Sumo-masen!

Like sumimasen (excuse me/sorry), but, y’know…sumo-ier.

My big agenda for my last day was attending the finale of the sumo tournament. From 11-5.

Full disclosure: I only made it through 4 hours.

I had a box seat, all of which are seiza-style, where you get comfy cushions and sit on the floor. They were well appointed, as all of them had one of these secured to the side:

(Definitely thought they were keys, at first.)

Most of the matches were over pretty quickly, but the tiny guys (sumo from Mongolia, mostly) were fun to watch. Usually they were so much faster, the larger guys ran right out of the ring. However, I did see one of them get lifted straight off the floor by his belt and get carried (kicking) out of the ring, like an unruly child. So it has its disadvantages.

I will note, they were really quite gentle with each other. No one was getting launched out of the ring, and even when they were shoved out, the victor usually tried to help check the other guy to make sure he didn’t fall off the platform.

My favorite part by far was the intermission, where they did comic sumo. It was everything I was promised.

I would have left sooner, but my box-mates had already left, and I discovered I could read until the crowd got really quiet, which indicated that something exciting was about to happen.