Long ago, there was a Buddhist festival known as “Houjyoue”「放生会、ほうじょうえ」, in which captive animals were released into the wild (and usually eventually wandered home, as domestic animals do). Fujisaki Hachiman Shrine 「藤崎八旛宮秋季例大祭、ふじさきはちまんぐう」 was the main site for this in Kumamoto. Riding on this existing festival, Kato Kyomasa in around 1598 brought a number of his samurai to the shrine to celebrate their safe return from the invasion of Korea, and thus, “boshita” was born. The term means “destroy,” with the chant “Boshta! Boshta! Horoboshita!"「 滅ぼした」- the final term meaning “completely devastate,” with the object understood to be Korea.
This was clearly not an image that Kumamoto wanted to continue, so the chant was changed to the Kumamoto dialect phrase “dokai,” which means “What’s up?” or “How’s it going?” and the name emphasized to be”Fujisaki Shrine Autumn Festival「 藤崎八旛宮秋季例大祭、ふじさきはちまんぐう しゅうき れいたいさい」 . However, many older people (like me) still call it “Boshita Matsuri.” It is famous for its horses called “decorated horses,” or “kazariuma” 「飾り馬、かざりうま」. If you want a good view, I suggest visiting the shrine from 05:00 on the 16th to watch the preparations; this is the most photo-friendly part of the festival. Then you can go back home to sleep.
This year, for the first time, I had an opportunity to visit the Pre-Festival Ceremony at the Prefectural Theater, known as “Zenyasai” 「前夜祭」. It was frankly more entertaining than the festival itself. I’ll remind you about it next year, and if you are in Kumamoto, you can attend. Attractive was a lobby display of the items used in the festival. In particular, the happi coats worn by each group are decorative and quite beautiful. Our friend Oka Miho has kindly provided some photographs. - William
(Note: I used the slideshow function for the first time and chose the default one-second timeframe, figuring I could edit it later, but I can’t. If you want a better view of the photos, click on the show to pause it.)