Guide– category –

The chonmage is the traditional topknot that sumo wrestlers wear in their hair — a style handed down from Japan's samurai era, when the topknot was ordinary men's dress. Sumo is one of the last places it survives in daily life. The hair ...

The dohyo-iri is sumo's ring-entering ceremony — a ritual procession the wrestlers perform before the day's top bouts begin. The top-division wrestlers file into the ring together in ornate ceremonial aprons, form a circle, and perform a...

In sumo, the dohyo is the ring where every bout is fought — a raised platform of packed clay, topped with a thin layer of sand, with the fighting circle marked out by partly buried rice-straw bales. It is far more than a stage. A new doh...

Tokyo's east side, where the Sumida River curves through the old downtown, lets you fold two very different sides of the city into a single day: the temple-town atmosphere of Asakusa and the sumo world of Ryogoku, the sumo town. Think of...

Ryogoku is the Tokyo district where sumo lives. On the old-Tokyo east side near the Sumida River, it is the neighbourhood built around the national sumo arena, the stables where wrestlers train, and the hot-pot that feeds them. If you ar...

Watching sumo live in Japan is easier to plan than many first-time visitors expect, once you know the calendar, the seat types, and where to buy. This is a practical planning guide for anyone hoping to sit in the hall for a grand tournam...

Watching sumo live at the Ryogoku Kokugikan is welcoming and easy for a first-timer, but a handful of customs keep the hall running smoothly. Move to and from your seat only between bouts, stay quiet and still while a bout is underway, a...

Chanko-nabe is the hearty hot-pot that forms the core of a sumo wrestler's diet: a communal pot of protein and vegetables, eaten in enormous quantities to build the size and strength the sport demands. Cooked in-house by the junior wrest...

Before a sumo bout, wrestlers move through a sequence of Shinto-rooted rituals that turn the dohyo into sacred ground. They throw salt (shio) to purify the ring, rinse their mouths with chikara-mizu ("power water") and wipe with chikara-...

A sumo bout is officiated by the gyoji on the ring and the shimpan around it. The gyoji is the robed referee who stands on the dohyo, calls the wrestlers into action, follows the clash up close, and points his gunbai (war-fan) toward the...