How to celebrate new years in Japan

How to celebrate a new year in Japan

Cultural significance of the holiday

New Year’s Day is the most important holiday in Japan; people usually take a week off to return to their parents’ homes and enjoy family gatherings, as American people do so in Christmas holiday. The New Year is also considered to be a time of closure, as on the last day of work, people sum up their work for the year, and on the first day of work, they set goals for the coming year. It is also common to clean the office or home before the new year so that they can welcome the fresh new year in a fresh environment. Some people even prepare brand-new under-wares to be more flesh.

Foods eaten for the New Year

Most of restaurants and supermarkets are closed for a few days around the new years day, as similar to the Christmas day in the United states (thus, this might not be the best time to travel in Japan). In the past, markets were closed even longer. In order to enjoy family gatherings without fresh foods and much of household works, a traditional New Year’s dish called Osechi was developed. People prepare Osechi before the new year and it lasts during the holiday. Today, we have refrigerators, but we still enjoy Osechi at New Year’s.

Osechi is usually displayed in a beautiful box that looks like a bento box, with many different kinds of small dishes. Not only do all the dishes that make up Osechi last for a long time, but each has a special meaning, e.g., wishing for health, success, happiness, and longevity.

People living outside of Japan (like us living in Tennessee) also often try to make Osechi even though the availability of food is very limited. In Asian supermarkets (e.g. Sunrise Supermarket and Lucky Asian market on Kingston pike), important ingredients sell out quickly way before New year’s day.

Special activities done on the day or days surrounding it

One tradition is to visit shrines on New Year’s day to pray for success and happiness in the new year. As most Japanese are not religious, their visit is not only to prey the success, but also, probably more importantly, to enjoy many stores lining along both the sides of streets. These stores sell small dishes, sweets, and alcoholic drinks and people can enjoy it immediately. These stores look actually similar to a European Christmas market. The biggest difference from the Christmas market is probably that … Japanese may need an excuse to go to such a market.

It is typical to give some gift (typically money) to children of relatives to celebrate a new year. This culture gives kids some fun for the relative gathering, in which adults enjoy conversations, food, and alcoholic drinks, but children easily get bored. In many cases (at least in my case), their parents keep the received money and eventually use it for the education cost. In happier case, some children is allowed to rush to a market and buy relatively expensive toys with the money they got.

Different traditions that my family may have personally practiced

This new years holiday (2023) is my first new years after I came to the US. I made some Osechi but I was too lazy to clean our house. Even though I had no family gatherings this year, the Osechi was far from perfect, and the house is not crystal fresh, I still felt the special atmosphere of the new year holiday. I think this is coming from the fact that during this holiday Japanese are officially allowed to be lazy. The food is prepared, the house is already clean (it is not my case though), and there are good reasons to enjoy food an alcoholic drinks. This atmosphere might be difficult to be shared with people in other countries (or maybe similar to Christmas holiday in the US?), but I think this is actually making new year’s holiday very special for Japanese.

あとがき

本記事は、ORNL の Asian Pacific American Club (APAC) に寄稿したエッセイの転載です。