Naha Tug of War Festival

I was so excited when I learned that the Naha Tug of War Festival was this weekend! I had seen pictures of it when researching Okinawa before we came here and it looked like it would be a cool experience! This event made the Guinness Book of World Records in 1995 for the having the biggest rope made by rice straw in the world. The rope was huge! They said it weighed approximately 90,000 pounds. My question is, where do they store this thing?

We made our way to Naha to catch the end of the parade that was going on before the main event. This is the first parade we have seen in Okinawa, so I was looking forward to it! During this parade, each town had their own (huge) flag and they took turns balancing it on their waist. It was quite the site to see! Sometimes they would lose balance of the flag, so there were people with sticks surrounding them to push it back up. That's the best way I can explain it! lol

After the parade had ended, we walked up and down Kokusai street looking at all the different shops. We then headed up to 58 where the tug of war was going to be happening. I wish we would have been there when the rope was being brought out, so that I could of got better pictures of it. Oh well, there's always next year! We got pretty close to the main part of the rope. Longer smaller strands of the rope came off from the main rope for everyone in the crowd to pull on. Once the contest began, it was seriously crazy! Chad and I both got a part of the rope to pull but it was hard to pull when I was getting smooshed the whole time. There was seriously too many people there for comfort! They stunk too! Haha! The tug of war lasted for 30 minutes, but Chad I left after like 20 because we were tired of being in the crowd of people. It was a fun experience! I told Chad to bring a knife so that we could cut off a piece of rope to bring home with us. It is said to bring good luck if you do! Unfortunately he left his knife in the car so we weren't able to get a piece this year. Bummer!