Paantu festival is an annual festival on the island of Miyako-jima in Japan’s Okinawa Prefecture. During the festival, groups of men are elected to decorate because the paantu, evil spirits covered from head to toe with mud and foliage, and are given driving out demons and cleansing the island of bad luck.
Of course, like several good festivals involving mud-covered monsters, this also means scaring the life out of young children. Although Paantu was once celebrated on several other Okinawan islands, today the sole place you’ll find it’s on the little island of Miyako-jima, some 300 kilometers southwest of Okinawa itself.
The celebrities are largely the Panantu people and they do what they do to make the island safe for those that live there. And being covered in mud and leaves,
the boys playing the part of the paantu also carry wooden masks which they hold before of their faces as they chase men, women, and kids down before smothering them with the identical mud with which they were painted.
It’s believed that being touched by a paantu during this way will bring luck for the approaching year. But when little children are concerned, even benevolent figures like Santa getting too close can cause tears. the fear these poor must feel with their parents not only allows the paantu to approach but physically hand them over to them.
They always prefer the small ones, and they arent even afraifd to share their goodluck gift with the older residents. If one among the paantu likes the planning of somebody, they’ll sprint after them and pin them to the bottom, virtually tea-bagging t
heir victim as they cover them with mud.
Traditionally, the dirt demons will bless new houses and cars as they pass them by. We’ll leave you with a pair of videos taken at newer Paantu Matsuri.
