K is for Kobe Luminarie

Almost exactly one year ago, on December 10, 2009, we were walking on the streets of Kobe after dinner, looking for what I thought was just a well-lit cathedral I had seen on a poster in the train coming over from Osaka earlier, when all of a sudden we found ourselves joining first dozens, then hundreds, then certainly many tens of thousands of people, all silently walking in the same direction on streets emptied of vehicles. We didn't know what was going on, but we sensed we were in for something special. 

After several blocks, crowd movers asked us to stop; we waited a few minutes, then we were motioned to walk on. As we turned the corner, this is what we saw. I was moved.

Kobe, 2009

After slowly, almost solemnly,  walking several blocks under the illuminated arches, listening to beautiful piped classical Baroque music, we all ended here, at the Kobe Cathedral. [Images look better enlarged.]

And this is looking back at the street we had walked up, many thousands still following us. I'm normally not very fond of being in a large crowd, but this was one of a handful of crowd experiences I treasure.

We learned that we had serendipitously dropped in on Kobe Luminarie, in memory of the Great Hanshin Earthquake on January 17, 1995. The 200,000 lights were donated by the Italian government and the design/installation was by Valerio Festi and Hirokazu Imaoka.

I am linking with Jenny's Alphabe-Thursday, where the letter of the week is K.