3 men arrested at festival over jumping on portable shrines

According to the Mainichi Shinbun men were arrested over the weekend in Askakusa after one of them jumped on top of a portable shrine and two others prevented police officers from arresting another man for the same offense. Here’s a video of the event in question:

Anyone who watches the video can see that vast majority of the men who defied the ban of jumping on the portable shrines had one thing in common: they were covered in yakuza-style tattoos. Those who simply read the text of articles about this issue probably could not understand why the rest of the crowd allowed these guys to commit the sacrilege of riding around on the portable shrines, but it becomes a bit more understandible when you can see that they were scary-looking gangster types. According to reports, the police are looking into the identities of several more of the men who jumped on shrines that day. Given the fact that news cameras recorded the faces of many of the violators, it shouldn’t be too hard for the cops to find them…

Update: Blogger Mark V Tokyo has posted an excellent photo from the matsuri, showing 3 heavily-tattooed men riding on one of the portable shrines (small version above). Check it out!