Toyooka, Crab County, Where the Crab is Plenty and the People Are Genki

They came from far and wide to witness the grand display of the freshest, biggest and most delicious crab in all of Hyogo at the 19th Toyooka Tuiyama Port Crab Festival. Held by the Toyooka piers along the scenic Maruyama river, this popular winter festival attracted all types of people, including families, young students,senior citizens and yours truly—despite the early Sunday morning start (8:30 AM), the out-of-the-way location and the cold winter weather (5゜C). “It was way too early for a matsuri,” said Kenny Wu, Toyooka City JHS ALT who has attended about six festivals since arriving in Japan last July. “However, I enjoyed it a lot.”

The day began with the Opening Ceremony which included Heike Suigun Taiko (Drum) performance and free warm sake served in a crab shell. Bowls of hot crab leg soup were sold for 300 yen, and about 50 local fresh fish and seafood vendors had their best quality products on sale for exceptionally low prices. It was truly paradise for any serious seafood lover. “There was lots of crab, for cheap!” said Wu.  Not only was the crab cheap, there was octopus, squid, salmon, etc. You name it, they had it and for cheap! They even offered crab sake. After being offered several hefty samples by the generous vendors we discovered that crab sake is very tasty and bought several bottles.

The fast-talking host with the million-yen smile, the showcasing of enormous crab on stage, the pushing, shoving and hollering of low prices from the crowd below were all part of the exciting amateur fresh delicacy auction. “That auction was crazy. Crates of live crab worth hundreds of dollars selling for like $10?!?!,” said Alvin Tran, Kinosaki JHS ALT who recently arrived in Japan and was happy to attend his first Japanese festival. “[The festival] was really cool and lots of fun. It was a great mini-introduction to Japanese-culture.”
As if all this activity was not enough to satisfy anyone before 10 AM, they then held a Tsuiyama crab raffle which Kenny Wu won! The grand prize was a night stay at a fancy and authentic ryokan, including a special and highly reputed Tsuiyama crab dinner course for two. “I was surprised when I won the raffle! Grand prize! Booyah!” exclaimed Wu. For Chinyere Okoli, Toyooka City SHS ALT, who was expecting more for her first festival in Japan, the festival was not as exciting. “I expected lots of people, lots of decorations and a bigger arena like in the town itself,” said Okoli. She was surprised to see people selling whole fish and crabs. “It seemed more like a Day market,” she added.

Okoli did enjoy seeing and taking a photo with the official festival mascot, Genbudo-san, a giant Rock man(because all Japanese festivals must have mascots). Accompanied by two assistants who were local models, Gen-san (for short) also came with his own rice-cake (mochi) wooden mallet (kine). This was convenient for all the mochi making that went on next in the schedule.

It was quite a sight to see a bit of mochitsuki, the traditional mochi-pounding ceremony in Japan. The cooked rice was pounded with the large mallets in a traditional mortar (usu). In a mochitsuki, two people alternate the work, one pounding and the other turning and wetting the mochi. They must keep a steady rhythm or they may accidentally injure one another with the heavy kine.  “The most fun was when that lady slapped thatmochi!” said Wu. “It made a good sound.”

As the day wore on and the chill in the air became stronger, the 100-yen bowl of hot porridge made fromcrab, rice and vegetables being served to all the festival attendees was a delicious (and cheap) relief. Wu, Tran and Okoli plan on returning and strongly recommend everyone to attend next year’s crab festival in Toyooka. According to Wu, “Everyone should be able to enjoy cheap crab once in their life.”