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The Sakasegawa Matsuri – which we discovered purely by chance – seemed for a long time to be an entirely pure form of Japanese festival. In the normal run of things, festivals here have one important event or purpose at their core – glittering shrines being smashed into each other, men running around in tiny sumo nappies, hapless volunteers in demon costumes being pelted with beans. These happenings are inevitably surrounded by streets upon on streets of stalls selling greasy fried things, jaw-dissolving sugary snackage, or chances to delight your parents by winning a bug-eyed goldfish with a lifespan which can be measured in hours, or a stripy balloon tied to a rubber band. Sakasegawa seemed keen to dispense with the stressful nonsense of events, apparently consisting of nothing but streets of stalls ready to help you get fat, broke and loaded up with tat as quickly as possible.

So we wandered up and down the streets, munching octopus balls, and knocking back cups of shaved ice so sugared up with condensed milk and fruit syrup that I swear I could hear colours for ten good minutes after I finished mine. Eventually, of course, we did find something going on. On a small performance stage, the least excited taiko band in the world tapped away lazily to old pop songs, and Anna – as the blondest and freshest of us all – was dragged out to dance with the old ladies. The evening was balmy, and I basked in the bizarre familiarity of it all, and tried not to believe how distant and alien it might soon seem.