This way to the Rainbow Festival at Aso Mountain!
On the second day of the festival I met the silkscreener who had licensed the cover of Living on the Earth to print on the festival t-shirts, and he offered me my choice as a gift.
The hemp-organic cotton camouflage tank top caught my eye.
On the back, the moon and the lovers from the back cover of Living on the Earth, plus a tipi and a puffing volcano drawn by someone else, nicely summing up the scene here.
Roku and Tako, the festival organizers, who also manufacture tipis, had just put up one of their largest tipis in back of the stage as a combination dressing room and shrine.
They created a shrine inside the tipi, in the most ancient Japanese style, according to Sachiho.
The big tipi made a gorgeous backdrop to the stage.
On either side of the stage Roku and Tako added their huge handmade and handpainted carp windsocks floating from bamboo poles.
And, I learned that, in addition to making superior tipi poles, bamboo makes a fine geodesic dome.
I was gifted a delicious meal at the Thai curry stand by the chef.
Back to the hot springs for a bath, this time with Kanako, the koto player. In this very natural bathhouse, there are no showers; you pour warm water from the springs over yourself from a bamboo bucket.
Kanako (on the right) doing a card reading with Doreen Virtue’s Goddess Cards for the owner of the on-sen (hot springs bath house), who is in the middle of having her hair coiffed.
Back at the festival, a troupe of dancers performed a ritualistic modern dance.
The children were fascinated.
After sunset, my favorite group of the festival played: Rabirabi x Piko, with electronic avant garde improvisational vocals and synthesizer by Azumi, and percussion by her husband and by her friend, Nana. The percussion got the crowd dancing, and Azumi’s wild vocals (some electronically processed and some not), her skillful synthesizer playing, and her joyous dancing took them to an ecstatic frenzy. I’d never seen a crowd react this way to electronic improvisation before. I wish I had a better photo. Sorry!
After the stage show, the nightly drum circle began, this time with fire dancers!
Alicia Bay Laurel 