Today’s report is going to be a little anticlimactic, compared to Day 7’s rich content. But let’s gambarize!
🌐 Location: Nishio, Aichi prefecture
Early morning, and groggy-eyed sekitori start arriving. Here we have Takarafuji in a drab kimono, a night-crumpled chon-mage, and eyes half-closed:
…which all stand in stark contrast with his spiffy fashionable orange Hermes bag.
Abi looks pretty surprised by half-asleep Enho.
My guess is it’s the first time he noticed Enho’s cauliflower ear.
The only one who seems to be a morning person is Kaisei:
So let’s get inside the venue. Kotoeko forces his knees together with rubber bands:
This seems to be quite an effort for him. In the hana-michi, Ishiura practices his tachiai:
What, no henka?
Hakuho practices his sonkyo:
Sonkyo is this crouching position which is performed during the shikiri (and also to accept the gunbai and possible kensho envelopes). It’s also quite useful to have a talk with someone sitting on the ground:
In this case a rather good-humored Kasugano oyakata. Hakuho also practices his shiko, as always:
And like a good Hitchhiker, he does it equipped with a towel. Which reminds me, here is Kakuryu again:
Silly though he may look, Kakuryu is very popular with the fans:
Kyokusoten, behind him, looks a bit taken aback by all the clamor.
Oyakata can be popular, too!
You have to admit Tomozuna oyakata looks quite nice in a mon-tsuki kimono.
There is a sekitori from Aichi prefecture – Akiseyama. Here he is practicing with Kyokutaisei:
But for some reason, he is not that popular in this event. This may be because there is a real home boy – one from the very city of Nishio: Kaisho, from Asakayama beya (Kaio’s heya).
The thing is, Kaisho is not a sekitori. He is in Makushita. And the only reason he is wearing an oicho-mage in this picture is that the torikumi guys arranged a Juryo bout for him to please the spectators.
Being a member of Isegahama ichimon earns him the privilege of getting kawaigari from Aminishiki. The spectators really love this – Aminishiki seems to be popular all over Japan. And with their home boy, oh boy!
Even this little sliver of video is a good demonstration of Aminishiki’s showmanship.
Some Makuuchi practice bouts: Onosho vs. Kagayaki, Okinoumi vs. Ryuden:
And here are Kaisei vs. Mitakeumi, and Tochinoshin vs. Kaisei:
One gets the impression that winning 10 bouts might not be beyond Tochinoshin’s capabilities the next basho.
Practice over, and lower-ranked rikishi get their hair redone:
Imagine if these tokoyama could sing in harmony. They would be a real… wait for it… barbershop quartet! [crickets]
And here comes the big news of the day. Our big ice-cream man has joined the Jungyo, as his herniated disc improved. And he got teased quite a lot for cleverly joining it on his birthday, because that means he gets lots of free cake!
The cakes are from the reporters. And Ichinojo is a good boy. He blows away the candles, and then does it again just to please a cameraman who didn’t get a good shot the first take.
I suppose he was then given an instruction to eat his cake like a good hungry boulder:
Um… is he really going to eat it with the plastic collar still on? And the candles? But well, the reporters said “do it”, so…
Although he participated in the dohyo-iri this day, he did not participate in the bouts and apparently not in any keiko, either.
Here is the West Juryo dohyo-iri for you.
Note how much more popular Aminishiki and Enho are, compared to local-born Akiseyama.
Enho and Yoshikaze still don’t participate in any bouts.
Time for Makuuchi dohyo-iri, and someone asks Tamawashi to hold a baby. The baby is not very happy about this.
As the kid starts an air-raid siren going, Abi decides to match him note for note. Mwaaaaaa!
Takarafuji, if you note, is all like “I was hoping I’ll get a little peace and quiet from baby cries in the Jungyo. Sheesh…”
Hakuho is on his way to do his own dohyo-iri. He does that without that supporter on his arm – for aesthetic reasons, I guess. But this fan caught him feeling up his injured arm:
That torn muscle, it is not going away.
Finally, it’s time for the bouts… but I don’t have any bout footage, sorry. Instead, here is Aoiyama, who found a back room with basketball equipment:
And here is Takakeisho, who is way too happy about this ladle his giving to Tamawashi.
Could it possibly be… the shin-ozeki… is doing the salt trick? He must know that revenge will come – and rather swiftly, as they are doing their matches in the same order every day.
Here is the yumi-tori shiki from this day:
And for our pin-up corner, how about a rather puzzled Yoshoyama?
