Naki Sumo Crying Baby Festival

The Naki Sumo Crying Baby Festival in Japan involves sumo wrestlers holding babies up in the air while priests try to make them cry—because in Japanese culture, a loud cry is believed to bring good health and scare off evil spirits. The louder the baby, the better. The wrestlers, for their part, look simultaneously proud and confused, while the babies are doing what babies do best: scream their tiny lungs out. Imagine entering your child in a competition where the goal is maximum tears. “Yes, that’s my boy! Proper sobbing, he is. That’s a medal cry.”