SAPPORO: The annual Sapporo Snow Festival started on Tuesday in Sapporo, the capital of Hokkaido, northernmost Japan, amid record-low snowpack.
A total of 201 snow and ice sculptures are exhibited at the main venue of Odori Park and two other spots during the event, which will be held through Feb. 11. The festival attracts over two million visitors every year.
This year, the executive committee of the festival took the unusual step of transporting snow from the snowy Hokkaido towns of Kutchan and Kimobetsu for the event.
It also made antiseptic available mainly at resting places of the venues and put up multilingual posters to encourage visitors to wear face masks and wash their hands, aiming to prevent the spread of the new coronavirus.
Sculptures in Odori Park include a total of five giant snow statues that feature motifs of the Ainu indigenous people, including the ship they used for trade activities in a wide range of areas and Blakiston’s fish owl they worshipped as a guardian of villages.
The statues appeared ahead of the opening in April of the National Ainu Museum and Park, nicknamed Upopoy, in the town of Shiraoi in Hokkaido. Upopoy is an Ainu word that means “singing in a large group.”
The snow sculpture of the palace on the water in Warsaw’s Lazineki Park is also showcased to mark the 100th anniversary last year of the establishment of Japan-Poland diplomatic ties.
Among the snow sculptures made by citizens are one depicting Michael Leitch, who captained Japan’s national team in the 2019 Rugby World Cup, and those featuring the Tokyo Olympics and Paralympics this summer.
Masahiro Horie, 64, who came from the western prefecture of Tokushima to see the statue of the rugby superstar, said, “I was concerned about the new strain of virus, but I decided to come as I’ve wanted to see the snow festival once.”
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