• The venue of the first India Matsuri Kyoto festival was Umekoji Park. It is an important place of public gathering in Kyoto, Japan.

Know about the India Kyoto Festival 2022 and similarities in life between Kyoto Japan and Manipur.

The festival covered Yoga, Indian classical dance i.e. Bharatnatyam, Odissi, Kathak performed by Japanese artistes, India classical music, Japanese music Bollywood songs and Food festival. Indian handicrafts and food stalls were the other attractions during the two day festival. 

Indian and Japanese dignitaries namely Daisaku Kadokawa Mayor of Kyoto, Dr.Vinay Sahasrabuddhe-President Indian Council for Cultural Relations (ICCR), Consul General of India, Osaka-Kobe-Nikhilesh Giri, Secretary Indian Chamber of Commerce Japan-Shitoru Roy and Ram Kalani- President of Indian Chamber of Commerce Japan attended the inaugural ceremony of the festival on October 29, 2022 morning. The renowned group Rhythms of Manipur and world record holder Sonali Acharjee participated in the festival too.

The festival started with the lighting of the ceremonial lamp by Daisaku Kadokawa, Dr.Vinay Sahasrabuddhe and Nikhilesh Giri from the Indian side.

Thoughal Jagoi.  

Rhythms of Manipur performed its national award winning music composition the Dancing Drummers, Thougal Jagoi on the first day of the festival, while Sonali presented Ravindra Nritya, Riturang Dance and enthralled the Japanese, tourists and Indian settled at Japan.

Dancing Drummers. 

Due to demand of audience Dancing Drummers was showcased again on the second day of the festival. Pung Chollom and Dholl Chollom were also presented and wowed the audience. 

Indian Classical Dance performance. 

Naturally deer live in the Jungles,isolated places, they are very soft animal.there are many species of  deer found in many parts of the World. Fortunately Manipur have a rare species brow antlered deer locally called Sangai( scientific name = rucervus eldii eldii)only found at the floating national park Keibul Lamjao which is very peculiar in many aspects.

Japanese husband and wife drummers.

Recently I was at Todaji, Great Eastern Temple, one of the Japanese famous, important and historical Buddhist Temple at Nara.  Above all the magnificent Buddha temple, the big Buddha Hall the world largest wooden building, the largest bronze statues of Buddha, Nandaimon gate, large wooden gate. It architectural design mostly built of woods, surrounding trees, ponds, fish. We saw tamed deers in hundreds in numbers coming out from adjacent Nara Park.

Also read Todaji Monastery is an amalgamation of Indo-Japanese Spirituality

Manipuris in Kimono.

Deer

From Nara railway station to the temple is about 3/4 kms. When we walked out of the station we saw deers on the road. Excited we clicked pictures as you see above. Our host, Dr Chaitanya Bhandare said you will see hundreds of deers near the temple. We were excited nevertheless experiencing this for the first time. Feeding to deer is not allowed but one of my team members feed some mazes to some of the deer after which others fed too. 

Whilst at temple gate if our Sangai can also be kept on main road near the city. This would attract large number of tourists from Manipur.

Similarities between life in Kyoto and Manipur

We were fortunate to stay at a hostel surrounded by Art galleries and ancient houses. No tall buildings, small but quality and clean lanes lead to our hostel. Similarities are -

1. In the morning newspaper hawkers distributed newspapers on two wheelers. In Manipur the same system of newspaper distribution is practiced.

2. Travel by bicycle was also common in Japan.

3. Bowing while meeting each other also very similar to Manipur.

4. Entering house without shoes.

5. Soup (kangsoi) fermented soyabean (hawaiachara), rice also very much similar. Overall, food habits are similar.

We had the opportunity to witness glimpses of the Golden Pavilion, Rokuonji Temple (Golden Temple) another important temple and tourist spot of Kyoto. Here also we found another similarly of Manipur with Japan. The blue Lilly here is like the Komberei of Manipur.

Also see Pictures of Temples of Japan or Read Temples of Japan

This temple is commonly known as Kinkaku-ji temple of Shokoku-ji school of Rinazai Buddhist denomination. This place is the centre of politics and culture and was used to welcome the Emperors of Japan and the trading partners from China. The garden of this temple, is designed both a special historic site and a special place of scenic beauty, still retains the atmosphere of those days. It was declared a World Cultural Heritage site in 1994.

Thousand Gate – In south eastern Kyoto, there is another magnificent place of worship Fushimi Inari Taisha, headquarters of some 30000 Inari Shrines around the country worshipping the God of agriculture. The special character of this place is in red thousands tori Gates and the fox statues. From early morning till late in night many people visit the shrine.

Rhythms of Manipur group in Kyoto.