A Japanese New Year

NEW YEAR'S EVE:

-Cleaning the house in preparation for the new year (I got to help change the paper in the shoji screens)

[Mom & Dad - doesn't this remind you of what your adorable daughter did to your Japanese lanterns when she was small?? ]



[Mayumi-san and I posing with the finished product. After being sprayed with water and left to dry, they were perfect]

-Lunch was home-made takoyaki! YUMMY!!

[The special takoyaki cooker]

[I got to practice my takoyaki flipping technique...lets just say I won't be getting a festival job making takoyaki anytime soon]

-New Year's Eve dinner was Korean BBQ (Aaron, check out that Japanese beef!!)
[Drool! I haven't seen this much beef since leaving Canada]

-New Year's Eve TV show: The Red and White (guys vs. girls) New Year's Eve Competition (I have video that I will post at a later date...don't you worry)(It was an amazing combination of modern and traditional style singing, with celebrities like Ken Watanabe as judges)

[This group got into trouble for having fake nudity in their performance...more disturbing to me was the main rapper/singer dressing up like a clown]

[The Japanese version of Christina Aguliera - yes, her dress was see-through]

[Japanese version of n'sync]

[Japan's Justine Timberlake]

[The men won this year]

MIDNIGHT: akemashite omedetou gozaimasu!!

-Midnight soba noodles (for longevity)


-First visit to the local temple and shrine (at the temple we all rang the huge bell!)




NEW YEAR'S DAY:

-Brunch (Can you believe how beautiful this food looks?! Yamamoto-san had been cooking for days and she must have gotten up really early to finish it all!)





-Yamamoto-san, Mayumi-san and I travelled to Kyoto to visit Heian Jingu.






Experiencing New Year's in Japan was amazing! So many new sights, tastes, practices...I can't begin to describe it all! Thank you Yamamotos!!