Fireworks!

Japanese cities take turns putting on huge firework displays during the summer.  As far as we can tell, they are simply celebrations of summer.  People travel to attend the fireworks shows.  They sell stickers for cars that announce which shows you have attended.  Tsuruoka's Fireworks display was on August 20th.    Tsuruoka is a city of about 150,000 people.  On fireworks night, that number doubles- or even over doubles.  Over 300,000 people are in town.  Is it worth it?  Oh yes!  We have never seen anything like it. 

The elders and Ken had to travel to Sendai that day to attend stake priesthood meeting.  They were to get home in plenty of time for the fireworks show, but they got caught in the traffic jam of people coming to Tsuruoka to see the big show.  But, even with the 45 minute delay,  they got here just after it started.  We watched it from a rice field near our home. 

I know this is a lot of pictures.  But, don't tell anyone, I took over 300 pictures that night!  It was hard to narrow them down to just these.

The show lasted for over two hours!

Mother Nature decided to get in on the act.  A full moon rose and joined the show as we watched. 

The elders have to be in their apartment by 9:00 pm.  So we had to leave before it was over to take them home. After we got back to our apartment, we walked just a block or so down our own street and got to watch the grand finale . . . .and my, was it grand! 

Boom!  Happy summer!