00:01:00 John Daub: Hello everybody, welcome to Soma, Fukushima. This is the Soma Nomaoi Festival, at least day three of it, where they catch wild horses as a ritual, part of a 700-year festival. I guess you can call it a festival or is it a shinji (ritual). It's something that they've been doing without stop for 700 years. For me that just is mind blowing.

00:29:00 John Daub: Yesterday was day two, the main day with armored horse racing and capture the sacred flag, where they launch flags up with a launcher. Looks like a bazooka on the ground and explodes like fireworks. And then two flags will come out most cases and several hundred people battle to catch the flag. It can get intense. People get hurt, like stretcher. Seriously, I saw first responders running out there to pick up injured people off of the ground.

01:00:00 John Daub: But more than that, it is oppressively hot in Japan. If you look at the weather for the next few days, it's going to get up to 38 and higher in Tokyo in particular. That's approximately 100 degrees Fahrenheit. But when you couple that with the humidity, it just sucks the life out of you. And already it's, look at my shirt. See this? This is sweat. I started sweating from 7 a.m. That's really unusual for me anyways.

01:29:00 John Daub: All right, let's take a look. This is Okada Jinja, where they do this wild horse catching. They're going to be here in a couple of hours. I think it's five or six guys in white capturing wild horses and trying to tame them. It's a tradition here at Soma. I'm pretty excited about it. The shrine is beautiful. And the area is quite beautiful. It's quite nice too.

02:01:00 John Daub: There's a lot of media here today because of the event. In fact, it's really hard. I've got a ladder. I actually bought a ladder on Amazon to try to reserve a space and then get up high enough over people to see the event because I got to film this for a main channel episode. You're starting to see some of the participants filter in. They're not in armor today. But yesterday, the participants were in armor and it was so hot. There were some people that were falling onto the ground from heat exhaustion.

02:31:00 John Daub: Oh, yeah, they're drinking sake over there. They're drinking sake. Is that part of the ritual or are they? Thank you. Thank you for that, sir. That's pretty awesome. He's giving him sake. It's like 8 a.m. That's the way you do it, man. Oh, he wants more in this heat. Wish I had a cup. I'm going to take you around. There's some yatai (food stalls) over here. Maybe we can try some food.

03:34:00 John Daub: Let me show you on the map exactly where we are, first of all. So we're not that far from Sendai, about an hour south on the Joban line. It's about three and a half hours or more. No, it's about four hours on the Joban line up here. It takes you approximately three and a half hours. The Shinkansen from Sendai and then the local train back is the way we'd go. This is Soma Okada Shrine. And you can see there's not a lot around here. Aloha, Michael. How you doing? Hello, everyone.

04:06:00 John Daub: This area, Minamisoma, was particularly hit hard during the tsunami. A lot of you might have seen it on NHK. You can see how close we are to the shore, that tsunami wave coming in quite a bit. Along the coast, so many things are brand new, including the roads. It just looked like all the history was wiped out. So this festival is pretty significant in many ways because it shows the resilience of the people of this area that for 700 years, even on the year that the tsunami hit, they still did this ritual. They couldn't do the armored horse racing, but the ritual went on despite.

04:45:00 John Daub: And now they're starting to line up as the horses are going to be making their way in. Check this out. Yesterday, I saw this event where people from the shrine had to run up the omikoshi (portable shrine) to a hill, and they did it in a minute. Check this out. This is absolutely crazy. I want to just one more time stress the heat and humidity. They're going up this hill at full speed. They could have walked. They chose to run. Look at that. This is not an easy task to do. And they're in all these long white robes. Hey, Jimmy's here. Hopefully see you next week. I'll have your L.L. Bean shirt packed.

05:49:00 John Daub: I will be here, but from the 6th, 7th, 8th, 9th, and 10th, I won't be in Tokyo, Jimmy. But I'm looking forward to seeing you. The stars will align. Look at that. They're on the top there. Honestly, that is absolutely crazy. That's going to be in the main channel episode. They're getting ready right now. They're lining up for something. I'm here mostly for the horse catching, but there's a lot of tradition, a lot of history here, and you can feel it because you can see it.

06:46:00 John Daub: He's got a knife, a sword hidden, and they've had sake. Oh, here comes a horse. You're seeing this live from Soma. I came from Tokyo. Wow. And the horse comes in for a blessing, I believe. And the guy's vest is activated. How you doing, guys?

08:42:00 John Daub: Again, I'm in Soma, Fukushima, for the Soma Nomaoi, and this is part of the ritual on the third day. This is the more religious aspect of this festival, which maybe the most important were samurai going back 700 years of the Sengoku period would come here and pray. This festival originating in Chiba, coming here 700 years ago, it was in the year 1323, 700 years ago to this day. Maybe not this day in particular, but 700 years ago for this festival to the year that it's taken place here at this very spot, which is crazy when you think about just how long that is for a continuous festival. And, you know, I look at the Guinness Book of World Records and they list some other festivals. This one isn't in there for some reason. I wonder why.

10:01:00 John Daub: I'm going to see if I can get my other camera here. Something's going to happen. Okada-san, can you hold this for a second? Just a moment, please. So right now, I'm going to take some video with the other camera while I have a chance. I'm getting some shots here. It's really colorful with their uniforms on. Alright, there you go. Three, two, one. So you can see the clothes that they're wearing are quite colorful. I like that. Different, I guess you would say these are kimono with ceremonial helmets or hats. I guess they're getting drinks of water or cool packs. There's the conch shells they use as horns which make a scary sound because it's so out of tune.

12:52:00 John Daub: Let me show you some more footage from yesterday's festival. You can see all of the horses here on the hiraba (open field), the open area where they did the armored horse racing. This is the capture of the flag. And you see all the other flags around there? These flags represent the clans of samurai. Despite the samurai not being, you know, there's no samurai anymore since the Meiji period ended all of that. But it was in the Boshin War. But it's still tradition. And here up in Soma, they still practice the samurai era festival. And it's just one of a kind. It's really authentic. It's not something that was made for tourists. But I think tourists come to see this because it's one of a kind.

13:36:00 John Daub: There's that cannon I was telling you. This is where they shoot the flag for capture of the flag. And it goes up about 150 meters into the sky. There's a boom, a white smoke. And these two flags will just trickle down to the ground. It's enough time for horses to get in position. And I guess you draw your sword. There it goes. And you draw your sword or something. But there were some battle royales going underneath there trying to get that flag because there's the white smoke. And I think you get a chance to see some of them drop. I'm not sure. I had another camera running. This is my C-cam, which is me holding it. And there they go. There they are dropping into the group. Anything, something's happening in there. People getting beat up. Look at that. Sometimes people fall off their horses. That can be very dangerous.

14:40:00 John Daub: And then yesterday, here is the horses running by. I think you get one shot of this during the armored horse racing. This is how fast it is when they fly by. I don't know when this actually happens though. I just set the camera there. Maybe it was a minute before. But when they fly by, they absolutely fly by fast because that's what a flyby is. Hey, Iken is here. This is very interesting, the continued tradition. I think it is. And you know, there's not a lot of tourists that do come up here from the West. Most of the tourists are coming in from other surrounding Asian countries, which I think is a big shame.

15:26:00 John Daub: It is true that in Japan they do eat horse meat, that meat called basashi (raw horse meat), but you won't find that on the menu here. At least I don't. Gyutan (beef tongue) is, but that's a real specialty from this area, northern Fukushima and Sendai region, which is in Miyagi Prefecture. And let me give you a little bit of notice. I'm guessing that the horses are coming. The gyutan that you get at Sendai, almost all of it comes from the United States, because not only is it cheaper, it just tastes better for beef tongue. Wagyu beef tongue does not taste as good as the American one, which is interesting. And the Americans don't eat it, so it's just basically something that's thrown away. They export a great number of it to Japan to be eaten as gyutan, and a lot of Americans come here and eat it up. So I'm not sure why gyutan is not more popular in the U.S.

16:23:00 John Daub: I think I let this camera run for a while. I'm not sure it's worth watching it. But it'll be in the main channel episode for sure. The number of media here is pretty crazy, and they usually will just take a 30-second news story. But in that 30 seconds, they do a lot of work for me, because I got to go around these people, and it's not that much fun. You can tell the local media versus the international media. National media are not friendly in the way they get out of the way. We are national media. I have a press pass, so they can't push too hard. I will push back. Just ever so slightly, with looks, dirty looks mostly.

17:35:00 John Daub: Let's walk over here. Look at this big flag. He's getting his portrait picture taken, finished. Oh, there's media here too. Sometimes people don't know where to go. You can look for the media. There's a speaker here, so apparently they're going to be giving speeches from this side of the shrine. This is the Soma Okada Shrine. Let's go underneath here, because we can. Wow! There's like another world on this side. Look at this. This is a beautiful shrine. Look in the back. I was not expecting this. And everyone's in the front waiting for the horses. This is a stunning shrine. Look at this part in the back. It's all wood, quite old. There's one lady sitting here. Smart. Holy smokes! What was I doing in the front?

19:15:00 John Daub: And then if you look over here, there's this path of wisdom with these lanterns. Look how amazing this is. Wow! It's not that hot in here. Nice and cool in the shade, and there's this peaceful... It's stunning. I like how the lights are lit. It's beautiful. It is darker in here because of the shade. Yeah, thank the trees. Trees, thank you. Arigato gozaimasu. Keep on living. Do what you do. Be trees. We love you for that. Thank you. Public service. Don't hug all the trees. First check for spiders and stuff.

20:35:00 John Daub: Let's walk around it, actually. I just saw a priest walk into the side there. But this is absolutely stunning. Isn't it? I can't go any further. I can't go over here. Let's go back to the front here. Maybe the signal is a little bit laggy in the back. I'll be here for just another three hours or so to film this part of the wild horse catching and then the closing ceremonies of the festival. You can see there's another shrine over here. Always walk to the side, not down the center.

21:26:00 John Daub: You can hear the sound, the nature in the background. But what you don't hear are the mosquitoes. They're eating my legs alive, which is why you'll see a lot of people wearing pants despite it being 34, 35 degrees Celsius in the 90s right now at 8:30 in the morning. All right, they're getting ready. The horses are going to be coming in. And then you can see they'll be here for the blessings. Wow, it is hot. Look at, I always love the trees on an old shrine, temple grounds. Take note of the trees. Look at this one blooming here in the summer heat. I don't know what kind of tree it is, but just looking at the trunk, it's spectacular, the way it's twisted.

23:40:00 John Daub: Now here comes some samurai. Just be careful what you say because they might just behead you. That's the way they used to do in the olden days. If you do not give them respect, bow your head, you lose your head. We're now amongst their descendants. Sometimes that spirit can run strong even today. And then here's a lot of the media swarming around. I'm not media. I'm a YouTuber. Just could be media. Let's just say I'm different. The cicadas are so peaceful. Hey, it's me. Thank you, Joy.

25:01:00 John Daub: All right, everybody. I think this is a nice introduction to this festival. Again, that guy's got an air conditioner. He's got a Russian vest. And it's loud. It's going to come over here. So this is a good introduction to this festival, the Soma Nomaoi. I hope that you do check it out. Maybe even consider coming next year. You can see over there, I guess this is where the people, the officials will be observing as young kids try to wrangle wild horses, a tradition going back 700 years. Women can also partake in this. This is something that was new, but only until the age of 19. So with Japan's declining population, I hear a little bit of rumbling that perhaps women should be taking part of it even longer. But can be dangerous. People do get hurt. And you'll see that in the main channel episode in a crash that was really not pleasant looking. They're going at full speed on those horses, by the way.

26:24:00 John Daub: All right, everybody. Thanks for joining me, sharing just a little bit of my trip here. This is what I do for a living. I go to locations, historical points, and I go to places. I see things, places of view, something that you don't know about, festivals you may not have heard about, things like this. And this is exciting. It's exciting to be here. And I'll be back on a train on the Shinkansen going back to Tokyo in about three hours' time. That's how fast this thing moves, where I get to edit again. So I'll see you back in Tokyo, everybody, unless something else happens. Until then, have a wonderful weekend. Today's Monday. Is it Sunday? I'm completely lost. I think it could be Monday. All right, bye, guys. Mata ne.