Re: basho or tournament

[Masumi Abe <abe@accesscom.com>]

Sumoans:

The word "basho" in sumo has special meaning and treated carefully by Sumo
Kyokai.

In 1993, Oh-zumo came to San Jose so-called the capital of Silicon Valley
in Northern California for two days. I live in Palo Alto about 20 minutes
ride north of San Jose. They visited San Jose about 10 years before then
and I saw them at that time, also. But it was special in 1993. It was the
first oversea "basho," though for only two days. It was called, if I
remember correctly, 1993 San Jose Basho. It was a big deal to be the first
official "Oversea Basho."

The regular and official 6 main tornaments were called "Hon-Basho." But
there are other "basho" tornament also.

Before Nagoya and Kyushu became the official hon-basho, they were called
"Jun-Hon-Basho," such as Nagoya Jun-Hon-Basho and Fukuoka Jun-Hon-Basho.
They had full 15 days, also, but rikishi's records were not included in the
official record book for any purposes, such as salary calculation and their
totla win-loss records, etc.

In Jun-Hon-Basho, Jun means "semi" in Japanese. But don't think that "jun"
in Japanese always means "semi." There are many "jun" in Japanese.

-Toshiyori Masumiriki


Pardoe, Richard (PRDR) wrote:

> The recent Vancouver event was called _Ozumo Canada Koen_ where koen is
> "performance".
>
> I vaguely remember that the San Jose event was called a tournament also,
> but memory is the first thing to go, so I could be wrong.
>
> Gochisozan
>
> > -----Original Message-----
> > From: Anne Doggett [SMTP:adoggett@pa.ausom.net.au]
> > Sent: Tuesday, October 06, 1998 1:36
> > To:   Sumo ML
> > Subject:      basho or tournament
> >
> > Frederik Verschueren asked
> > >Does anyone know where the basho outside Japan took place  ?
> > >In know some cities : Paris : '95, London, Australia : '97,
> > >Vancouver : '98.
> >
> > I asked my Japanese friend who knows alot about Sumo about this, but
> > she
> > told me that there have been no bashos outside Japan. According to
> > her,
> > basho is the official term for the 6 official yearly contests held in
> > Japan. Any other contest can be described by the English word
> > tournament.
> > I know this is not what Frederik meant but I'm interested in the
> > terminology myself so I am wondering if my friend is correct.   During
> > the
> > Australian tour the term tournament was used on the program rather
> > than
> > basho.  The word basho literally means "place".  Maybe someone can
> > help
> > clarify.
> > Anne
> >


--
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copyright (c) 1998 Masumi Abe
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<abe@accesscom.com> Masumi Abe <abe@sentius.com>
San Francisco Bay Area / Silicon Valley / Palo Alto
My Own Web Site: http://www.accesscom.com/~abe/
JUSTIN URL: http://www.dosanko.co.jp/spoton/abe/index.html