Another New Year, another Dobbshead in the money pit

Yes, it's another New Year here in Osaka, Japan and it's time
to merge two religious practices together; Shinto money worship and
Church of the SubGenius money worship (in fact, is there any
religion that doesn't worship money?). Every year for three days,
locals in Osaka march down to the Imamiya Ebisu Jinja shrine to
give offerings to the lucky money god Ebisu, who is one of the
seven Chinese Dieties of Good Fortune. Businesses like to display
a lucky money rake (as in raking it in) decorated with lucky bamboo
leaves and little Ebisu tschockes. First they toss last year's rake
into a sacred garbage pit, then march over to a giant walled-in swimming
pool size offering pit where millions of yen are thrown, make a prayer, then
have this year's lucky money raked blessed by a sacred temple maiden.
The Police are out in force to manage the traffic, which gets maniacal
at times. Where I enter the picture is at the money pit. I elbow my way
in to the retaining wall, groove for a few minutes on the sounds of cascading
coins and fluttering paper cash, before throwing in my offering of a hundred
sixteen yen (equals ONE DOLLAR - ONE DOLLAR FOR SALVATION!!!) taped to a
sacred Dobbshead. Then I watch Dobbs smile as he is pelted with money,
as you can see in the picture. Hopefully it translates into a one day spike
in SubGenius catalog sales, but for me, the slack is undescribable. I try to
hang onto the wall as long as I can before the surging crowd pushes me on, through
the shrine complex and past the lovely shrine maidens. Latching SubGenius rituals, both real and imaginary, onto existing religious practices is your best entertainment value. Hell, the Romans did it for 800 years and then the Catholics outdid them. I'll post a video for 'yall, see comments.