Kabatas High School students had the opportunity to watch the unforgettable performance of Japanese dancers.
The Executive Board members of Kabatas East Asia & World Project submitted a letter to the mayor and requested his support for a sister school agreement between Kabatas High School and a high school from Shimonoseki.
HEIKE SONG & DANCE
Heike ondo is a Japanese folk song that originates from Shimonoseki, Yamaguchi Prefecture in Japan. The song is basically a narrative of the Battle of Dan-no-ura, which was a major sea battle of the Genpei War, occurring at Dan-no-ura, in the Shimonoseki Strait. It is played during the summer to accompany the Heike Odori, which is the bon dance of the area.
The dance that accompanies Heike Ondo is called Heike Odori. It is simple and it can either proceed around a yagura or in a straight line along a designated street. The dance proceeds forward with a few steps backward. Observers of Heike Odori will immediately notice the dance's pronounced hand movements, first the left hand, then the right hand, and then both hands together.
It is said that the dance is supposed to be portraying grief and sorrow; the song and the dance tell a narrative of the Battle of Dan-no-ura from the losing side's perspective. The hand movements are supposed to symbolize wiping tears from one's face in a gesture of crying.
ABOUT SHIMONOSEKI
Shimonoseki is strategically located on the southern tip of Honshu separated from the city of Kitakyushu in Kyushu by the narrow Kanmon Strait. Shimonoseki, population approximately 280,000, is a major fishing port famous for its fugu (blowfish) and is an important ferry terminal for boats to Busan in South Korea and over to Kyushu.
Shimonoseki has been the scene of a number of battles throughout its history including the decisive sea Battle of Dan-no-ura in 1185, which resulted in a victory for the Minamoto over the Taira clan and paved the way for the establishment of the Kamakura shogunate.
In 1863 samurai from the Choshu clan based in nearby Hagi closed the Kanmon Straits to foreign shipping leading to an international expedition of British, Dutch, French and US gunboats to reopen them.
Both cities are located facing major straits: Istanbul faces the Bosphorus, and Shimonoseki faces the Kanmon Straits (Straits of Shimonoseki), By virtue of this similarity, Istanbul and Shimonoseki mayors signed a sister city agreement in 1972.
April 18, 2017
