I am so behind on updating our blog. The beginning of the year is somehow always so busy. I promised myself that I would make some solid New Years resolutions but I haven’t even gotten a chance to sit down and do that yet. Is it too late? It’s still January… maybe as long as I can get them figured out by the end of this month, I will be okay.
So another fun thing we did earlier this month was attending the Mochitsuki event at the Asian Art Museum in San Francisco. Once essential to the Japanese New Year celebration, the practice of mochitsuki (mochi pounding) is now rare even in Japan, as people tend to eat store-bought mochi rather than make their own in today’s hustle and bustle society. San Francisco-based Kagami-kai is a group dedicated to maintaining the Japanese tradition of mochitsuki, and this was their sixth year performing and churning out mochi for the masses at the Asian Art Museum.
My friend Akiho was visiting from Virginia Tech because she was interviewing for an internship position at UC Berkeley, so she, Dan, and I went together with some of our friends from the San Francisco Bay Area Japanese Language and Culture meetup group. It was quite an experience — the Kagamikai’s mochitsuki performance was very impressive, and the taiko drumming accompanying it was equally breathtaking. We even got to have a bite of mochi at the end. Growing up with Japanese traditions, it really doesn’t feel like the New Year has come until you have some mochi. π
Below are some photos and video footage of the mochitsuki action:
For more information on this yearly event, please hop over here.