Top O' the Asa (朝) to Ye!

That's right folks, March 17th is a day celebrated worldwide. Good ol' St. Patrick and his feast day are probably more effective than the UN at bringing nations together in a joyful atmosphere. Tokyo's St. Patrick's Day parade and celebration is no exception to this.

I was in Tokyo early, awaiting the arrival of John, Bryan, and Amy (Lisa was busy with work, and could not make it out to Tokyo until Tuesday). I had checked into the Sakura Hotel in Asakusa, and I was enjoying the golden dragon festival that was going on there. Here's is a clip of video from the festival:

I met up with Our friends Katie and Sean at the festival. We waited together for our friend Tom to arrive, and then we hopped on the Tokyo Metro headed for Ueno. At Ueno, we boarded the JR Yamanote Line and rode it around the ring to Harajuku Station. The cos-play girls weren't there, but the neighborhood was bustling with people preparing to watch the St. Patrick's Day Parade. I was completely surprised that Japan would even know what this day is, much less, have a parade to celebrate it. But sure enough, everyone in Harajuku had on green clothing, and lots of people were enjoying pints of Guinness sold by the street vendors. There were a bunch of other JETs there, and we arrived just in time to get a great spot on the parade route. Every Irishman in Japan appeared to be out for the parade, as well as a large number of Japanese fans of all things "Erin."
There were Irish Setter clubs, Irish wolf-hound clubs, Caeli dancers, jiggers, Japanese pipers' clubs, a few guys dressed up as St. Patrick, A few guys dressed up as Irish KISS, an Irish bartender wearing beer-goggles, A creepy older guy in a funny T-shirt, and even some green-clad cheerleaders from Senshu, a local high school. I felt as thought I was in a science fiction story, where the universe is the same, except all the people look different. I felt a sense of familiar comfort mixed with foreign curiosity. The two emotions mingled well together, and I helped them to get along by downing my share of Guinness. We had a wonderful time, and when it was all over, we still had time to walk around the shops of Harajuku looking for a non-existent Nathan's Hot Dog shop (finally, we settled for Wendy's burgers) before I had to hop on the train to go pick up Bryan, Amy, and John. I'll leave you with some video footage of the parade itself.