“Splash girls collection 2008” was held at Akihabara Station and Kanda Myoujin Shrine on Saturday, August 2nd.
Reference:“Splash girls collection 2007” Over 50 maids participate in the water splashing ceremony!! 1st “Akihabara Enviroment Conference” held (in Japanese only)
“Splash girls collection 2008” is an summer event in Akihabara to cool down the summer heat by splashing water on to the streets. Started in 2004 in a small park, this Anti-global warming event has expanded into taking hands with the government in 2006 and developing an NGO group “LIKOLITA”in 2007. Supported by the prestigious Kanda Myoujin Shrine, they celebrated their 5th anniversary withsending “Get Together with a Splash!”
30 maids from 12 maid cafes in Akihabara took part in “Splash girls collection 2008” .Maids followed the ancient Japanese court music to the shrine pavillion as they entered. Inside the pavillion, water was prayed and purified by the priest. Then the “First Splash Ceremony” was held.
A speech by Mr. Sanada, the representative of the NPO group LIKOLITA followed by a minute of silence to mourn the victims of the horrible incident at akihabara in this summer.
Then after the “Let it cool!!” call from the maids, “Operation Blanket Splash” started. “Real” shrine maidens as well as on lookers sprinkled water with hopes of peace. The temperature fell from 36.1 to 33.3 cooling down the heat. Also Dalleto, the maker of Street Fighter Online MG had a virtual reality splashing event as well on internet.
After the “First Splash Ceremony”, the “Akihabara Sister Cooling Campaign” sprung into action. Held at the UDX exit of Akihabara Station, Fuji Soft Building and Yodobashi Akiba Store, volunteer personel delivered the purified water by bicycle to encourage the people of Akihabara to join in. The event was successful seeing the temperatures of UDX exit of Akihabara Station, Fuji Soft Building and Yodobashi Akiba Store dropped 31.1 to 30.8, 31.9 to 31.4, 43.9 to 35.5 respectively.
Having the purification from an Akiba priest, there was not much fun and games as an usual year, but the seriousness has purified the tragety of June 8th.
