Did you ever stop to think “you know what’s missing from my life? A party where everyone gets to deal with gigantic dicks!” Probably not, but guess who did think of that – the Japanese! And theirs isn’t a sausage fest either, but an actual celebration dedicated to the phallus.

Kanamara Matsuri, which translates as the Festival of the Steel Phallus was allegedly first organized back in the 1600s in Kawasaki. Legend has it that on this occasion the local prostitutes of the city were praying for protection against sexually transmitted diseases (STDs). The fantastic version of the tale is about a girl who was cursed with a toothed demon in her vagina and thus accidentally castrated her first two husbands, and then a blacksmith made her a steel penis in which the demon broke its teeth. The fun thing about this whole story is that the woman probably did have a condition, and the teeth vagina was probably a way of describing syphilis back in the day.

Either way, aside from the fun of it, the Kanamara Matsuri festival is now meant to raise awareness about the importance of using protection against STDs every year in April. If it manages to send this message while also allowing everyone to march on the streets with oversized penises, bravo to the Japanese! Some of the ways you can add a penis to your outfit range from nose-penises to food-penises. Just to get a sense of it, here are a few photos from this year’s celebrations: