The high point of this fair arrives at two o'clock in the morning. Shorinzan Darumaji, a Zen temple in the hills west of Takasaki, holds its Nanakusa Taisai daruma market every January 6 and 7 — opening on the morning of the sixth and running straight through the night, because 2 a.m. on the seventh is held to be the auspicious hour when the temple's deity descends. At that moment the great star-festival prayers are chanted, and the temple grounds, in the coldest hour of a Gunma winter night, are at their fullest.

Takasaki is the birthplace of the daruma as good-luck charm, a fact enshrined in the local karuta cards every Gunma child memorizes. Around 220 years ago, during the Tenmei famine, the temple's ninth abbot taught struggling farmers to make papier-mache daruma from a founder's ink drawing, giving them a winter livelihood. The doll's glaring, indomitable face — paint in one eye when you make a wish, the other when it comes true — was born of hard times, which perhaps explains it.

Stalls line the approach selling daruma of every size; the custom is to return last year's doll to the temple and buy one a size larger. The temple is about fifteen minutes by bus or taxi from Takasaki Station (or a walk from Gunma-Yawata on the Shin'etsu Line), an easy add to any New Year itinerary. A daruma bought at midnight, amid smoke and sutra-chanting, seems to wear a slightly different expression than one bought by day.