The Cats of Dubrovnik

Commanding the steps, the higher and lower ground, the alley and piazza, from positions of imperious distain, the cats of Dubrovnik do not mewl and they do not beg, but rather deign to be occasionally stroked. Clinging to the sides, they live in shadowlands of walls and wars, avoiding the bright reflections made by souvenir shops on smooth stones when storms pass over and over again. Rebuilt, remade, renewed as medieval imagination, photographs of martyrs fade to white, disappearing like rubble and holes and cats.

I like big butts and I cannot lie ...

And while we're on the subject of Japan, it has already been noted in this blog that I have a certain penchant for big blokes, as does Dingo Baby for that matter, and it doesn't get much bigger than sumo.

Which is why, after a quick trip on a bullet train, we found ourselves at Day 4 of the Nagoya Sumo festival (July 2014). Even though bouts had started at 0830, the stadium was still relatively empty by the time we arrived for lunch. The earlier fights involve only the minnows, the newbies, the getting too old with knackered knees. Technically more inept, they are of little interest to the average spectator.

But the lack of crowd in a stadium that would hold several thousand could also be attributed to Sumo's decline in popularity. It is a sport for the aged. On our front row of cushions we were surrounded by pensioner groupies; ladies who clamoured with delight when their favourite wrestler came on. They gathered in the foyer and by the arena entrances to take pictures and clap and clamour some more. They were lovely, but anyone under the age of 50 was rare.

A strong hint of yakuza involvement didn't do much for the sport either, and the fact that a Japanese wrestler hasn't been a yokozuna (champion) since 2003 adds to the general sense of malaise. For the last few years it has been the Mongolians who have dominated (all three yokozuna in Nagoya were  Mongolian but East Europeans also seem to do well).

Despite the declining interest it is a magnificent performance, especially as the fights progress through the afternoon and the men and the crowds get correspondingly bigger: bigger butts, bigger moobs, bigger mawashi (loin clothes), massive thighs. There is gamesmanship and strategy as the better fighters try to psyche each other out with false moves and dummy lunges. But personally I think it is the sound of flesh crashing into flesh, like walruses slapping into each other, that excites the throng, as a surprisingly mobile 150 kilograms of muscle and fat tries to shift another 150 kilograms out of a ring. Immovable object meets irresistible force. No wonder their knees give out.

The bouts also become increasingly ritualised, with stomping and salt throwing, incantation and fan waving, squatting and getting up again, taking more time than the actual fight itself, which lasts on average four seconds (although they have up to four minutes). For a younger generation brought up on the sensory overload of anime and video games it's not surprising that not-much-happening isn't going to get their attention.

The opening ceremonies were completely opaque to us even with the handy guide and the help of our neighbour who valiantly attempted to explain the rules, in Japanese. Lost in translation she persisted throughout the five hours of subsequent bouts. We were mostly puzzled by the hundreds of spectators suddenly throwing their cushions at the ring when one of the yokozuna went down, but apparently that's allowed.

The rules extended to behaviour in the stadium but we found the general Japanese desire to comply dissipating and hints of naughtiness sneaking in. Our neighbours in the boxes behind became drunker and drunker, ignoring the 'no drink, no food allowed' rules which we unfortunately had to obey as we were too close to the sacred space of the dohyo (wrestling platform) to contemplate breaking regulations even if we had been aware of what they were. I did try moving to an empty aisle bench just one away from my designated seat but that seemed to attract the attention of the authorities who politely asked me to move back - possibly. Or what they may have been asking was if I would mind appearing on national television, as a few moments later a cameraman appeared in front of me to film my reaction to the next bout. I'd like to think I gave such an enthusiastic performance of squealing and clapping that it will encourage future generations to support the sport.