Gate Matsuri (Kamishima, Toba City)
　
On New Year's Day, when the east sky is getting bright, men all over the island raise the ring called Awa symbolizing the sun. The men raise the rings towards the sun with a bamboo pole. This festival is to drive away the evil and pray for a peaceful New Year. (Woman, Toba City)


Around 6:30am before the sun rises, a group of men dressed in white show up holding Awa. Other men with a bamboo stick surround the men in white. When they push bamboo pole into Awa, Awa rises up gently in the sky.

The sound of bamboos hitting each other and the voice of people who stick Awa grow like a wave. This is the climax of Geta Festival.

This festival is interpreted in many ways but there is no established theory. It is said that long ago, people at three parts of the island made each Awa respectively. And they drop their Awa in front of each other. Then, they offered the Awa that was not dropped to the shrine.

Awa making on New Year's Eve

On New Year's Eve, "Miyamochi" of this year and their relatives in white clothes got together and made Awa on 2F of the Federation of Fisheries Cooperative. They bound 4 or 5 branches of gumi and tied it with rope. They made a circle with them and rolled it up with paper. Then, they rolled it with sliding-screen paper again and finally tied it with hemp rope. A crowd of onlookers shouts encouragement, "Oh, YoiYoiYoi, Yoisa Yoisa Yoisa".



New Year's Morning, Hinatano Matsuri

Around 9:00 a.m. on New Year's Day, a ritual was held on the east beach. "Miyamochi" gave "Moromo" one by one to the shrine priests and officers on the island.

Moromo" is a celebratory present. "Miyamochi" makes it by himself while he puts Konbu seaweed on a tangerine orange and ties it with a leave of thatch.

There is a rule that anyone can snatch it when "Miyamochi" gives "Moromo" to officers. Whenever someone snatches "Moromo" from them, everyone laughs.