More Penis Festivals in Japan!

Remember the old posts I put up about penis festivals? Well, there are even more pictures of these festivals! Reuters and Destructoid talk about phalluses being marched down streets of Japan during a festival called the Kanamara Festival. According to Reuters, the Kanamara festival is actually over a hundred years old and was originally done to prevent Japanese women from getting syphilis. That's right. SYPHILIS. The festival is also held to protect people from AIDs. There were approximately 30,000 people at this event to boot. Man, I wish I could go celebrate my name!

This is the wikipedia entry:

"The Kanamara Matsuri is centered around a local penis-venerating shrine, once popular among prostitutes who wished to pray for protection against sexually transmitted diseases. It is said that there are divine protections also in business prosperity and the clan's prosperity, easy delivery, marriage, and married couple harmony, etc. Today, the festival is used to raise money for HIV research. There's also a legend of a demon that hid inside a young girl and castrated two young men on their wedding nights before a blacksmith fashioned an iron phallus that was used to break the demon's teeth, leading to the enshrinement of the item."

Original articles from Destructoid and Reuters.

Japan loves the Chocolate Penis

I got an e-mail from Steph with some pictures. Needless to say, I found the above picture to be the best. She begins to discuss this picture by mentioning that "...my favorite concession stand food was the artfully shaped chocolate-covered banana. They cut off one tip, then attached it to the other tip with a toothpick before dipping it. Unfortunately they ran out of the penis-shaped lollipops."

According to Stephanie, there is a festival on March 15th that glorifies fertility. Every year, they choose a well-known carver to take a whole tree and transform it into a giant majestic oak of a penis. Needless to say, I am in awe.

Stephanie describes it best by noting that "this was the best Japanese festival I've ever been to." I am inclined to agree. Japan. Wait for me! Don't stop being crazy!

Speaking of which, Steph also mentioned that the Vagina festival was before that. After noting that the festival was actually less exciting, I sort of came to a realization that the penis is just much more expressive than a Vagina. Vaginas are sort of there and stare at you. Like Princess Peach in Bowser's Castle, she sits there saying "woe is me" and doesn't get out much. Perhaps, it could be more expressive with the PR firms. However, penises have been glorified enough in the media that they can practically look at the camera and flash a Tom Cruise-level (minus the weirdness of Scientology). Vaginas just don't look that great on paper or as something to iconify (I made up a word, what are you going to do about it? Nothing. That's what I'm talking about). Now, Penises are the Hollywood Equivalent of Will Smith at the Box Office when it comes to the audience recognizing and smiling about some sexual organ.