A visitor to Japan who wanders into a sumo tournament might be forgiven for thinking they had intruded upon a religious ceremony.
Tournaments begin with a line of burly men wearing little more than elaborately decorated aprons walking in a line onto a raised earthen stage. Their names are called as they circle around a ring made of partially buried bales of rice straw. Turning toward the center, they clap, lift their aprons, raise their arms upward, and then exit without a word.
