TOKUSHIMA--Summer here is busy with more than 1 million spectators expected to pack the Awa Odori dance festival, which dates back over 400 years.

But the festival from Aug. 12-15 this year is not the only place visitors can see Awa Odori. As a culture, it has been spreading worldwide.

While the organizers of this year’s festival are trying to draw foreign tourists, using the slogan “Love & Cool” on posters, the dance has brought foreigners to Tokushima and Tokushima to the world for a long time already.

On the evening of July 6, about 20 people from 11 countries including Brazil, the United States and Fiji were practicing Awa Odori moves in a conference room of the Tokushima Prefectural International Exchange Association.

An instructor told them how to move and to pay particular attention to their feet and knees.

They were members of the Arasowa-ren dance group, which mainly consists of non-Japanese dancers. It was the group’s first rehearsal before the big day at the festival.

Nearly half of the dancers were wearing “tabi” socks and wooden geta clogs for the first time. They practiced for about 90 minutes, looking excited and nervous at the same time.

The predecessor of Arasowa-ren was founded in 1981. The word “arasowa” has connotations of a world without conflict, while “ren” is an Awa Odori term for a dance group.

Many of Arasowa-ren’s members were non-Japanese from the start. More than 100 people join the group each year. At one time nearly 300 people participated.

Marcelo Eidi Cho, 34, a fourth-generation Japanese-Brazilian dentist, was taking part for the first time. He was closely following the movements of others.

“My legs are more tired than I expected,” he said with a smile. “My knees hurt.”

Cho came to Japan in May this year on a Japan International Cooperation Agency training program.

He became interested in Awa Odori when he saw a dance group practicing in a park near Tokushima University. Then, a friend invited him to join Arasowa-ren.

“I hope I can become good at it,” he said. He pledged to keep practicing, adding that he hopes spectators will enjoy it.

The group’s instructor was Shinichi Niki, 60, a member of another famed group, Nonki-ren. Nonki-ren has been teaching Arasowa-ren how to dance since 2017.

Niki said Awa Odori has three primary elements: a two-beat rhythm, hand and leg movements and a smile.

The true spirit of the dance is to get everyone moving, he said.

“Encouraging spectators to join and enjoying dancing together is what makes it Awa Odori,” he said.

The dancers embrace their learning deeply. One former member from Malawi has now returned home but apparently still does Awa Odori moves.

“I think Awa Odori is a form of diplomacy that doesn’t require language,” Niki said.

He added that he hopes others will join in and thereby learn the culture of Tokushima--and spread it to others after returning home.

AWA ODORI WORLDWIDE

The tourism policy section of the Tokushima prefectural government said there are at least 14 ren groups outside Japan.

Awa Odori has wide recognition in part because its images are often used to publicize Japan abroad.

But the groundwork of today’s global presence was laid by Japanese groups, including Tokushima prefectural associations set up by Tokushima expatriates living in countries such as the United States and Brazil.

One Tokushima resident who considers it his mission to teach overseas is 82-year-old Hideaki Oka, a former head of the well-known ren group Godyahei.

In 2021, Oka visited Seattle at the invitation of a prefectural association there. It was no easy journey as travel restrictions were in place because of the pandemic.

In Seattle, Oka taught 20 to 30 Japanese-Americans the Awa Odori dance moves. And the results were impressive.

“I watched them dancing cheerfully and joyfully in formation. It made me feel (the dance) was accepted globally and had taken root,” he said.

Oka first became involved in teaching dancers overseas in 2008. He had joined a delegation sent by the prefectural government to commemorate the 100th anniversary of Japanese immigration to Brazil.

On that occasion, he taught basic dance steps to about 100 members of a Brazil-based Awa Odori group, Represa-ren.

“I still remember how they got it right so quickly, and how they lost themselves in the dance,” he said. “Maybe because it’s quite similar to the rhythm of samba.”

Oka has been dancing Awa Odori for 60 years. He retired as head of Godyahei in March 2022 after more than 40 years.

“I want to keep teaching, at home and abroad, for as long as I’m physically able,” he said.

SAMBA FUSION

Awa Odori first arrived in Brazil in 1972, carried there by a prefectural association.

Represa-ren was founded in 1979 by Eikichi Fujioka, an immigrant from Tokushima Prefecture.

Since then, the dance has had an interesting development, according to Nobue Kasai, a samba instructor who has worked in Sao Paulo since 2009.

Kasai, 50, said while Awa Odori dancers have performed at festivals for Japanese-Brazilians, the traditional Japanese dance has become fused with Brazilian culture.

During the Brazilian Carnival in Sao Paulo in February, a team of Japanese-Brazilian dancers wore costumes with Awa Odori motifs. They drew applause from the crowd.

“It was a costume that apparently mixed Awa Odori with the culture of samba,” said Kasai, who was on the team.

Kasai joined an Awa Odori group in her native Saitama Prefecture about 20 years ago as a dancer of the dynamic, energetic “otoko odori” (men’s dance).

“Someday, I want to see Awa Odori in Tokushima, home of the festival,” she said.