Cherry Blossom 2007, Seattle, WA

Every year, Seattle celebrates Japanese culture by having a festival with lots of fun events.  It's usually pretty small, but being a fan of everything Japanese, it was exciting nonetheless.  This year, it was near the Seattle Science Center.  Most of the time, I went around looking at cool Japanese merchandise and browsing a silent auction.  I also saw a Kendo demonstration.  The performers were both children and adults.  They should us some basic maneuvers and then had some duels.  I cannot express how fascinated I am with the Samurai and there weapons.  Seeing people train and practice was incredible.  Here's a quick photo album of some of things I saw.

Here's the logo for the event.

A nice shot of some performers in kimono's in front of the Space Needle.

Items being auctioned off.

This is permanently here.

Swords!  This is actually just a blade.  The wooden parts are what they store the blade in before everything else is complete.

Another blade.  Notice the beautiful carvings on the tang.

The same blade.  If you look closely you can see the patterns on the edge of the blade.

A few blades and some written patterns on the wall.

Polishing a blade.

So shiny...

These are the kendo performers.  You'll notice all kinds of people.

All suited up and ready for battle.

Some of them doing warm-ups.  Size doesn't matter in this sport.  Not nearly as much as skill.

A video of some warm-ups.

A practice they do where they initiate multiple attacks as fast as possible.

A nice duel.

Another duel, but this is between a man and a female.

Very nicely done wooden boat.

Fancy origami.

Advanced origami.