Torinoichi, Monzennakacho (酉の市)

Friday (11/19/2010) was the second and final day of the torinoichi in Monnaka. I got an OK video of walking from my usual station exit all the way through the market. I also got some interesting information when I stopped to talk to one proprietor. I always wondered what these guys do in the ‘off season’, i.e., the 363 days of the year when there’s no market. Unsurprisingly, they have other jobs. Unsurprisingly, the guy that I talked to owns the two or three little yakitori concessions that set up around the station. I would guess that he has employees with kinky perms and tracksuits who sell new year’s decorations in December too, if you take my meaning.  His name is the same as my company, so I made a joke involving the substitution of ‘securities’ for similar sounding ‘bird store’. He was nice enough to laugh instead of just looking puzzled, which is what people typically do when I make Japanese-language jokes. Or English-language jokes.

Original post 11/6/2010
One of the fun benefits of living in Monzennakacho (other than it being an out-and-out ii tokoro to live in) is all the events at the shrine. There’s the flea market most weekends, there are food stalls several times a month, many more on genuine festival days, the big festival every year…and once in a while you can see a priest blessing a new car, because this shrine is known for traffic safety too. But once a year in November, it’s the site of the ‘rake market’, where you can buy the craftsy, gaudy good-luck rakes that you sometimes see stuck up in a high corner of shops. The point is to ‘rake in’ money for the business, and I just thought you’d like to see a few random pictures I took on my way home. It wasn’t so crowded, but it was 12:30 AM, the night before the actual market day. There’s one more day coming up, the 19th. Seriously though, these are too expensive for casual souvenirs. Save your pennies and go to the pre-New Year’s hagoita market at Sensoji, December 17-19.

This market-related link from the main shrine page may be temporary.


4 Replies to “Torinoichi, Monzennakacho (酉の市)”

  1. Is that "Shouken" and "Shouten" joke? I used to tell jokes in English in an attempt to improve my English and got similar reactions.

  2. Well, I was trying to say 証券–>ちょうてん,鳥店. I'm used to people not understanding my jokes, regardless of language.

  3. 鳥軒 ちょうけん would be funny too, but at what point do these onyomi make no sense? Somewhere before the point of the jokes, I'm afraid.
    腸軒 would be good for a horumon specialist…

  4. Many Japanese words sound alike and most of Japanese jokes are simple "puns" as you showed us here. We have few insider jokes only my wife and I will understand since I explained to her why it was funny. After that it became really funny. Oh, well.

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