Mochi Celebration

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Japanese New Year’s Mochi Celebration

Have you ever celebrated the New Year with a Mochi Festival? Today was my first time. No, I am not in Japan, but on Bainbridge Island just across Puget Sound from of Seattle Washington. It’s a bright, cold winter’s day at Island Wood, an environmental education center, and the community is celebrating the coming New Year with the Japanese custom of making and eating mochi.
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So what is mochi and how do you make it? After washing sweet rice, you soak it overnight. You then steam the rice in wooden boxes over an open fire until it’s sticky. You place the hot glutinous rice in a large usu or stone mortar. Now comes the exciting part. The tool used to pound the rice is huge, the size of an ax. The mallet head is two feet long with a three foot handle. The pounding requires a strong full-body swing like chopping wood. You enlist your friends and family to pound the rice until it’s smooth and shiny.

Perfect rhythm is a critical part of the process. The mochi master, who reaches into the usu and turns the rice between hits, calls out the rhythm in sing-song Japanese words. It reminds me of African work chants or rowers on the queen’s barge. If the pounders are off, the mochi master’s fingers get smashed; not a good way to start the New Year. Lots of teenagers and adults volunteer to pound the rice, but only the mochi master chants and turns the rice.

When ready, other helpers roll the mochi and pinch off small pieces forming them into cookie-size disks. Mochi taste like raw bread dough, but it can be spiced up with bean paste, meat or fruit.

While some folks pound the rice, musicians pound the huge Taiko drums. They twirl and dance while keeping the rhythm. The rhythmic boom, boom, boom makes me want to pound the drums and dance.

Both the mochi and the history of the Japanese Americans on this island are fascinating.

Prior to the start of World War 11, this group owned property and businesses on the Island. The novel/movie “Snow Falling on Cedars” chronicles their lives. Then in the spring of 1941, they were ejected from their homes. Given only a few days notice to arrange their affairs, they gathered at the Island’s Eagle Harbor for transport to Manzanar Internment Camp in Idaho. As the war progressed the U.S. allowed Americans of Japanese decent, to become soldiers. It’s puzzling that they were loyal enough to fight beside us in the trenches, but not loyal enough to reside in their own homes.

Now a proud outcome to a shameful event is happening on Bainbridge Island. The community is building a memorial to honor their Japanese American neighbors at the very spot where they boarded the ferry on April 1, 1941. I can only imagine their fear, anger and grief as they watched their island home recede in the distance.

As Congressman Jay Inslee (D-Bainbridge) said when introducing to congress the oldest survivor of the group. “This is a story that needs to resonate throughout the decades. We have to ensure the power of fear never overcomes the promise of liberty”.

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Photos

Mochi Celebration
Donna Moore and Helen Nisanni in front of the rice steamer

Mochi Celebration
Taiko Drums