あけましておめでとうございます。今年もよろしくお願いいたします。
Happy New Year's everyone!
^_^
Like Christmas, New Year's this year was very different from previous years. I didnt have ozoni that mother made, nor any kind of mochi at all. And more importantly, I didnt spend it with my family at all. But on the plus side, I did watch the entirety of Kohaku for once, and also I went hatsumode!
New Year's Eve was a pretty low key event for me. During the day, I attempted to clean up my room, which is slowly getting messy again. A few of the other HUSAs got shelves for their rooms, and I'm beginning to wonder if I should get some too. But the main thing I did last night was watching 紅白歌合戦 Kohaku Uta Gassen. For those of you not in the know, it's a big end of the year concert that NHK hosts. Male and female singers are split into two teams (White team for men, Red team for women) and compete. While there is a panel of judges, votes from the audience in NHK Hall, as well as the general public, are counted to determine the winner. It's a pretty big deal, imho. In Hawaii, I had seen it performed before, because both KikuTV and NGN broadcast it. But because of location and licensing, what's shown in Japan is slightly different from what I've seen in Hawaii. So it was a nice change to have the end of the contest to be near midnight on 大晦日.
This year's lineup was a bit different from years past. For one, the hosts were different from the last five years, almost. Nakama Yukie was a judge, when she had usually been the Red Team host. And instead of Nakai Masahiro, the White Team was represented by 嵐 Arashi, a pretty interesting idol group. But what struck me most interesting and a bit sad, was that the singers for each team were different from years previous. There were a couple of regulars, like Wada Akiko, Hikawa Kiyoshi, Koda Kumi (!!!), and Kitajima Saburo. But there were a lot of missing singers. I always do Fuji Ayako's songs at karaoke, but she was absent again this year. So was Mikawa Kenichi, who always has the most gender-bending performances. I usually look forward to Nakashima Mika and Otsuka Ai, but they didnt show up either. As sad as I am that I didnt get to see them perform, I'm happy for them. While it is an honor to be invited to perform on Kohaku, that means that they dont get to spend New Year's with their families. They're human too, and I imagine they like to spend time with their families too.
As for the songs that were performed, a lot of them were the most moving I have ever heard. Not gonna lie, I ended up crying a lot during this year's performance. Kobayashi Sachiko's song, お母ちゃんのひとり言, was about a child reminising about their mother. How their mother may have scolded them when they were younger, but they still loved her for it. And 嵐 performed a song, that I dont remember its name, but it was about ふるさと, or one's hometown. Having not seen my hometown for about three or so months, it was a little heartachey to hear about going back home and cherishing where you're from. But by far the most moving song that was on, was 植村花菜 Uemura Kana's トイレの神様 "Toire no Kamisama". Translated, it means "God of the Toilet", and it is a strange title. But the lyrics were just so beautiful. When she was a young girl, she spent a lot of time at her grandmother's house, and helped out doing chores there. Her grandmother told her, that the reason why she had to keep the toilet clean was because inside lived a beautiful kami. And that by cleaning it everyday, one day she could become a beautiful lady just like the kami. Later, her grandmother was hospitalized, and the day after she visited her grandmother, she passed away. And even though she wasnt the best grandchild, she feels that her grandmother waited special to see her one last time before she left. I have a feeling that this song is true, because she really did start crying when she was performing. As someone who was really close to their grandmother, I really felt something with this song. I think of all the performances, I really enjoyed hers the most.
Today, New Year's Day, I decided to go to the local shrine and actually do 初詣 hatsumode, or the first visit to a temple in a new year. While there are shrines in Hawaii, I have never actually gone to them, much less do the whole 初詣 thing. So while I'm here, I decided to actually do it. It was actually a lot of fun!
This is the shrine we went to, 御建神社 Midate Jinja. It's located behind the train station here, and part of another srhine complex thingy called 松尾神社 Matsuo Jinja. There was a really long line to get to the shrine, and normally, that wouldnt be so bad. However, this being in the middle of winter, it was FREEZING, so waiting was a bit of a pain. Me and a friend that came with me stood in that line for a while before we were up to the temple. After carefully observing the 日本人 in front of us, we threw our money, rang the bell, and prayed for the coming year. While up there, we also got 御神籤 omikuji, which are basically fortunes. My kanji isnt so good, but between the two of us, (hopefully) we were able to read and understand them. They didnt sound too bad, so we kept them. We also took a drink of the sake that was up there. Apparently, the 日本人 behind us were amazed to see my 白人 friend drink so much sake without problems. We also bought お守り omamori, which are good luck charms. I got a normal one that I'm going to give away as omiyage, and a card one for myself. My friend also bought some お守り, as well as a 神矢. She got it with a little bit of hesitation, because we didnt know what those things were called. I have seen them before, so I knew they were for luck, but I've never bought one myself. Also, my dictionary on my iPod didnt give a reading, so we were kinda shooting in the dark with かみや kamiya, which is the reading for those two kanji. I thought that since we got it, but MS isnt accepting it as a proper input for it. So I have no idea. Haha, oh well.
XD
Like Christmas, I missed out on doing the usual routine for New Year's. I missed another "family holiday", and missed out on some favorite traditions. But I did make up for it with things that I have never done before. While I usually fall asleep halfway through Kohaku, I actually stayed awake through it all. I even got a few good cries out of it. On New Year's Day, instead of spending it lying around the house and calling Aunty, I went on my first hatsumode (is it my 初初詣? XD) and had a grand old time. 2011 surely started out wonderful. I can only hope that the rest of it will be as enjoyable!
No comments:
Post a Comment