Daruma Dolls

On Wednesday January 12th I went to a Daruma Doll Festival! Me and 4 other girls headed out around 1pm and walked to the train station, took the train up to Ome (about 30 minutes) and walked around the festival. The Japanese love their festivals and I suppose having one on a Wednesday afternoon is not too uncommon… who knew?!

A daruma doll is an ugly little “doll”, which really is just a head with a face. They come in lots of colors and sizes, but the traditional is red. Each color represents something that will bring you good luck in the new year. One color is for wealth, another for health, etc. (sorry for the rhyme). You make a wish, pertaining to the color of the daruma you bought, and then color in one of the eyes. Once your wish comes true, you color in the other eye! The following year, you bring your doll back to the festival you purchased it at, and throw it into the fire and it burns. Awesome huh?! Even if the wish doesn’t come true, you still get to burn it the following year.

I got George and myself each our own dolls to make our own wish.

The festival was a lot of fun. There were plenty of vendors to keep us entertained. We drank a sweet, hot, chunky (YES, I said CHUNKY) sake… well… we all tried it, but I think almost all of us threw it away! We also had yakisoba, which I am not much of a fan of… so then I also had what I have nicknamed “Japanese pancake” It’s similar to Gyoza. It has pork and vegetables put inside of what looks like a giant pancake. It’s super greasy and probably not very healthy, but it sure does taste good! I also had a candied strawberry! It was 100 times better than a candied apple.

One interesting thing that happened was a little girl saw us, and turns and points and keeps repeating “Gaijin! Gaijin!” (which means foreigner in Japanese). Her mother began “shushing” her. It was so funny because it was totally that kid that is saying to her mom “Look at that fat (or interject any other non-PC title here) person!” It was too funny to be offended. My friend Kate, who is an incredible photographer, took photos most of the photos on that day, but I didn’t bring my camera. Once I get a few pictures from her, I’ll try to add them to this post!

DARUMA!

--Chelsea