No-Show-Gatsu

In recent years, I have been doing the following activity on the first class after the winter break.

I split the class up into teams and, while listening to traditional Japanese music featuring the koto or shamisen, I have the students write on the blackboard as many words as they can in rōmaji related to the Japanese New Year. 

In addition to being kind of fun—not barrels of fun, mind you, but fun enough—this activity can be rather instructive.

For starters, you'll find that many Japanese students, not being proficient in the Hepburn romanization, will write things such as fukubukuro with an "h" rather than an "f" (hukubukuro) or nengajō with a "y" (nengajyo). The reason for this is that many Japanese learn simpler forms of romanization known as kunrei-shiki or Nihon-shiki. For more on this, go here. This is a good chance to briefly re-introduce the students to the Hepburn romanization and encourage them to use it in the future.

A few years back, my second-year English Communication majors came up with the following words:

One of the interesting things about this is that while many Japanese students will offer up words like hagoita, a decorative paddle used when playing a game resembling badminton called hanetsuki or even tako-agé (kite-flying), you shouldn't expect to see any of your neighbors playing hanetsuki or flying kites on New Year's Day. (In all my years in Japan, I have never once seen young women in kimono playing this game live as I have in television dramas.)

I then tell the students to ask one another if they had done any of the things on the board.

"Did you eat o-sechi or nana-kusa gayu?"

"Did you decorate your homes with shimenawa and kadomatsu?"

"Did you send any nengajō?"

Of the 23 students who attended that day, twenty had eaten o-sechi, four had a shimenawa at the entrance of their homes, six had gone to the hatsu-uri New Year's sales, eleven had drunk o-toso, and so on. 

Erasing those items which few or none of the students had partaken of, we came up with the following significantly pared down list:

Where New Year's in Japan was once a very colorful, tradition-laden event, all that remains of it today, or so it seems, is the food, the shopping, and banal TV programs. Less than half of the students visited one Shintō shrine (hatsumōde), let alone three, during the holiday. It's kind of sad when you think about it. 

Now, I'm not suggesting that we need to put the Shintō back in the Shinnen (New Year), like some good Christians back home demand Christ be kept in that pagan celebration of the winter solstice also known as Christmas. But, I find it odd that the Japanese are so lackadaisical when it comes to their own heritage and culture.

So When is O-Shogatsu Over Anyways?

This is a piece I wrote for GaijinPot last year.

My wife took down the shime kazari the other day.

Shime kazari are the decorations you find hanging on front doors and gates at o-Shōgatsu (お正月, or the Japanese New Year). Traditionally made with twisted rice straw, they are often festooned with a daidai (bitter orange), fern fronds and gohei or shide (zigzag strips of white paper), the ornaments serve to welcome Toshigami-sama, the Shintō deity who brings a bountiful harvest and blessings for the new year.

Modern designs, like ours (above and below), take great liberties with more traditional decorations, adding generous loops of red-and-white  cords of twisted paper, known as mizuhiki, pine branches, colorful Japanese washi paper, auspicious doodads and occasionally fresh flowers.

I asked my wife what she was doing.

“Shōgatsu is over… ”

“Says who?”

“My parents already took down their shime kazari.”

“So? I paid ¥4,000 for that. Put it back. Please!”

“But… ”

There’s quite a bit of debate about when you should take your New Year’s decorations down. Regional variations have something to do with it — why, even the design of the shime kazari themselves can vary greatly from region to region — but so do different interpretations of when o-Shōgatsu is officially concluded.

I guess you could say a similar discussion exists in the West concerning when Christmas trees should be tossed out. Is it the Feast of the Epiphany, which falls on Jan. 6 (hence the 12 Days of Christmas)? Or should the tree and other holiday decorations remain until Candlemas, which falls on Feb. 2, i.e. 40 days after the nativity of Jesus? Thanks to Christmas tree recycling drives hosted by the Boy Scouts in early January, in America at least, trees are now being ground up into mulch before they can become a fire hazard.

As for the last day of o-Shōgatsu, many assert that it is Jan. 7. This day is widely considered to be the final day of matsunouchi, the week-long period starting with New Year’s Day during which the kadomatsu (New Year’s “gate” pine) and other decorations are displayed. New Year’s greeting cards, known as nengajō, should be received within the first week of the year. The seventh is also the day Japanese eat nanakusa gayu, a dishearteningly bland rice porridge dish made with seven different herbs. It was for these reasons, I suspect, that my wife’s mother and many others had already taken their own decorations down.

But, I still wasn’t sold on the idea.

During a quick walk around my neighborhood, I noticed several shops were still displaying their shime kazari. Perhaps because it was Seijin-no-hi, or Coming-of-Age Day, a national holiday that serves as a psychological bookend to New Year’s.

Whatever the shops’ motivations, some believe that it’s quite alright to keep the decorations up until Jan. 15, a date known as Ko-Shōgatsu (小正月, Little New Year), as was the custom up until the Edo Period (1603-1868). The first week of the new year was called Ō-Shōgatsu (大正月, lit. “Big New Year,” in this instance) while the rest of the month was considered just regular “Shōgatsu.”

Rice porridge with seven herbs and salt.

Ko-Shōgatsu is known by other names, too, such as Niban Shōgatsu (Second New Year’s), Onna Shōgatsu (女正月, Woman’s New Year) and so on. Before Japan adopted the Gregorian solar calendar, the 15th was the day on which the full moon appeared. As far back as the Heian period (794-1185), it was customary to eat rice porridge made with sweet, red azuki beans. A similar dish called o-shiruko (sweet red-bean soup), made with azuki beans and half-melted globs of mochi (sticky rice cake) is traditionally eaten around the 11th, the day kagami (mirror-shaped) mochi decorations are broken. Today, at shrines throughout Japan, you can find hi-matsuri (火祭り, fire festivals), known as sagicho or dondoyaki (burning of New Year’s gate and other decorations), held on the 15th when kadomatsu, shime kazari and the previous year’s talismans are set alight in a bonfire.

Despite that, others argue that it’s acceptable for New Year’s decorations to remain until Hatsuka (20th day of the month) Shōgatsu, which falls, not surprisingly, on the 20th of January. In the Kansai area, the head and bones of the buri (Japanese amberjack) are cooked with sake kasu (lees), vegetables and soy beans. Because of this, the day is also called Honé (bone) Shōgatsu.

My wife, following her mother’s example, had been deferring to tradition. I countered with the argument that if we were really going to stick to good ol’ “tradition,” we would have to keep the shime kazari up until March 2, which — in accordance with the Chinese lunar calendar — is actually Jan. 15.

“Let’s keep it up until Hatsuka Shōgatsu, then,” my wife suggested.

“The 15th will be fine,” I said. “We don’t want to get carried away.”

Kadomatsu

Kadomatsu (門松, literally “gate pine”) are traditional decorations of the Japanese New Year placed in pairs in front of buildings, and to a lesser extent homes, to welcome ancestral spirits or kami of the harvest. They are put out immediately after Christmas, sometimes as early as the evening of the 25th, and remain traditionally until the 15th of January (Matsunouchi, 松の内), but only until the 7th in recent years.

Designs for kadomatsu can vary depending on region but are typically made of pine, bamboo, and sometimes umé tree sprigs which represent longevity, prosperity and steadfastness, respectively. 

The fundamental function of the New Year ceremonies is to honor and receive the toshigami (deities of the new year), who bring a bountiful harvest for farmers and bestow the ancestors' blessing on everyone. After January 15th the kadomatsu and other New Year’s decorations are burned in bonfires at Shintō shrines to appease the gods and release them, an event known as Dontoyaki (どんと焼き) or Sagichō (左義長).

At the Nishitetsu Grand Hotel

At Daimyō Elementary School

In front of Mitsukoshi Department Store in Tenjin

At the Seahawk Hilton Hotel in Momochi

In front of a popular Japanese restaurant called Chikae

Shimenawa

Shiménawa (七五三縄, 注連縄 or 標縄, literally "enclosing rope") are another common decoration of the Japanese New Year. Rice straw is braided together to form a rope, that is then adorned with pine, fern fronds, more straw and mandarine oranges. They can represent a variety of auspicious items, such as the rising sun over Mt. Fuji or a crane. The shiménawa pictured above is the one that hung on my front door a few years ago.

Used mostly for ritual purification in the Shintô religion, shimenawa can vary in diameter from a few centimetres to several metres, and are often seen festooned with shidé paper. The space bound by shimenawa often indicates a sacred or pure space, such as that of a Shintō shrine.

 Shiménawa are believed to act as a ward against evil spirits and are also set up at a ground-breaking ceremonies before construction begins on a new building. They are often found at Shintō shrines, torii gates, and other sacred landmarks.

They are also tied around objects capable of attracting spirits or inhabited by spirits, called yorishiro. These include trees, in which case the inhabiting spirits are called kodama, and cutting down these trees is thought to bring misfortune. In cases of stones, the stones are known as iwakura.

Most of the following photos were taken of shiménawa hanging at the entrance of restaurants and boutiques in my neighborhood.

This is the kind of shimékazari typically found in Fukuoka.

Shimekazari

When you live as long as I have in only one part of a country, it's easy to assume that the way things are done in your region are the same nationwide. It took me two decades to realize that sansha mairi (visiting three shrines at New Year's) was a custom peculiar Kyūshū, and in particular to Fukuoka. 

Similarly, the shimé kazari, a New Year's decoration placed above the entrance to homes and buildings, varies from region to region. Shime-kazari is said to originate from shime-nawa (twisted hemp and rice straw rope placed at the entrance of shrines to indicated a sacred space) and meant to keep misfortune and unclean spirits away and greet Toshigami (年神), the gods and ancestors brought with the new year.

Sorry, but . . .

Few end-of-the-year customs in Japan seem sillier to the casual observer than that of the mochū hagaki  (喪中葉書, "mourning postcard"). Mochū hagaki  (pictured above) are postcards sent out to friends, relatives, co-workers, and others in December or earlier, notifying them that due to the death of family member in the past year they are in mourning and will therefore be unable to send nengajō (年賀状), or New Year's greeting cards. It is as if people are saying, "FYI: I am sending this postcard to you now to inform you that I cannot send you that other postcard later."

To be fair, mochū hagaki do serve some useful purposes. For one, they inform others that they need not bother sending a nengajō to the family out of respect for their loss—even when the person who has died was 105 years old, as is the case in the postcard on the left, and "relief" rather than “sorrow” might be a better adjective describing the emotions felt when Great Grandpa finally kicked the bucket. And, probably more importantly, mochū hagaki preemptively assuage any misunderstandings that might occur when a nengajō goes unanswered.