New year series part V: sake

Finally, the last of the new year series~! So, despite all the alcohol from bonenkai and shinnenkai (if you don’t know what I’m talking about read part 4 of this series =P), the Japanese still fit in another alcohol-drinking opportunity: a small cup of japanese sake (sah-keh) to toast for the new year. Before the [...]

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New year series part IV: year end and new year parties

To commemorate the end of the year and the beginning of a new year, Japanese hold year-end parties called bo-nen-kai (忘年会）and shin-nen-kai (新年会）respectively. It’s not the clubbing kind of parties, but more like a gathering where people sit along a long rectangular table, eating food served as single portions. Many companies hold bonenkai (year-end parties) [...]

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New year series part III: fukubukuro

So, during the festive season, Japanese stores (including supermarkets) put up fukubukuro-s (or 福袋 in kanji) for sale. Only for the last few days of 2010, ending about a week from the new year? Or when the bags sell out. Basically, it’s like a lucky bargain bag, where you pay, let’s say 1000yen for 3000yen [...]

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Cheers to a new year, a 5-part series! Part 1: Lion Dance

Happy new year dudes!  xD あけまして　おめでとう (akemashite omedetou) My sincere apologies for not putting up a post for so long… I’ve been travelling around! ^__^ (which, of course, i will blog about later on) To welcome the new year, I’ll be putting up 5 posts on 5 consecutive days about the little things Japanese do [...]

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