Hello everyone! Happy Holidays!
Did you have a nice Christmas? Did Santa Claus come to your town? (^^♪
I had a party with my family at home. After starting this pandemic, many people like to stay at home and have a home party. I made some Christmas dinner for my family on Christmas day 🎵
Today, I will introduce you to another winter event. It was the winter solstice day on the 22nd of December in Japan. We call it Touji(冬至).
In Japanese culture, we have some superstitions that if you did something on the winter solstice day, you would be happy and you would have a long life. One of them is to take a Yuzu bath.
Do you know what Yuzu is ? Yuzu is a Japanese citrus fruit in the picture below. They smell perfect 💛
Fortunately, we have a Yuzu tree in my family’s garden and it is quite dangerous when you pick them from the tree. There are some hard prickles you must be careful with. We were able to pick over 100 Yuzu.
At Asonoyu, one of the hot springs in Uchinomaki Hot spring town, welcomed customers with Yuzuyu (ゆず湯) on that day. Yuzuyu is literally translated as Yuzu bath or Yuzu Onsen(hot spring).(Actually, my family runs Asonoyu 🙂 haha ) We floated some Yuzu in the bathtub.
Also, we served boiled sweet pumpkins with Yuzu jam tea to show our everyday appreciation to our customers. All of them are my mom’s handmade ♡ Many customers said, ” What an amazing surprised afternoon tea ♪ We were just happy to have a Yuzu bath! ”
It is said, If you ate pumpkins on that day, you would have a long long life ☆彡
It was a party for me. I love bathing and it smelled perfect. I felt very relaxed. Plus, we could talk to many of our dear customers. I love communicating with people‼ I was really happy 💕
If you have chance to come to Aso on the winter solstice day, enjoy Yuzuyu and please come to talk to me at Michi no Eki Aso, let’s have a joyful conversation! I cannot wait to see you in Aso!
Kirara
