new year 2014

Happy New Year to all of you! Hope you had a lovely Christmas holiday.

Although I had a good time indoors in London I prefer spending this time of the year with my family and in Japan as we have annual customs: having a new years menu: otoso, osechi and ozoni, visiting shrines and receiving new year cards. Without all of these it is hard to feel the new year has arrived. 

The only thing I did Japanese way was to change omamori to a new one. Omamori is Japanese amulet we get from the shrines and temples we visit usually early in the year. When we make the first visit of the year to one (hatsumoude), we return the old omamori thanking for protecting us in the previous year and get a new one for the new year. I now have a bit of collection of old ones as I kept forgetting to take them back...

The new one in yellow is what I got during the trip in Shikoku last year. Hope this will take care of me well. Hope it's gonna be a good year for all of you too!

明けましておめでとうございます。

お屠蘇もおせちもなく迎える新年は、何だかもの足りなく、日本が恋しくなる季節です。

新しいお守りをおろして、気持ちも新たにがんばります。今年もよろしくお願いいたします。