We at WaWo Japan Travel are thrilled to wish all of our wonderful readers a Happy New Year.
We’d like to take this opportunity to share a bit about our hatsumōde New Year’s shrine visit, before touching upon last year’s projects and our plans for the new year.
The New Year’s season is a very big deal here in Japan, a fact that is perhaps best emblemized by the practically endless crowds of people at its main event, hatsumōde. Despite its popularity, hatsumōde is a relatively simple affair.
It’s a shrine visit–the first of the year, to be precise–where people line up, cast a coin or two into the offering box, make some wishes for the new year, and then maybe buy some omamori charms before heading home.
For our hatsumōde, we visited Meiji Shrine–a massive, storied shrine in the heart of the Tokyo metropolis and one of Japan’s most popular hatsumōde locations. While most Japanese citizens do their hatsumōde visit on January 1st, 2nd, or 3rd, we were a bit late to the party, visiting the shrine on the 6th. Fortunately for us, this meant that the famously massive New Year’s crowds had long since dispersed, and we were able to make our offerings and prayers in relative peace and quiet.
Afterward, some of our staff purchased omikuji fortune slips. These slips contained classical Japanese poetry with translations into other languages. We had a blast reading the poems aloud in overly-theatrical voices and comparing the different languages.
It was a wonderful, joyous start to the new year, full of laughter and hope.
2024 saw the start of this website and the Articles section. Throughout the year, our editorial staff worked tirelessly to transform their inbound tourism work across Japan into compelling narratives that shed light on often-overlooked destinations and experiences.
We’d like to share one article from each of our current writers to highlight just how many adventures we went on last year–and just how many you can do this year.
Arita, Saga – The Birthplace of Japanese Porcelain
By Saori Futsukaichi
https://wawojapantours.com/arita-saga-the-birthplace-of-japanese-porcelain/
Hakuba, Nagano – The Ultimate All-Season Destination
By Fangfang Zhu
https://wawojapantours.com/explore-hakuba-valley-an-ultimate-all-season-destination/
Okunoshima, Hiroshima – The Charming Rabbit Island with a Hidden Dark Past
By Jolene Qiu
https://wawojapantours.com/okunoshima-hiroshima-the-charming-rabbit-island-with-a-hidden-dark-past/
Northern Shimane – Japan’s Ancient Refuge for the Divine
Southern Shimane – A Silver-Lined Land of Myth and Culture
By Benjamin Bramhill
https://wawojapantours.com/northern-shimane-japans-ancient-refuge-for-the-divine/
https://wawojapantours.com/southern-shimane-a-silver-lined-land-of-myth-and-culture/
Imizu, Toyama – The Sleepy Venice of Hokuriku
By Joseph Bayliss
https://wawojapantours.com/imizu-toyama-the-sleepy-venice-of-hokuriku/
2025 is looking to be another fruitful year for our team. We have dozens of articles in the oven, and we’re working around the clock to improve the quality of our output with more dynamic and insightful writing.
In the coming weeks, keep an eye out for new articles on unique experiences and locations in Niigata, the concrete marvels of Kasukabe, Saitama, and fantastic skiing and snowboarding opportunities in Nagano.
<Author>
Joseph Bayliss
Travel Consultant at WaWo Japan Travel
