "Sumimasen" I said, "Wakarimasen." I'm sorry... I don't understand. My son, who speaks no Japanese, understood well enough. "He's telling you it's time to move on dad... come on... let's go." Looking back at the kids' photo now it seems that several of them were looking behind me and to my right. At the time I thought... perhaps I'm a bit too close to family. It was best for the two of us to go for another beer.

So we sat back on one of the red, covered tables, drank our beer, and watched the party wind down. It was 11:30 and the priests on the raised stand finally ended their chanting. They filed past us to a standing ovation, my own included, and the party began to break up. The entire evening had been a remarkable feat of public relations. The organizers had good reason to be pleased with it.

Walking down the side street towards our ryokan I looked back and noticed a woman in a beautiful summer yukata introducing her young daughter to a man standing near the wall where the kids had been sitting earlier. The two of them, mother and daughter, had been regulars in the Bon Odori. He seemed to give the very young lady a bow, but perhaps he was just bending down to say hello. In any case, it seemed quite gracious on his part. I considered taking their picture. I considered being a real photojournalist.... but... there was that line of young men in their khaki pants and sports shirts standing right behind him.

I thought... I am a guest... I have been treated very well and I owe the proprietress of my ryokan my best behavior. It is no small thing in Japan to introduce a stranger to your community. You take responsibility for their actions. I was under an obligation. And I thought... more strongly... that it might also be unwise and I was far from home. I had, perhaps, already stepped a bit across the line. In the end I did not take the picture... even now I haven't named the street. I will take up photojournalism in my next life.

The next morning I ran across my friend who had explained how things work. One of the young Western women in his party at the ryokan had danced in the Bon Odori for three hours straight. She had thanked the new Boss for the evening.... and she had, indeed, been handed that envelope.