Event

The annual Kobe Festival (Matsuri) is unlike any celebration you are likely to run into in the Kansai region during the year. There are plenty of colorful street festivals in Japan and most are tied to an ancient shrine. The Kobe Matsuri is tethered to the past as well, but it is mostly to the worship of commerce, especially with the West. Rather than reaching back centuries, however, this festival draws its inspiration from the Treaty of Amity and Commerce that led to the opening of the Port of Kobe in 1858. The celebration had antecedents during the Great Depression of the 1930s. Civic leaders wanted to find a way to take the peoples’ minds off their economic misfortune and decided to throw a party. They used the Rose Festival in Portland, Oregon as their model with abundant floats and overflowing flowers. In 1967, the Kobe Chamber of Commerce staged a centennial celebration with business overtones that featured gayly dressed street dancers. Four years later when the first official Kobe Matsuri was launched, the 70 parade participants drew widely from these prior celebrations. One popular element the Matsuri borrowed from American parades was the crowning of a festival Queen. As…