Take Part in New Year’s Traditions January 1st-3rd!

Japan’s New Year’s traditions aren’t something any municipal government puts on, but rather what the local residents and businesses do. At midnight on New Year’s Day, many Japanese people line up at their local Shinto shrine or Buddhist temple to pray for good fortune in the coming year, and some either stay up until dawn or wake up early to catch the Hatsuhinode (初日の出), or first sunrise of the year. Japanese families traditionally play games like karuta (think Slapjack, but the “announcer” reads a prompt before players slap) or hanetsuki (think badminton without a net), a game played with wooden paddles and tiny shuttlecocks. Finally, there’s hatsu-uri (初売り), when stores hold huge sales and sell mystery bags called fukubukuro (福袋). Fukubukuro have a limited supply and sometimes the contents are a secret, but the combined value of the items inside always exceed to value paid for the mystery bag, so the shopper always wins in the end!