Hiratsuka Tanabata

Tanabata is a Japanese festival celebrating the meeting of Orihime (Vega) and Hikoboshi (Altair). According to the legend, the Milky Way separates the lover from each other, and only once a year they are allowed to meet on the seventh day of the seventh lunar month. It is believed that if that day is rainy, Orihime and Hikoboshi will not be able to see each other and must wait for another year, so people usually pray for good weather and make wishes for themselves.



Lots of Tanabata Festivals are being held in Japan on July or August. The biggest one is in Hiratsuka, Kanagawa. Hiratsuka Tanabata is held in the beginning of July for a few days. Took me one and a half hour to reach Hiratsuka from Tokyo.


The Tanabata is being celebrated all over the place. You should expect to see hundreds of people in Hiratsuka.


Japanese people celebrates Tanabata by writing a wish on a small piece of colorful paper called Tanzaku, and then hanging it on a bamboo.


You can put as many Tanzaku as you want but the effectiveness will decrease each time you put another one.




There are lots of huge Tanabata decorations in the streets. It is amazing to see so many large streamers along the street. You can easily feel the festive moods all around you.












Senbazuru, a string of a thousand paper cranes origami. Folding a thousand paper cranes origami will make a person's wish come true.









After spending some quality time enjoying the festival, we went to the beach to take some photos of us. These people are my good friends whom I usually hangout with. I just thought it would be best to show their faces in here once in a while. :)


Happy Tanabata everyone !