Skip to main content

Omar- 2014年ようこそ！

2014年ようこそ！


Hello Everyone!


First of all 明けましておめでとうございます！！！Happy New Year! It’s been a while since my last post! But it’s already almost been 4 months since I have been here! I really can’t believe it! I had the most amazing New Year’s! Every year I usually just hang out with my friends and welcome the New Year but this year was my first time celebrating with a Japanese family. I did a lot of different things to welcome the New Year with my host family! 

First of all to prepare for the New Year, everyone needs food! My host mom took me with her to the early morning fish market. 

We woke up unbelievably early... and went by car. When I got there it was freezing cold as well! Who wants to be awake really early and stand in the cold :（　 After getting past the cold I was able to enjoy the fish market. What was even more cool was that one of the Hippo Members husband owned a fish stand. So I was able to talk to him and get a close look at all the fish. 


I walked around the fish market with my host mother, well more like I followed her while she shopped. But I had a great time. I talked to a lot of different people and saw them prepare their merchandise. 

After purchasing A LOT of things! I finally escaped the cold! And then my host mom stored everything she bought and saved it for the new year. 

When New Year's Eve came my host mom brought out a large box obento (Japanese lunch box). She than took out the stored food she bought from the fish market and prepared various dishes. I said it was a large bento, but when I said that my host family laughed and said it was not a bento. Instead it is called "Osechi"   An Osechi is a traditional Japanese New Year food. They only use them during the new year. 


 When the New Year came, instead of watching the ball drop, I went to a traditional Japanese Shinto Shrine. It was really crowded! I waited almost 3 hours to get to the front of the line. When we finally got to the front of the line I got to say my wish or my wants for the new year.  

When going to pray at the shrine there are specific manners you must follow.
1. Threw your coin in to the offertory box
2. Ring the bell 
3. Make two deep bows 
4. Make your wish 
5. Clap twice  
6.Make one more deep bow 





This was very interesting! Lastly because I was one of the first 50-100 people at the shrine I was able to get the mochi (Japanese rice cake) that was made by the locals. Before the new year came there were a group of people that would pound the rice and prepare it to make it mochi! This was an amazing New Year's experience for me and I hope to have countless more.
Making mochi (rice cakes)










Happy New Year everyone! I'll talk to you soon!

Omar  
Labels:

Comments

Post a Comment

Popular posts from this blog

Daniel- こにちわ！！

こにちわ！！　(Daniel) Hello,こにちわ, bonjour,  Привет ! My name is Daniel Panasenko, and I am the 2012-2013 LEX intern in the Hippo office in Tokyo. I am from Sacramento, California, although originally from Dnipropetrovs'k, Ukraine.  I first came across LEX and Hippo when I came to Japan with People to People in 2009. I was hosted by members of the Hippo Family Club for four days, and I enjoyed the experience so much, that I came back to work for Hippo as an intern. Although I am fairly new to Hippo, I have been received warmly and welcomed into the Hippo family. Everyone at the office and at the family clubs are very kind, supportive, and incredibly patient as I unintentionally butcher their language. As the year progresses, I will blog about my experiences in Japan as well as my insights into the language and culture. Although I am a bit overwhelmed by the novelty of the lifestyle and language, but I am more than happy to be here, making fascinating new discoveri...
Post a Comment
Read more

Michael- Koto-ku Community Festival

Koto-Ku Community Festival Wow! It seems like just yesterday that I was writing my last blog post, but yet it was really 2 weeks! I have been told it has gotten a lot colder in the U.S., so I should probably tell you I've only worn a light jacket once so far...And that was when the latest typhoon was offshore and pulling wind down from Russia. Otherwise, it has been amazing weather here. As always, I've been doing a lot, but I will talk about one thing I really enjoyed. I worked at a Hippo booth at my community festival. The festival was held over the weekend a week ago at Kiba Park near my home. The park is quite large and known for the Tokyo Museum of Contemporary Art, but mostly it's cool because it has a suspension bridge over a canal in the middle. The event was quite exciting for me as it was also my first Japanese festival. I want to say it was a mix between a flea market and a trade show. There were many tents set up in many different areas. Booths varied a...
Post a Comment
Read more

Danielle- Shopping Malls

Shopping Malls I noticed I don't talk about shopping enough, so here's a brief overlook of some of my favorite shopping malls (so far~) out here in Japan. AEON I have one about 5 minutes away from my local train station here in Chiba. It feels very homey to me, just because it's really spacious and open and reminds me of a shopping mall I had back in Illinois. What I love about Aeon, too, is that it has a bunch of different stores (other than just clothes). On the first floor, you have your groceries, bakery, and cosmetics, and stuff like that. On the other floors, you have your clothes, electronics, food court (talk about majorly nostalgic, especially with the KFCs and Subways), and mini arcade. Chiba is kind of out-of-the-way, and so Aeon has been a very convenient place for me to buy my toiletries and CalorieMate... and just walk around, if I feel like it. I bought my first winter coat there and some gloves, and it was all reasonably priced, I think (granted,...
Post a Comment
Read more