SUMO THE SPORT OF BIG BOYS AND THEIR GAMES

Today I am reminded of one of my favourite times inJapan. My introduction to the sport of Sumo or Sumo wrestling. Prior to my arrival in Japan I had little knowledge of this sport. Some of the guys at work were already fans of the sport by the time I had arrived. Sumo is fought tournament style and takes place once every two months in a different city and lasts 15 days each time. Each one of these tournaments is called a Basho and these are very popular sporting events in Japan. Each Basho has the attention of most of the male population of Japan. Sumo has been fought in this style since the Middle Ages.

Sumo Grand Champions or Yokozuno(s) are national heroes and are often Legends after their retirement from the sport. A fighter, if really good, might reach the upper level or professional level of the sport in his early twenties and if really, really good may become a Yokozuno in his late twenties. Typically a career in this sport would be over by the time a fighter reached his mid thirties. Armed with about that much knowledge I am invited to the November 1983 Basho in Fukuoka, a large city nor far from where we live in Omuta, Japan.

We left home early in the morning and arrived at the stadium shortly after starting time which was 9:30 am. The tournament is fought over 15 days, with each contestant fighting once each day. The tournament lasts until 7:00-7:30 pm, when the last fight is fought. You might ask how could each day last 10 hours. It is started at 9:30 with bouts between the very newest and very youngest of fighters, maybe junior high age. There might be 30 or more fighters in each division and these divisions go from the new, very young, thru high school, college ranks, amateur ranks (various levels), semi professional ranks, the bottom tier of the professional ranks, the mid tier and finally at about 5:30 the highest level of Sumo fighters fight.

This included hundreds of individual matches during the day to get thru all of the ranks. It is started on time, the bouts are fast, crisp, and fighters quickly move out of the rings after a bow to their opponent no matter if the fight was won or lost. This sport is about, honour, tradition, respect and humility. For example no one tells a Yokozuna (Grand Champion) when to quit the sport. If they have 2-3 consecutive Bashos (tournaments without winning at least 12 of their 15 fights), the champion knows that for honour’s sake it is time for him to retire, and he does. In the lower ranks, fighters are moved up or down the rankings based on their performance in the previous basho. Winning 8 of your 15 matches gets you a promotion. Winning 7 or less can lead to demotion for the next basho.

Ok we arrive and it extremely crowded at the entrance to the stadium. The basho is fought indoors in a round arena spiralling up from the ring. At the entrance to the stadium vendors are selling food and Saki, the national drink of Japan. Not like bottles, but big casks of Saki and cushions. Hmmmm I’m thinking maybe we should have one of these. Looks like a long day. Food? Nah, who needs food right? Well we enter with thousands of others. The stadium is not yet full because it is early in the day and the very junior ranks are fighting. Throughout the morning and into the afternoon people are arriving and leaving. The flow is ebb and tide all day.

We are seated in a box, on the floor, with a tatami mat to sit on. This a mat of woven reeds which is typical of seating in Japan. Our box measured about 6′ wide by 10′ long and was probably meant for 4 people to sit in. You sat in whatever position you could get comfortable with on the floor. All you possessions for the day were kept with you in the box. Such as saki, food, camera, cushions, jackets, and whatever else you need to see out the day.

The day passed quickly and the consumption of Saki increased as time went on. We started to notice some unusual things happening around us. In a lot of ways watching the crowd was as great a pleasure as watching the fights. We noticed that about lunch time, hundreds of women entered the arena carrying pots of cooked food, more saki, linens and chopsticks. These, they dutifully laid out in front of the “little man” in order to make sure he didn’t want for anything during the stressful time of watching his favourite sport and drinking saki.

Once the little sweetie was fed, the women cleaned around them and packed up their goodies and left. Hmmmm thinks I “this is quite a civilized tradition. I wonder if I could get Deysi to do this for me”. At this my friend snorts and says “ya, not bloody likely mite”. And we banish the sweet thought from our memories. Another fairly regular occurrence, which happened earlier than I expected was, that once the saki consumption got up there, some of the guys could be seen talking and cheering and then suddenly topple over onto their side and have a little sleep. Now this is really civilized!

The day progresses like this until the final bout of the evening which would feature the two top fighters in the tournament to that point. All fights are set by the committee and are intended to match fighters of equal skill and experience. They are supposed to try and make each fight as interesting as possible. The fighters enter the ring, posture a bit, throw some salt to purify the ring, crouch down and at a signal from the referee they lunge at each other and try to push, pull, throw, slap, or otherwise convince their opponent to get out of the ring or to touch any part of their body to the ground. It is usually quick, but in that short time there is lots of action.

These are not small boys, with an average weight of right around 300lbs (135kg). Some weigh as much as 500lbs. When these two behemoths meet in the centre there is an audible smack of bodies. You are happy that you are not caught between them. You would be a grease spot on their chests. When one pushes the other out, or down, the match is over and the next pair, who are now sitting ringside, get up onto the mat and prepare for their match.

The people each have their own favourite fighters and cheer loudly when it is their turn to fight. I enjoyed my introduction to Sumo, very much. It has been a lifelong interest to me. I try to watch each and every basho that I am able. One day at this tournament was long. After the last bout we still had to drive yet another hour home. I cannot imagine going for 10 hours each day for 15 days, as the diehard fans do. I would need a liver transplant at the end!