Happy New Year!!
I (Tomo) hope everyone’s having a nice week. What’s your new year’s resolution? Mine is to be more self-disciplined! Like getting up in the morning and spending more time in the Word and prayer. I was challenged by David to read through the whole Bible this year and I made my own Bible reading calendar. I read three chapters from the Old Testament and one chapter from the New Testament everyday and I’ll have read the whole Bible by Dec. 20th! I made every Sunday “catch up” day… My home church in Japan handed out a similar plan a couple years ago and I read through the Bible in about 2 years using that plan. This year my goal is to stick to the plan and finish in a year. It’s gonna be good!
Well, today I want to write about Japanese New Year. On the 1st of January, many people get up early and go to a shrine to pray for a good year. Here’s how you do it: you go up, ring the gigantic bell to wake the gods, throw some pennies in, clap twice, and pray for whatever you want. This year I was looking at the news and it said one of the shrine bells fell on a high school boy and he broke his nose! How ironical.. Also, New Year is the biggest family holiday, kinda like Christmas or Thanksgiving in America. My parents go visit all the relatives usually on the 2nd or 3rd every year. And we eat lots of New Year’s food! The New Year festivity (visiting family and eating New Year’s food) usually goes on for the first week of January. This year I’m over in America, and there’s nothing going on for the New Year so it feels a little weird…
Let me introduce some of the New Year’s food we eat in Japan!
My favorite is Omochi!! Omochi (or just Mochi) is made from rice and you cook it on a grill and eat it with soy sauce & nori sea-weed or soy bean flour, or put it in hot soup called Ozoni.. mmm yuummm.. I haven’t had omochi this year. David and I are going to go to a Japanese market later today to get some! Cooked omochi is very sticky and stretchy. Every year people choke on omochi and die… so I have to be careful!
Another typical New Year’s food is Osechi, which is like an assorted food in a tiered food boxes. They are all cooked in a way that makes them last long. You’re supposed to prepare them by New Year’s Eve so you won’t make the god of fire angry by using fire on New Year (its practical meaning is so that the women can take a break from cooking). And there’s superstitious meaning to each food item. For example, herring roe (my favorite!) symbolizes a wish for family prosperity (many little fish eggs àmany children à family tree prosper!), and so on.
mmm I miss Japan…