About three weeks ago Pete and I went to Ryogoku Kokugikan to see the sumo. One of my favourite students organised it for us and brought his friend along. It was the second Sunday of the 15-day tournament; right in the middle of the event.
So in we went. The sumo hall itself is extremely cool. The ring is in the center; surrounded by sumo officials and a number of other people sitting down* directly around the ring. These ringside seats in turn are surrounded by sumo box seats; these are boxes with four cushions, which people can buy tickets for and sit with their friends and eat, drink, etc. The tier above the box seats are the arena seats, which are the cheapest seats, like stadium seats.
*(Ringside is not a good place to sit. Sure, you can see very well, and that's important for referees. But look at how small that ring is. Now, recall that the idea of sumo is to push your opponent out of the ring. We saw sumo wrestlers plow into the officials at least two or three times. And being crushed by a sumo is no joke!)
Matches start from around midday, but all the earlier events are for lower-ranked sumo and therefore not of as much interest. We arrived a little while before the late afternoon matches, when all the highest-ranked sumo compete. The basic rules of sumo are not difficult to understand. A sumo loses if he steps outside the ring, or touches the ground with any part of his body apart from his feet.
Here you can see the o-sumo-san (sumo wrestlers) doing their entering ritual. The top ranking sumo, or yokozuna, get their own entering ritual. There are currently two yokozuna, both from Mongolia.
In Ryogoku Kokugikan you could buy bento (lunch boxes) 'themed' for sumo wrestlers. I bought an Asashoryu bento. Asashoryu is the longer-standing of the two yokozuna. He's a bit contentious though and has been in the press for having an aggressive attitude. Also, people say his form is starting to slip. A yokozuna cannot lose their top ranking once they've earned it - it's very difficult to attain this ranking in the first place, and there have been times when there has been no yokozuna at all - but yokozuna are expected to relinquish their position, or retire, once their abilities decline.
The matches themselves are very short, usually only a few seconds, and each is preceded by a ring entering ritual where the sumo throw salt into the ring etc. The yokozuna were the last to perform. Hakuho, the first, won his match effortlessly in about one second. Asashoryu, the second, lost. This was greeted by much excitement, and everyone in the box seats stood up and threw their cushions in towards the ring. I threw mine too, but I wasn't a very good shot, and hit some guy in the head.
After the sumo, we went to a nearby chanko nabe restaurant. Chanko nabe is the food that sumo wrestlers consume in large amounts in order to gain weight.
And you can see why. I would like to stress that we ordered a serving for three people. Three people. There is also an additional plate of minced meat, which you can't see in this photo.
Nabe is basically hotpot, so you put all the random meat, seafood and vegetables into boiling water, take them out, dip them in sauce and eat them. Chanko nabe itself is actually fairly healthy, but it has a lot of protein, and just look at that serving size!! The four of us couldn't finish ours.
Sumo wrestlers traditionally eat two meals of chanko nabe a day, and sleep right after eating, to increase weight gain.
Anyway, going to the sumo was terrific fun. ^_^
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