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| Events Your first month will be a busy time, settling in to your neighbourhood, making new friends and getting to know your way around Sendai. There are lots of things going on in and around the city during summer, so make the most of your opportunities to get out and do stuff. Welcome Parties There will be a Welcome Party on your first night in Sendai, organized by the Advisors and ALTs for Group A and Group B arrivals. You can get to know other new JETs better, and meet gveteranh Sendai ALTs. MAJET the Miyagi Association of Japan Exchange & Teaching) also organize a joint Sendai-Miyagi Welcome party for all the new JETs in the prefecture. This is a good way to meet ALTs living outside Sendai City. Your school or JTEs (Japanese Teachers of English) may also have a welcome party or dinner arranged for soon after your arrival. This would be a good opportunity to meet your school staff in a relaxed atmosphere and try out your Japanese skills. Festivals Summer is festival season around Sendai. Sendaifs most famous event, the Tanabata Festival (tanabata matsuri). On Chuo-dori in Ichiban-cho (Sendaifs main shopping area), colorful ornamental globes, streamers and bamboo decorate the arcade. More than 1,500 decorative bamboo branches form tunnels over the shopping arcades. The Tanabata Star Festival parade (hoshi-no yoi-matsuri) begins at 5 p.m. on Jozenji-dori.@Each year more than 10 different parade groups are formed in order to illustrate scenes based on a chosen theme, and there are also stage performances. On the eve of the festival, fireworks are set off around Nishi-koen Park in celebration of the coming event If you like fireworks, you might also want to go to Matsushimafs Lantern Floating and Firework Festival (matsushima toro-nagashi hanabi taikai), where you can watch spectacular fireworks (hanabi) and floating lanterns lighting up the famous bay. Sendai holds a similar event on the Hirose River the@Hirose-gawa Lantern Floating Festival (hirose-gawa toro-nagashi matsuri). Easily accessed from Kawara-machi or Nagamachi-itchome subway stations, people wander the river banks dressed in yukata (summer kimonos), floating paper lanterns carrying their wishes, eating festival food from the numerous stalls and watching the fireworks. For those of you who like live music, Sendaifs Jozenji-dori Jazz Festival will be a nice way to spend a September weekend.The festival features live performances by over 600 groups of various musical genres (not just jazz!) on stages and streets around the centre of the city, particular on Jozenji-dori. Itfs the biggest music festival in Japan, and well worth a stroll around. |
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