{"id":175900,"date":"2026-02-02T17:05:15","date_gmt":"2026-02-02T08:05:15","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.fukuoka-now.com\/?post_type=event&p=175900&lang=en"},"modified":"2026-02-12T18:05:10","modified_gmt":"2026-02-12T09:05:10","slug":"mekari-shinji-harvest-festival-26","status":"publish","type":"event","link":"https:\/\/www.fukuoka-now.com\/en\/event\/mekari-shinji-harvest-festival-26\/","title":{"rendered":"Mekari Shinji Harvest Festival"},"content":{"rendered":"

A traditional New Year ritual held at Mekari Shrine overlooking the Kanmon Strait, performed early on Lunar New Year\u2019s Day. The ceremony traces back to a legend from the late 2nd century, when Empress Jing\u016b is said to have offered wakame seaweed from the Hayatomo Strait to the gods upon her victorious return from a military expedition to the Korean Peninsula.<\/span><\/p>\n

After a kagura dance offering, three priests dressed in traditional robes, <\/span>eboshi<\/span><\/i> caps, white <\/span>tabi<\/span><\/i>, and straw sandals enter the low tide waters by torchlight to harvest wakame with sickles. The seaweed is then offered at the shrine to pray for safe voyages and a bountiful catch. This solemn ritual\u2014where darkness, tide, and firelight converge\u2014marks the start of the New Year in Kitakyushu.<\/span><\/p>\n

\"\"\u5199\u771f\u63d0\u4f9b\uff1a\u00a9M.Sakamoto<\/span><\/p>\n

\u2022 Kagura: Feb. 16, 2026 (Mon.) 23:00~1:00 *cancelled in case of rain.
\n\u2022 Shinji ritual: Feb. 17, 2026 (Tue.) 2:30~4:00 *rain or shine
\n\u2022 Mekari Shrine
\n\u2022 Temporary parking available (50 spaces, Map<\/a>)
\n\u2022 3492 Moji, Moji-ku, Kitakyushu City, Fukuoka<\/span><\/a>
\n\u2022 https:\/\/www.mekarijinja.com\/mekarisinji<\/span><\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

A traditional New Year ritual held at Mekari Shrine overlooking the Kanmon Strait, performed early on Lunar New Year\u2019s Day…<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":30292,"featured_media":175874,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","template":"","tags":[],"class_list":["post-175900","event","type-event","status-publish","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","location-kitakyushu","event-type-culture","en-US"],"jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.fukuoka-now.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/event\/175900","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.fukuoka-now.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/event"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.fukuoka-now.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/event"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.fukuoka-now.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/30292"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.fukuoka-now.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=175900"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.fukuoka-now.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/175874"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.fukuoka-now.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=175900"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.fukuoka-now.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=175900"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}