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🏮 Bishamondo Hadaka Oshiai Taisai

毘沙門堂裸押合大祭

Minamiuonuma, Niigata (Zenkoji Temple (Urasa Bishamondo)) · Every year on 3 March

170 days to go
Rooms around Minamiuonuma, Niigata fill up while the festival is on.

The Urasa Bishamondo Nude Oshi-ai Festival, held at Urasa Bishamondo (Zenkoji Temple) in Minamiuonuma City, Niigata Prefecture, is a traditional event counted among Japan's three great strange festivals. It has a history of about 1,200 years, and in 2004 it was designated by the Agency for Cultural Affairs as an intangible folk cultural property requiring measures such as documentation. Its origin traces back to a crowd of people gathered to worship Bishamonten, each wanting to be first, who began pushing against one another. Today, men stripped to the waist push and shove while chanting "Sanyo, Sanyo," and the sight of them trying to be the first to worship Bishamonten enshrined at a higher level is the highlight. It is also called the Great Candle Festival because large candles weighing about 30 kg are used, and during several rounds of fukumochi-maki-yo (lucky mochi scattering), lucky items such as mochi and sake cups are thrown out.