Melbourne Cup v Yabusame

If you are from Melbourne, you will know that the start of November means horse racing, gambling, drinking and most important of all ... undeserved, but welcome, public holidays. For those of you not from Melbourne, let me quickly explain. There is a big horse racing carnival in Melbourne at the start of November. The pinnacle of this carnival is the Melbourne Cup horse race. Strangely, all of Melbourne is granted a public holiday in honour of the Melbourne Cup. Some say it's strange to have a whole day off work for a race that lasts approximately 3 minutes, but I'm not going to question it.

When I came to Japan, I thought it would be the end of gratuitous public holidays at the start of November. Thankfully, I was mistaken. In Japan, the 3^rd of November is a public holiday called Culture Day, the focus of which is unsurprisingly Japanese culture.

Out of deference to the Melbourne Cup I decided to mark Culture Day by observing a Japanese equestrian activity. Originally, I was tempted to eat horse sashimi (Basashi) but then decided it would be best to see some horses in the flesh ... living flesh, that is. So I decided to watch some Yabusame.

Yabusame is Japanese horseback archery. It is a traditional activity which dates back hundreds of years. Basically, a mounted archer gallops along while firing arrows at two stationary targets. As you can imagine, this is not easy! The rider is at a full gallop, is not holding onto the horse with his/her hands in any way, must gather an arrow from the holder on his/her back, draw their bow, take aim and fire. To make matters worse, the rider is wearing a pretty elaborate and bulky outfit. Here are some photos.

So how does Yabusame compare to the Melbourne Cup? Well, it's a matter of horses for courses (ha!) In some ways they are alike: both are crowded with on-lookers, both occur on a holiday and both are probably dangerous. As much as I love Melbourne, the use of bows and arrows in Yabusame definitely adds a level of excitement which is not present in the Melbourne Cup. Perhaps a hybrid could be created, the Melbourne Yabusame Cup. It could be the Melbourne Cup but with jockeys armed with bows and arrows and allowed to shoot at each other. Yes, I think that would work well.

Thank you for reading and take care.

Our Man in Japan