January 25, 2009by cheesie41 Comments❤︎47 Prefectures❤︎

Happy Niu Year

I had to resist the temptation to type “Merry Christmas” into that title box. God knows I have been doing it for how many years already. But i reckoned i have to stop being so delusional!

And i’m listening to “It’s Snowing Slowly” by Starlite Chamber. Neh, the one in Oli’s video you all say very touching one. And i heard it snowed a lot a lot in Nara yesterday.

Talking about song, you know i listened to Eva Cassidy’s Songbird 37 times yesterday?  It’s a soundtrack from Love Actually. And i thought it sounded really familiar, but couldn’t make out which scene it is from. So i spent half an hour searching Youtube for it, and found out it is when Sarah and Karl’s intimate scene in the apartment! That’s my fav fav fav scene of Rodrigo Santorooooomgheissohot. You can watch it here.  

This year i dread CNY a little less, because touch wood, don’t you think it is less hot than usual? Must be the cold current from North or whatever. And then yes la it’s very boring but i can blog ma. I wanted to blog about toilets in Japan, but where got people blog about toilet on CNY one. So suey. Choi choi choi.

So i’m gonna show some food pictures. Since everyone is in an eating mood anyway.

These are what we had on Oshōgatsu–Japanese New Year.

osechi9 by you.

 

 

Wiki:

The Japanese celebrate New Year’s Day on January 1 each year. Before 1873, the date of the Japanese New Year) was based on the Chinese lunisolar calendar and celebrated at the beginning of spring. However, in 1873, five years after the Meiji Restoration, Japan adopted the Gregorian calendar, so the first day of January is the official New Year’s Day in modern Japan. It is considered by most Japanese to be one of the most important annual festivals. 

 

 

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osechi by you.
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All these food in jubako boxes is called Osechi-ryori (お節料理), traditional Japanese New Year food.
osechi10 by you.

Some of the Osechi dishes have special meaning to it, just like Chinese New Year food. They also play a lot of food pun! 😀

For example,

 

  • Daidai (橙), Japanese bitter orange. Daidai means “from generation to generation”.
  • Kazunoko (数の子), herring roe. Kazu means “number” and ko means “child”. It symbolizes a wish to be gifted with numerous children in the New Year.
  • Konbu (昆布), a kind of seaweed. It is associated with the word yorokobu, meaning “joy”.
  • Kuro-mame (黒豆), black soybeans. Mame also means “health,” symbolizing a wish for health in the New Year. If you noticed in the picture they sprinkled gold on it! 
osechi4 by you.
See!

niuyear by you.

Happy Niu Year!

 

You wanna see more food? Or are you on a diet?

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