Today, I headed back to Ryogoku to witness the dohyo matsuri – the ceremony in which the dohyo is consecrated ahead of the new basho. As Bruce related, the dohyo is broken down and rebuilt for each tournament. The start of the tournament begins with this ceremony, which in a way officially declares the sacred ring open for the business of sumo.
The event was set to start at 9.50am, so I arrived in Ryogoku around 9.30. Apparently the event has become better attended in recent years, as the portraits for the two most recent yusho winners are also unveiled, but I did not expect to see a line wrapped literally around the block from Kokugikan:
In all, I would say around 2,000 people attended the ceremony, which was free for the general public. The weather was fantastic and warm, and the crowd was generally in a very good mood. Seats inside the venue were available on a first come first serve basis.
For someone like me who doesn’t typically have access to the lower bowl of Kokugikan to sit in box seats during a basho, it was a great opportunity to get to see the new dohyo up-close. As fans piled in behind the san’yaku rikishi who were in attendance, I did an end run around the perimeter of the venue so that I could land a seat about 5 boxes back from the dohyo and get closer to the action.
A yobidashi called the event to order at 9.58pm, and the total time of the event was about 25 minutes. Three gyoji entered the room to announce and administer the ceremony, during which a number of rituals were observed. The gyoji all wore enormous white (linen?) gowns over the top of the usual dress.
About 30 elders from the NSK were in attendance on the side of the dohyo (10 per side), with the san’yaku rikishi minus the injured Hakuho behind one set of elders. I’m not sure exactly who gets to attend but from the faces I was able to scan, it seemed to be a strong overlap with the shimpan department (if anyone knows if is or is not true, feel free to correct me in the comments).
I am not yet an expert in these rituals, but a branch was waved from the dohyo on all three sides in which the elders were sitting, a ceremonial cup was poured for each of the elders, and stakes were placed in all four corners of the dohyo. A scary moment did occur when the chief gyoji missed his chair entirely when sitting back down, and tumbled to the ground. He was helped back up by an attending yobidashi.
Taiko drummers finished the ceremony by parading a lap around the outside of the dohyo. I saw them enter the room, but was still startled by the sound, which reverberated around the mostly empty Kokugikan.
The ceremony ended with the declaration that the dohyo matsuri had been completed and the basho could begin.
As I – as well as other fans – scampered forward from the box seats to attempt to get a photo of the newly consecrated dohyo, men with bullhorns shouted to the audience that the event was over and to leave the arena.
The work of setting up for the basho to begin on Sunday was already underway, and team members were milling to and fro around the venue to get things ready for showtime. While the torikumi for Day 1 had already been announced, it was not yet listed on the scoreboard in the venue, for example.
As I walked back outside, I noticed newly minted Komusubi Aoiyama doing an interview with local media:
We can presume he will be working hard this basho to do his style of sumo. Later, I was also passed by a quick moving Sekiwake Tochinoshin, who also had a reporter in tow:
He really is an enormous man.
Exiting the arena, I discovered the answer to one of our burning questions before every basho: which stable would be providing the chankonabe which is served every day at the tournament? The answer is as old as a thousand generations: a beaming Chiyomaru told us that this tournament’s “Variety Chanko” comes from the legendary Kokonoe-beya.
I made it back to the front of the arena just in time to see a group of workers taking down the massive yusho portraits which had been presented to Tamawashi (for winning the Hatsu basho) and Miyagino oyakata (for Hakuho winning the Haru basho). Unfortunately owing to the size of the crowd I wasn’t able to witness their actual presentation, but it was cool to be able to marvel at the portraits which we only see hanging from the rafters in Kokugikan (or in a few cases, in the nearby Ryogoku JR train station).
And with that, the basho is underway. We have plenty of treats lined up at Tachiai this month – let’s get into the coverage!
I think the “I will do my own sumo” is mostly the line they resort to during basho interviews, where they are caught without enough oxygen in their brains…
Aoiyama was asked how he felt about participating in the dohyo matsuri, as 26 basho passed since he was in san-yaku. Ha said “No tension, I feel exactly the same whether I am here or at my heya. The only difference is in what I am wearing”. Asked about his injuries, he said “This basho it’s so-so”. Hmm, honesty. That’s refreshing.
Tochinoshin, on the other hand, stuck to the familiar “ichinichi-ichiban” (I’ll take it one day at a time) line. Oh well, not everybody in Kasugano can have an original thought on the same day.
So, I guess Shikimori Inosuke had a bit of the ceremonial saké ahead of time, just to make sure the kami will like it.
If I’m not mistaken, that round the yobidashi teams with the drums are doing in the dohyo matsuri marks the start of the yosei-daiko tour, wherein they travel between heya and supporter places and declare tomorrow’s torikumi out loud.
I need a t-shirt that says Ichinichi Ichiban
I need reading glasses – at first I read ‘Ichinojo ichiban’ – would be great, too
Great report Josh – I always hope to see this whole thing first hand some day.
Cheers
It was a cool event. It’s the kind of thing, because it’s free and open to the public, that you should definitely experience ONCE if you’re there towards the start of a basho
Now that I’ve seen the ceremony, it was put to me that a good move is to just skip that next time and jostle for a good place for the portrait presentation afterwards, especially if you want a photo of the winners receiving their personal, smaller portrait. Hakuho’s (or his representatives) been there 41 times before but if you’re a Tamawashi fan, that must be an incredible moment to see up close.
I wish I knew that earlier… Just now I am in the Queue for the day tickets (I only managed to get a regular ticket for day 2 and 4, but day 1 is important). i’s amazing, around 05:20 the queue was already at the JR Station, and a few minutes later until the edo museum . ..
This would be great to see one day. Do you need tickets or do you just show up? Do they announce when it is scheduled? Do they do this in the other tournament cities?
I would expect the dohyo is consecrated in the other tournament cities, but I’m not sure if the ceremony is the open in the same way or publicised. It is always on the saturday before the basho in so far as I know, so I would expect it to be at a consistent time in future in Tokyo. I’m not going to be at Nagoya this year so perhaps someone can let us know.
As far as this ceremony is concerned, you can just show up. People queue in an orderly line around the block so my advice would be if you want to see the dohyo portraits to get some water from a convenience store and show up 45+ minutes in advance so that you’re far enough up the line to stop for a photo as you enter the arena and can still get close seats.