Japanese Penis Worship

Japanese Penis Worship

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Celebrating penises is a real thing. And while Westerners are still being shy about it, the people of Kawasaki, Japan, have been embracing dicks at the annual Festival of the Steel Phallus (Kanamara Matsuri) since 1977.
Penis-worshipers parade through the streets of the small a suburb of Tokyo, carrying candy, lollipops, balloons, purses and even dick-shaped carved radishes, all in the shape of male genitals. The festival’s biggest draw includes portable worshiping shrines of gigantic pink, orange and black phalluses floating through the crowd.
The festival’s origin can be traced back to the 17th Century , when a local blacksmith constructed a meter-long “Steel Phallus” to honor Shinto, the goddess of fertility and childbirth.
Dick jokes and fun aside, the festival has also served a noble purpose—to raise awareness for HIV prevention. And that’s something we can definitely get behind.

The first Sunday in April marks the celebration of the Shinto fertility festival, the Kanamara Matsuri or the “Festival of the Steel Phallus.” Known colloquially as the “Penis Festival”, these festivities celebrate just that: the power of the male genitalia. And it is an event that is gaining increasing popularity, especially among foreign visitors, each year.
The next Kanamara Festival will take place on Sunday, 7 April 2019.
So you're probably wondering why the Japanese celebrate the “steel phallus.” Well, legend has it that sometime back in the Edo period (1603-1867), there was a sharp-toothed demon who fell in love with a beautiful woman. The woman, however, didn't return the demon's affection and decided to marry another man. Angering the demon, he inhabited the woman's vagina before their wedding night and when they tried to consummate the marriage, the demon bit off the groom's penis with his razor sharp teeth.
When the woman remarried, the jealous demon once again made his feelings clear by biting off her second husband's penis. Deciding that enough was enough, the upset villagers concocted a plan to trick the demon. A local blacksmith forged a steel phallus and upon its insertion, the demon's teeth were broken and he left the woman's vagina for good.
Sometime thereafter the legend was commemorated by way of the Kanamara Matsuri and the enshrinement of the actual steel phallus at Kanayama Shrine, constructed to honor Kanayama Hikonokami and Kanayama Himenokami, the Shinto deities of childbirth and lower abdomen health.
The Kanayama Shrine then became renowned as a site for sex workers to pray for protection against STDs. Nowadays the shrine is said to aid fertility and is often visited by married couples hoping to start a family. The festival itself has also become popular with the gay, lesbian and transgender communities.
They have come up with additional monkeys at this shrine.
Well, imagine a whole lot of items and activities dedicated to the male sex organ.
First you are welcomed to the shrine with some festival-appropriate signage.
Along with food and drink vendors like any typical Japanese festival, there are also stalls selling penis-themed souvenirs including key chains, trinkets, pens, toys and chocolates.
Or maybe a pair of glasses with a penis nose attached?
These visitors walked around asking if anyone had a tissue!
The most popular item would have to be the penis (and vagina) shaped lollipops. Grab one early to ensure you don't miss out and avoid the long queues (they can and do sell out).
Just take a look at the crowds trying to get their hands on one!
And if you're wondering whether to open your wallet, all the proceeds from items sold go to AIDS research.
There are plenty of opportunities to pose with other phallic items too.
Give this guy a small tip for a photo and he'll show his appreciation.
Or a bottle of “testicle-vagina” rice wine? The bottle of sake that the woman is holding here is sold at the festival as a kind of play on words with the characters used for this “Kingyoku/Banko Happy Set” (as Japanese kanji characters can carry different pronunciations and meaning depending on context). While the first word could be taken to mean “testicles”, it's actually in reference to the expression kin-gyoku ryouen , meaning “flawless jewel.” And while the second could be mistaken for “vagina”, it's referring to the expression ban-ko fu-eki , portraying a permanent state of goodness or quality.
If you can't wait to drink your sake, then the free tasting from early afternoon might be up your alley. But of course there is a Kanamara Matsuri twist! You eat a small dried fish before swallowing the amazake (sweet sake). Why? The sweet cloudy white sake mixed with the salty fishiness of the dried fish is said to mimic both the look and taste of semen!
Or maybe you'd like to try your hand at carving a penis out of a radish?
Perhaps the highlight of the festival are the three large phallic portable shrines (mikoshi) that are carried throughout the streets in a parade from around midday. There's the “Kanamara Fune Mikoshi” – a steel penis in a ship – which represents the steel phallus that the woman used to dispel the demon…
The “Big Kanamara Mikoshi” made of wood… (here they are carrying out a Shinto ritual in order to “transfer” the Gods from the shrine to the portable one to be carried through the streets, and to bless/purify it).
And then the standout pink penis mikoshi known as “Elizabeth” which was donated to the festival by Tokyo drag queen club Elizabeth Kaikan.
“Elizabeth” is famously carried through the streets by trans-gender/cross-dressing festival participants.
It was a very windy day and “Elizabeth” took on a precarious lean. You can imagine how it sounded to have people in the crowd start screaming “The penis is falling!”
The portable shrines are carried throughout the streets for around an hour and a half before being returned to the shrine so there are plenty of opportunities to take pictures with them both before and after, although the large crowds can make them difficult to get to, especially around midday before the parade.
If you wish to go out onto the streets to follow the parade, make sure you get out of the shrine before 12 as they block off the exit right before the mikoshi leave and it becomes so cramped in there that you literally can't move. Otherwise, you can follow the mikoshi from a distance after they leave and the exit clears. Anyone can participate in the parade, and the shrine actually loans out kimonos to anyone wanting to don one and join in.
Be sure to also wander the festival grounds to take in some of the other cultural displays.
And if you are wanting to get pregnant, then you can take advantage of being at one of the last remaining fertility shrines and pray to be blessed with child.
It may appear to be an outlandish display of sexuality (and in many ways it does make Western culture seem quite prudish), but many would argue that the openness of the festival is a healthy one which celebrates the ability to reproduce. In fact, many Japanese visit the festival with their children and happily go about giving them a penis lollipop or propping their babies up on a phallus for a picture without “sexualizing” it in any way. I even passed by a family who were buying penis candles together, the children contemplating with the utmost seriousness which color would look best in their rooms.
It is also a place where people of any sexuality are welcomed and the festival exudes a kind of acceptance that I haven't seen so often in Japan, where ideas of homosexuality and sex change are often ignored and/or repressed as “not the done thing” by society at large.
So why not experience something you don't see everyday and embrace sexuality, whatever your preference, by celebrating the life-creating male sex organ.
When: First Sunday in April (next event: April 7th, 2019).
Where: Kanayama Shrine on the grounds of Wakamiya Hachimangu Temple, Kawasaki, Kanagawa, Japan.
Time: Officially 11am to around 4pm, however, this festival is getting so incredibly popular these days, it's already packed at 9am. Our word of advice: Go early and head straight for the lollipops so you can avoid the long queues later. The parade takes place from around 12:00-13:30. Other activities conclude around the same time, although the stalls remain open and phallus items are around for more picture taking.
Access: Kawasaki-Daishi train station on the Keikyu Daishi Line. Take the south exit. Upon exiting, you'll see a Sunkus convenience store across the road. Take the street to the right and the shrine is just a minute or so on foot on the right hand side. Just follow the crowds.
From Shinagawa (Tokyo), take the Keikyu Main Line to Keikyu Kawasaki (around 10 mins on the Rapid Ltd. Exp. or around 25 mins on the local service) and change to the Keikyu Daishi Line (5 mins). Total fare ¥240.
Posted on Published: January 9, 2015
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"A hundred thousand revelers come here to celebrate one thing: the male organ."
Every year on the first Sunday of April in Kawasaki, Japan, one might cross paths with a peculiar sight — a succession of enormous erect penises parading down the street under the strength of men in traditional female garb.
This year, photographer B.A. Van Sise was in attendance of the annual Festival of the Steel Phallus , a regional tradition dating back to the 17th century that today serves as a platform for the benefit of HIV research. Here, Van Sise shares his experience and some of the history behind what is perhaps the most phallic festival in the world.
Early April in Kawasaki, Japan, is set aside for the Kanamara Matsuri, or the festival of the steel phallus, in which a hundred thousand revelers come here to celebrate one thing: the male organ. Home to the Kanayama Jinja Shrine, Kawasaki, southwest of Tokyo, has been closely tied to the male anatomy for centuries, due to a persistent local legend, so its famed Shinto shrine to the relic of a steel phallus was, well, erected.
Legend holds that a jealous, red-faced, sharped-tooth demon hid in the vagina of a goddess and then bit off, to their great surprise, the penises of her first two husbands. History forgets to mention why she failed to warn the second guy.
Finally a third, more determined suitor, a blacksmith, created an iron phallus that broke the demon's teeth; the man won over the beautiful woman while the demon presumably returned back to the ether to receive quite the lecture from his orthodontist.
The shrine is humble but has stood the test of time. Made of old stone and boasting a small but pretty network of traditional orange torii gates, it was built in roughly 698 CE — but is now more famously home to the festival — in prim and proper Japan, an unusual but charming celebration of the sacred and the profane.
While beautifully frocked Shinto priests in the shrine celebrate the thousands-year-old god, long worshiped by prostitutes fearing disease and pilgrims worried for their fertility, a different sort of celebration is going on outside, as tens, if not hundreds of thousands of partiers take to the streets.
Revelers carry penis lollipops (funny to look at, but not particularly tasty), phallic vegetables, and enough whimsical toys to stock a year's worth of Las Vegas bachelorette parties. They enjoy them all while snapping not-quite-ready-for-Instagram selfies and watching a parade of all of Kawasaki's manliest men, struggling to carry a bunch of giant junk through the street.
Local families and businesses work for months to make the enormous genitals carried on the shoulders of teams of men through Kawasaki's tight streets. Three, in total, are carried around town; two are of metal and one, true to Japan's contemporary anime-loving culture, is of the cheery, bubblegum-hued cartoon variety, and lofted by 18 fellows wearing glitter and fantastic makeup.
For the prudish, it might be hard to see, but it does have its benefits: These days, sales from the festival — penis clothing, candy, food, toys — rake in gobs of money every year, put duly to work toward HIV research.
This year marks a half century for the festival in its modern form. Visitors wanting to see it themselves, and unafraid to face the throbbing masses, can make it to Kawasaki from Tokyo in an easy day trip on the first Sunday of April, any year, and see for themselves the giant phalluses of Kawasaki — and the many men who get them up.
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B.A. Van Sise is a New York-based portrait and features photographer.

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