opera kanta

harvest moon

Wednesday, 7. October 2009, 15:36:10

.
On october 4, we saw the harvest moon.
On the night of harvest moon, Japanese enjoy moon viewing. It's one of traditional yearly events. Some enjoy it with having "dango"(rice cake) and some with drinking.
Moon viewing is called "tsukimi", the dango is called "tsukimi-dango", the alcohol is "tsukimi-zake(sake)".
It is just like "hanami", "hanami-zake" and "hanami-dango".

right:Tsukimi is never without "susuki"(Japanese pampas grass)

Tsukimi-dango.
Look at the package paper behind.
There is 3 items set of "tsukimi"--rabbit, susuki and dango in it.
Japanese think that a rabbit is making rice cake in the moon.

Ghibli museum-4harvest moon-2

Comments

Anne # 28. October 2009, 19:29

Reminds me of the "Easter Rabbit"

Is the rabbit a symbol of fertility in Japan also?

opera kanta # 29. October 2009, 05:10

Umm... Apparently, Japanese don't think about rabbit as a symbol of fertility. Maybe you might think it is a bit odd though, a symbol of fertility is kelp. It comes from a pun.