Big fat sweaty men

So as you can tell we had a day to watch sumo wrestling but not after fitting in tons before that.
We saw the Imperial Palace (where the Emperor of Japan lives) and we kept going up to random old men and asking them if they were the emperor and if we could get their picture and making a huge big deal so that they couldn:t refuse. It was pretty hilarious. Caught it all on video too.

We went shopping and had lunch in a cute little restaurant where you sit around small tables but can actually fit your legs into a hole underneath the table. I am getting used to the weird looks I get when I ask for meesz to drink (water) although I am really becoming a fan of Jasmine tea too.

In the shopping market I found a whole store devoted to Mon-chi-chi:s!! Do you remember those funny little monkey looking things? I have to get one. I used to have a puzzle when I was younger that I adored!

So we took a ferry around a river that led us through Tokyo and we saw heaps of fancy bridges and it was very cool sitting on top of the boat.

We then headed out to the Sumo tournament and watched 20 matches. Each match begins with a bit of　an intimidation act as well as a spiritual act to remove the evil spirits from the ring by clapping their hands loudly and stomping one foot and then the other foot. Then they go and glare at each other and then do the corner stomp thing again. This happens for a bit until they decide the intimidation has been enough and then they advance at each other. It is truly awesome even though it lasts only a few seconds for each fight. However the build up for each fight as well as for the last match is great. The best competitors are placed at the end of the night and some of the matches have sponsors flags posted at the beginning of the match (like women in bikinis walking around the ring before each round of a boxing match) to show how much money will be awarded to the winner of this match. So a lot of excitement goes into each fight. Best part was when some old man sitting in the crowd got flattened by one of the sumo:s who got flung off the ring. It was great! I even called 4 of the last 5 matches correct, based on some reading I have been doing from a book called Freakonomics (given to me for my birthday from the lovely D for Donal!) which discusses (amongst many other things) how sumo wrestlers cheat just like teachers. Obviously an intriguing subject for me to want to read about!!

After a big night at the sumo tournament and then finding out own way home (as tomi left us at the stadium) we had some quick dinner and then were all sitting in the lounge at the hostel, so I prompted some good old Health games (being a Health teacher...) and we had some good fun. One of the games involves wacking other people with a cushion to allieve yourself of being "IT", so we were having so many laughs even some of the other backpackers joined in. Problem was that I didn:t call the game quits until 10:00 and then expected them to go staright to bed. Yeah right. I went to bed but found out this morning that some of them were so wired they were hanging out in each others room and didn:t go to bed till midnight (and some even later). I think I should think twice about timing next time!!