Akemashite Omedetou Gozaimasu!

Kotoshimo Yoroshiku Onegaishimasu!

....or in other words, Happy New Year!

It's snowing outside! The first snow of the season has come on the first day of the year, how cool is that?

I hope everyone had a good evening and has started off 2008 with a happy note. We had a quiet one in, just the two of us with some yummy food, some DVDs and a bottle of Dom Perignon, a very generous Christmas present from my boss.

Our first nengajo arrived before we even got out of bed (though this is more an indication of how late we slept in rather than how early they arrived). 2008 is the Year of the Rat, so many of the cards this year had cute little mice on them. Here are a couple of my favourites from today

This super sweet one comes from a student at my school. Funnily enough, I've never actually taught her, which may be a good thing, it would be hard for me not to favour her. My very first day at the school, when I was very nervous and didn't know where to go or what was going on, she and her friend came and introduced themselves in English and helped me out. Since then, we've become email buddies and we remember each other's birthdays. She's a very good calligraphy artist and I have a piece on my wall that she did for me. I suspect she painted this card and then had them printed out. It's hard to see on this scan, but the pink details have been done by hand.

How gorgeous is this little kogeshi doll? The black parts of the face and the Japanese writing look like they have been printed, but everything else is hand-done. The beauty of the yuzen paper doesn't show up in the scan. This is from one of the Japanese teachers that I teach English with. She also is a very good artist and takes care of the art club after school.

It's such a delight having the postman arrive with these on New Years Day. What a wonderful tradition! I feel like 2008 nengajo design is really quite dull.... Oh well, there's always next year.

Today, Wayne and I are going to head into the "big city" and go to a large temple to watch the New Years festivities. In the first few days of the year, most Japanese will go to a temple to pray for the year, some of them in their finest kimono. My camera should get a workout today!