January 1st is the most important festival in Japan. Usually, people clean and decorate the "mirror cake" at home. The so-called mirror cakes are "sacrificial potatoes", which are usually large piles and small piles with oranges on them. Traditional families and companies decorate their doors with loose doors and decorations woven with ropes to show their luck. On New Year's Eve, Japanese people are used to watching the annual routine program "Red and White Songs" held by NHK. At the end of 12 o'clock, they have the custom of eating New Year's Eve, and then listen to the temple ring the New Year bell on 108, so the New Year is here! In the morning, the family should congratulate each other on a happy new year, taste "cooking in the first month" together, and then go to the mailbox to receive new year cards. Then go to a nearby shrine to pay homage and pray. The first dream on New Year's Day is called "the first dream". If you dream of "Mount Fuji, eggplant and treasure ships", it indicates your good luck for a year. In the first month, the average company will have a seven-day holiday. At this time, many people go home to visit relatives, which often causes traffic congestion. This scene is very spectacular.
Japanese people always pay attention to etiquette, and many etiquette in life have their own national characteristics. For example, the Japanese think it is impolite to put the glass on the table when drinking, and let the guests pour the wine themselves. When pouring wine, they should hold the bottom of the bottle with their right hand, while guests should hold the glass with their right hand and the bottom of the glass with their left hand. Japanese also avoid lotus patterns: avoid numbers such as "9" and "4" because "9" is pronounced as "bitter" in Japanese; The pronunciation of "4" is the same as "death", so we should avoid the habit of table 4 in room 4 on the fourth floor.
Japanese businessmen also avoid "February" and "August" because they are off-season. I also hate cats with gold and silver eyes. I think people who see such cats will have bad luck. Eight ways to use chopsticks are forbidden, namely licking chopsticks, mixing chopsticks, moving chopsticks, twisting chopsticks, inserting chopsticks, pulling chopsticks, crossing chopsticks and picking chopsticks. At the same time, it is forbidden to use the same pair of chopsticks for everyone to share, and it is also forbidden to insert chopsticks vertically in rice. Pronunciation of Japanese characters
There are two ways to pronounce Chinese characters in Japanese. One way is to pronounce Chinese characters according to their form and meaning, which is called "training reading". For example, the word "water" is pronounced as "mizu" and "Yama". The other is to imitate the pronunciation of Chinese, which is called "sound reading". For example, the word "water" is pronounced as "sui" and the word "mountain" is pronounced as "three". Generally speaking, Chinese characters in verbs and adjectives are mostly "training reading". But not every Chinese character has two reading methods: training reading method and pronunciation reading method, and some have only one. Because it is a convention, you can only remember it when you study. Chinese Characters in Japanese There are 1945 commonly used Chinese characters in Japanese, which are called when using Chinese characters, and they are promulgated as decrees. Chinese characters used in newspapers and magazines should be within this range. Japanese students have to learn Chinese writing, reading and training from primary school to junior high school. In Japan, there is a social atmosphere. The more Chinese characters you know, the higher your education level. Ornamental cherry blossoms are the national flower of Japan. In warm and humid Japan, cherry blossoms bloom from south to north from the end of March to the beginning of May every year. Cherry blossoms occupy a unique position in Japanese life and spirit. Every spring, radio and TV stations report the progress of Hua Xun every day like the war. The flowering period of cherry blossoms is only about a week. During this period, many companies, organizations and schools collectively organized flowers in parks and other places, and some even occupied the venue in advance and reveled all night, which was called the "cherry blossom banquet". During this period, Sakura Resort became a prosperous business district. During this period, the royal family also invited diplomatic envoys and celebrities from various countries to participate in flower viewing activities in the park. Cherry blossom viewing is a grand activity in Japanese life. Japanese Performing Arts There are three kinds of traditional Japanese dramas, the oldest of which is called "Neng", which originated in14th century. The stage scenes and props of the performance time of Neng are extremely simple. The actors wore masks and ancient costumes, singing monotonously and moving very slowly. Kabuki appeared in the17th century with complicated plots and martial arts dance scenes. Kabuki has gorgeous costumes, spectacular scenes and stage effects such as lightning and snowstorm. Lewen is a kind of puppet show, which was originally formed in16th century. These puppets are about half a man's height and are beautifully made. Each puppet is operated by three people on the stage. Traditionally, "Neng" and "Kabuki" are clothes disguised as women, but now they are slightly modified. The music of traditional drama with drums, flutes, Japanese three-stringed instruments and thirteen-stringed instruments is a unique style in Japan. Before Meiji Restoration (1867), Japan was a country with status hierarchy. Only samurai or wealthy businessmen have their own surnames, while ordinary people have no surnames, such as "Taro Zuo" and "Five Soldiers Wei", but their names are not surnames. In the eighth year of Meiji (1875), the government issued a decree to abolish the identity system and required everyone to determine a surname. People choose their surnames in various ways. For example, Dalang is a long-term worker of the landlord Aoki, so Dalang works according to the owner's surname and is called Aoki Taro. Others take surnames from the geographical environment where they live. For example, the five soldiers who live by the bridge take the bridge as their surname and call it the bridge five soldiers. At present, the common surnames of Japanese are Sato, Suzuki, Tanaka, Yamamoto, Gao Qiao, Nakamura and Ito, among which Suzuki and Sato are the most common. Japanese new year
"The first month" means New Year in Japanese, and it is one of the most important festivals in Japan. The customs and habits of Japanese New Year are almost the same all over the country. For example, on the morning of New Year's Day, you should drink "Tu Su wine" and eat dishes specially made for the New Year: herring roe, black beans, dried fish cooked with soy sauce and sugar, etc. This means that future generations will be prosperous and healthy. You should also eat "bibimbap" (rice cake soup) for breakfast. During the Spring Festival, pine branches and bamboo branches are hung in front of every household, which is called "door pine" and has auspicious meaning. The first three days of the New Year are called "Three Congratulations Days", and people pay New Year greetings to each other. On New Year's Eve, people have the habit of observing the 30th anniversary, especially going to the shrine at midnight to hear the bells of the 30th anniversary. At this time, the shrine is crowded with people, often reaching tens of thousands. Visiting the shrine on the first day is called "the first day" and it is a necessary procedure to celebrate the New Year. In the month of 65438+February, people want to send each other new year cards and prize-winning postcards, and the post office has set up a postal channel for this purpose. It is said that it is a unique happy New Year for Japanese to visit New Year cards on the first day of the new year. Besides the New Year, the most important Japanese festival is the Kogasawara Festival in mid-August. During this period, most Japanese people will go back to their hometowns to visit their graves, and the traffic tension is quite similar to that before and after the Spring Festival in China. The main highways connecting Tokyo and other cities often have traffic jams as long as ten kilometers or even dozens of kilometers. During this period, many activities were held in various places, such as dancing in orchid pots and setting off fireworks. March 3rd is Girls' Day (Peach Blossom Festival). Families with girls should set up shelves to worship layers of dolls symbolizing ancient emperors and nobles, and wish the girls a smooth growth and all the best. May 5th is Children's Day (Boys' Day). Families with boys use bamboo poles to hang carp flags outside their homes, and several boys at home also hang carp flags. July 7th is Beggars' Day. According to legend, there was a pair of lovers in ancient times, who lived far apart, and only this day could they get together. On Valentine's Day in China, people will write prayers on colored paper ribbons and hang them on bamboo branches, hoping that their wishes will come true. 1 1 month 15 is the third day of July, that is, when girls are three or seven years old and boys are five years old, they are taken to shrines or temples by their families on this day to pray for healthy growth under the protection of God. Besides these national festivals, there are countless local festivals all over Japan, some of which attract thousands of foreign tourists every day. In Japanese residential areas, there is an organization similar to the China Residents' Committee, which is responsible for collecting water and electricity charges, organizing residents to engage in environmental sanitation and publicizing traffic safety. Japanese people rarely have the habit of dropping in casually, but they must say hello when they meet every day. Morning, day and night, they all have their own opinions. Saying something about cold and warm weather is also an appropriate greeting. Don't ask others where to go and what to eat. If the other party doesn't take the initiative to talk, it is generally impossible to inquire about other people's private affairs, otherwise it is a sign of ill-breeding. When you move to a new place, the first thing to do is to bring some small gifts, such as towels and soap, and visit your neighbors from door to door. Generally, you say, "I just moved here and live in XX. Please take care of me in the future." So we know each other. Before you move out, you should also say goodbye from door to door. Usually you say, "Thank you for your long-term care. Please come to my house when you are free. " Before Japanese kana Chinese characters were introduced into Japan, there were no characters in Japan. Around the Qin and Han Dynasties in China, Chinese characters began to spread to Japan. For a long time, the Japanese used Chinese characters as symbols to record Japanese, which was of course extremely inconvenient. Later, according to the creativity of Chinese characters, I extracted radicals and created Japanese letters-pseudonyms. A pseudonym means a borrowed name. As a letter for writing Japanese, kana can be divided into hiragana and katakana. Hiragana is a cursive script, simplified from the cursive script of Chinese characters. Katakana is a regular script, which is taken from the radical of China's regular script. Newspapers, letters and books are written in Hiragana, except for foreign words. The origin of "Yamato" "Yamato" is another name of Japan, and "Yamato Soul" refers to the spirit of the Japanese nation, also called "Yamato Nation". "Yamato" was originally a place name. There are still place names such as Yamato, Yamato Takada in the south of Nara. Around the middle of the 4th century AD, during the Wei, Jin, Southern and Northern Dynasties in China, a clan group in dispute unified Japan and established the "Yamato Court" in the "Yamato" area, thus starting the "Yamato regime", that is, the rule of the emperor. At the beginning of the establishment of the Yamato regime, he surrendered to China and sought recognition and protection. The Book of Jin, the Book of Song, the Book of Southern Qi, and Liang Shu recorded the historical facts of Yamato's communication with China and the fact that Emperor China named him "the general king of Japan".