{"id":33,"date":"2009-01-02T02:09:56","date_gmt":"2009-01-02T06:09:56","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/blogs.transparent.com\/japanese\/?p=33"},"modified":"2009-01-02T02:09:56","modified_gmt":"2009-01-02T06:09:56","slug":"the-firsts-of-the-new-year","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/blogs.transparent.com\/japanese\/the-firsts-of-the-new-year\/","title":{"rendered":"Japanese Culture: The Firsts of the New Year"},"content":{"rendered":"<p>The Japanese are very fond of catagorizing and naming activities that are the first to be performed in the New Year.\u00a0 For example, hatsuhinode (<strong>\u306f\u3064\u3072\u306e\u3067<\/strong>) is called the first sunrise of the New Year.\u00a0 People wake up at around seven or so in the morning and drive out to the ocean or a quiet place where they can reflect upon the events of the past year.\u00a0 The view is really stunning, and sometimes people will take pictures of the sky and put it in their photo albums.\u00a0 Not only is it a time to reflect on the past year, it&#8217;s also a time to make decisions about the future.\u00a0 It&#8217;s a day where people resolve to do something different this year and make plans to accomplish any unfulfilled goals.<\/p>\n<p>Hatsuyume (<strong>\u306f\u3064\u3086\u3081<\/strong>) is the first dream of the new year.\u00a0 According to the custom of hatsuyume (<strong>\u306f\u3064\u3086\u3081<\/strong>), the contents of a dream can influence the outcome of the New Year.\u00a0 For example, if a person dreams of Mount Fuji (which is a famous mountain in Japan) it&#8217;s considered a sign of good luck.\u00a0 It&#8217;s also considered good luck to dream of a hawk or an egg plant.\u00a0 If you have dreams about either of the three or better yet all three things, you&#8217;re going to have a fantastic year.\u00a0 I&#8217;m not sure if this actually works, but a friend of mine told me to\u00a0visualize\u00a0an image of\u00a0hawks, egg plants or of Mount Fuji just before I go to sleep.\u00a0 That way, you&#8217;ll get some really good dreams about them for the coming year.\u00a0 Who knows, if I succeed in dreaming about all three, I may win the lottery this year! Or not!<\/p>\n<p>Hatsu uri baagen (<strong>\u306f\u3064\u3046\u308a\u30d0\u30a2\u30b2\u30f3<\/strong>).\u00a0 Hatsu uri baagen (<strong>\u306f\u3064\u3046\u308a\u30d0\u30a2\u30b2\u30f3<\/strong>) is the first sale of the New Year.\u00a0 It&#8217;s a time when department stores put out mass discounts on old items to make room for new items.\u00a0 With the current state of the Japanese economy in poor shape, many department stores may have to find new ways to get people to shop.\u00a0 One time and tested way department stores have traditionally lured customers is through the fukubukuro (<strong>\u3075\u304f\u3076\u304f\u308d<\/strong>).\u00a0 The fukubukuro (<strong>\u3075\u304f\u3076\u304f\u308d<\/strong>) is a grab bag or goodie bag.\u00a0 It&#8217;s a surprise as to what&#8217;s inside, and customers stand in long lines just to get these freebies.\u00a0 Sometimes you can get some really expensive and cool stuff like designer handbags and shoes.\u00a0 Sometimes the prizes are lame.\u00a0 I got a paper fan once, and <span style=\"text-decoration: line-through\">it was the hightlight of my day! <\/span><\/p>\n<p>Ok everyone, gotta go.\u00a0 I got to get my first sleep of the New Year, so look forward to my other posts!<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>The Japanese are very fond of catagorizing and naming activities that are the first to be performed in the New Year.\u00a0 For example, hatsuhinode (\u306f\u3064\u3072\u306e\u3067) is called the first sunrise of the New Year.\u00a0 People wake up at around seven or so in the morning and drive out to the ocean or a quiet place&hellip;<\/p>\n<p class=\"post-item__readmore\"><a class=\"btn btn--md\" href=\"https:\/\/blogs.transparent.com\/japanese\/the-firsts-of-the-new-year\/\">Continue Reading<\/a><\/p>","protected":false},"author":22,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"content-type":""},"categories":[3],"tags":[2796],"class_list":["post-33","post","type-post","status-publish","hentry","category-culture","tag-new-years-traditions"],"aioseo_notices":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/blogs.transparent.com\/japanese\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/33","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/blogs.transparent.com\/japanese\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/blogs.transparent.com\/japanese\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.transparent.com\/japanese\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/22"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.transparent.com\/japanese\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=33"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.transparent.com\/japanese\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/33\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/blogs.transparent.com\/japanese\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=33"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.transparent.com\/japanese\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=33"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.transparent.com\/japanese\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=33"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}