This is the grand stage of Bando Taro. That was the old name for the Tone River—"Bando Taro," the eldest son of the eastern plains—the largest river in the Kanto region, and along its wide gravel banks the town of Sakai stages its summer fireworks, the proudest night of its year. Star-mines compete across the sky as pyrotechnicians from different regions launch their own designs, each bringing a distinct signature to the night. The great shells ride the river wind upward, climbing high into an open sky unobstructed by mountains or towers—the kind of clear, expansive view that only a major river can give, its broad floodplain leaving room for the fire to breathe. There is a quiet pride in a small town that can summon something this large. Sakai is not a city; it does not have skyscrapers or crowds in the millions. But it has the great river and the wide sky above it, and for one night in summer it offers them to whoever comes—a modest place playing host with the most generous things it owns, the water and the open air and the fire rising between them.