Taiwan and Japan - Day 15

Sumo Time

Today after the late day at the maid cafe yesterday we decided to have a bit of a sleep in and skip Tokyo tower. We have done this before anyway so it wasn’t a huge deal for us. We got up and headed out for breakfast with Steve and Rob before making our way to a bus station to meet up with our group for the tour.

Today we had booked a guided tour to a sumo match which is something we all wanted to see but due to limited dates is hard to get into. The tour started at the station and as we were walking up we bumped into the others. Together we made our way in to meet our tour guide Michiko. She was a lovely lady who spoke fantastic English. She gave us our tour stickers and then we waited for Brad and Alysha who were running late. Dani and Rob located Brad and Alysha and then we were off jumping on 2 trains to arrive at the Sumo stadium. Michiko gave us a tour of the Sumo stadium and showed us the different parts and even showed us how they start a fight by using rob. She then gave us a handout of the fights we would be seeing with little descriptions underneath each sumo. They were hilarious my favourite one was “scared of ghosts or ghosts scared of him?”

After the tour we were taken into the stadium to our seats. The sumo stadium is amazing we had to sit in the aisle while we waited for a fight to stop and then we were seated. There are all 6 different tiers of sumo’s with their being 3 main champion sumo’s. We got some food and settled down to watch the main fights. I did not expect it to be as exciting as it was. There was a lot of ceremony with each fight. The fight only started as soon as both opponents placed their knuckles on the ground. We saw such flexibility and strength with these men. We even saw a smaller sumo who was 50kg lighter throw his heavier competitor over. Before we knew it all of us were into it screaming and yelling and having a ball.

After wards we trudged home for an early night. I cannot explain to you how cool the sumo’s were and how much of an amazing experience it was. I would 100% do it again. Anyway its time for bed. Disneyland tomorrow.