{"id":41,"date":"2009-01-09T07:59:57","date_gmt":"2009-01-09T11:59:57","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/blogs.transparent.com\/japanese\/?p=41"},"modified":"2009-01-09T07:59:57","modified_gmt":"2009-01-09T11:59:57","slug":"kagami-biraki-%e9%8f%a1%e9%96%8b%e3%81%8d","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/blogs.transparent.com\/japanese\/kagami-biraki-%e9%8f%a1%e9%96%8b%e3%81%8d\/","title":{"rendered":"Japanese Culture: Kagami biraki (\u93e1\u958b\u304d)"},"content":{"rendered":"<p>The observance of kagmi biraki (<strong>\u93e1\u958b\u304d<\/strong>) is usually an indication that the New Year&#8217;s celebrations are winding down to a close.\u00a0 Kagami biraki (<strong>\u93e1\u958b\u304d<\/strong>) is usually celebrated on the eleventh of January, but it can differ depending on the region.\u00a0 Kagami biraki (<strong>\u93e1\u958b\u304d<\/strong>) means &#8216;breaking of the mochi&#8217; in Japanese.\u00a0 Mochi (<strong>\u3082\u3061<\/strong>) is a white rice cake.\u00a0 Mochi (<strong>\u3082\u3061<\/strong>) is a general term for rice cake in Japanese.\u00a0 The specific mochi (<strong>\u3082\u3061<\/strong>)\u00a0consumed on on kagami biraki (<strong>\u93e1\u958b\u304d<\/strong>) is a mochi (<strong>\u3082\u3061<\/strong>) called kagami mochi (<span class=\"t_nihongo_kanji\"><strong>\u93e1\u9905<\/strong><\/span>).\u00a0<\/p>\n<p>Kagami mochi (<span class=\"t_nihongo_kanji\"><strong>\u93e1\u9905<\/strong><\/span>) consists of two round mochi (<strong>\u3082\u3061<\/strong>)\u00a0cakes one on top of the other.\u00a0 The larger mochi (<strong>\u3082\u3061<\/strong>) cake is on the bottom, while the smallar one is on the top.\u00a0 Sometimes a daidai (<strong>\u4ee3\u3005<\/strong>) is placed on the very top of\u00a0the kagami mochi (<span class=\"t_nihongo_kanji\"><strong>\u93e1\u9905<\/strong><\/span>).\u00a0 A daidai (<strong>\u4ee3\u3005<\/strong>) is a bitter type of orange.\u00a0 The kanji (<strong>\u304b\u3093\u3058<\/strong>) or Chinese characters for daidai (<strong>\u4ee3\u3005<\/strong>) means generation to generation.\u00a0 As a result, a daidai (<strong>\u4ee3\u3005<\/strong>) is placed on top of the mochi (<strong>\u3082\u3061<\/strong>) to symbolize the continuation of generations and long life.<\/p>\n<p>Unlike regular mochi (<strong>\u3082\u3061<\/strong>), the kagami mochi (<span class=\"t_nihongo_kanji\"><strong>\u93e1\u9905<\/strong><\/span>) is placed in a special part of the house.\u00a0 Some traditional Japanese homes have a small, home-made shrine called a kamidana (<strong>\u304b\u307f\u3060\u306a<\/strong>).\u00a0 On the kamidana (<strong>\u304b\u307f\u3060\u306a<\/strong>), you&#8217;ll see a sanpoo (<span class=\"t_nihongo_kanji\"><strong>\u4e09\u5b9d<\/strong><\/span>) or a stand.\u00a0 The sanpoo (<span class=\"t_nihongo_kanji\"><strong>\u4e09\u5b9d<\/strong><\/span>) holds the shihoobeni (<span class=\"t_nihongo_kanji\"><strong>\u56db\u65b9\u7d05<\/strong><\/span>).\u00a0 Shihoobeni (<span class=\"t_nihongo_kanji\"><strong>\u56db\u65b9\u7d05<\/strong><\/span>) is a sheet of cloth on which the kagami mochi (<span class=\"t_nihongo_kanji\"><strong>\u93e1\u9905<\/strong><\/span>) is placed.<\/p>\n<p>On the day of kagami biraki (<strong>\u93e1\u958b\u304d<\/strong>), the kagami mochi (<span class=\"t_nihongo_kanji\"><strong>\u93e1\u9905<\/strong><\/span>) is broken into edible bits with a hammer.\u00a0 Using a knife to cut the kagami mochi (<span class=\"t_nihongo_kanji\"><strong>\u93e1\u9905<\/strong><\/span>) is considered taboo.\u00a0 The cutting act symbolizes the cutting of family ties and so a hammer is used instead.\u00a0 I think that eating a kagami mochi (<span class=\"t_nihongo_kanji\"><strong>\u93e1\u9905<\/strong><\/span>) is a perfect way to end the New Year&#8217;s celebrations.\u00a0 On that note, I&#8217;m going to end this post by showing you a Youtube clip on how to make kagami mochi (<span class=\"t_nihongo_kanji\"><strong>\u93e1\u9905<\/strong><\/span>).<\/p>\n<p><iframe loading=\"lazy\" title=\"Making Kagamimochi:\u93e1\u9905\u3092\u4f5c\u308b\u3002\" width=\"500\" height=\"375\" src=\"https:\/\/www.youtube.com\/embed\/5m96dE6xa2o?feature=oembed\" frameborder=\"0\" allow=\"accelerometer; autoplay; clipboard-write; encrypted-media; gyroscope; picture-in-picture; web-share\" referrerpolicy=\"strict-origin-when-cross-origin\" allowfullscreen><\/iframe><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>The observance of kagmi biraki (\u93e1\u958b\u304d) is usually an indication that the New Year&#8217;s celebrations are winding down to a close.\u00a0 Kagami biraki (\u93e1\u958b\u304d) is usually celebrated on the eleventh of January, but it can differ depending on the region.\u00a0 Kagami biraki (\u93e1\u958b\u304d) means &#8216;breaking of the mochi&#8217; in Japanese.\u00a0 Mochi (\u3082\u3061) is a white&hellip;<\/p>\n<p class=\"post-item__readmore\"><a class=\"btn btn--md\" href=\"https:\/\/blogs.transparent.com\/japanese\/kagami-biraki-%e9%8f%a1%e9%96%8b%e3%81%8d\/\">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":[1],"tags":[2778,2779],"class_list":["post-41","post","type-post","status-publish","hentry","category-uncategorized","tag-kagami-biraki","tag-kagami-mochi"],"aioseo_notices":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/blogs.transparent.com\/japanese\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/41","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=41"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.transparent.com\/japanese\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/41\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/blogs.transparent.com\/japanese\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=41"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.transparent.com\/japanese\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=41"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.transparent.com\/japanese\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=41"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}