The Haisai Festival celebrates Okinawan culture and the arrival of spring in the modern Shintoshin waterfront district of Naha. The word 'Haisai' is a cheerful Okinawan greeting, and the festival's spirit is correspondingly warm and welcoming. A headline event is the mass sanshin (three-stringed banjo) performance, in which hundreds of players gather to perform traditional Okinawan songs together in the open air. Eisa dance groups, traditional crafts demonstrations, and island food markets round out a colourful programme that introduces visitors to the full breadth of living Ryukyuan culture.
- Type
- Festival
- Category
- Matsuri
- Season
- Spring
- Month
- March
- Region
- Okinawa
- Prefecture
- Okinawa
- City
- Naha
Highlights
- ◆Mass open-air sanshin performance with hundreds of players
- ◆Eisa dance demonstrations and audience participation
- ◆Traditional Ryukyuan crafts exhibitions and workshops
- ◆Island food market with dishes from Okinawa's outer islands
- ◆Held in the modern, walkable Shintoshin waterfront precinct