Summer Fireworks

In Japan, summer means fireworks, festivals, watermelons and snow cones.

Us veteran JETs took the newbies to Okutama Nohryo Fireworks Festival in West Tokyo to experience a bit of Japanese culture. The fireworks display was modest and didn't last long, but the mountain air and the lack of crowds was preferable to Tokyo Bay's firework display which was also taking place on the same day. The daytime high in downtown Tokyo was 37 degrees C, and come evening, the temperature was still in the 30s, so it was nice to get away from the heat and humidity.