A Blue New Year in Japan
How Being Alone Taught Me About Japanese Culture
When I first came to Japan, I was very lucky I did not experience a lot of culture shock and could quickly adapt to the culture. However, it doesn’t mean I didn’t have any culture shock at all. It’s impossible to know everything about a culture, so of course, there were aspects of Japanese culture which were difficult to understand before coming to Japan.
One of the most difficult was experiencing Uchi and Soto (内・外 meaning inside and outside, respectively) when I had to spend winter holidays alone. I will describe this in more detail later, but first, let’s look at some of the cultural differences in Japan when it comes to the holidays.
New Years in Japan
In America, it’s very common for people to go to parties to ring in the New Year, however, the customs are not as intricate or serious as they are in Japan. In contrast, ending the year properly in Japan is very important!
December tends to be quite lively with people having end-of-the-year parties — bōnenkai (忘年会) with their coworkers as a way to end the year positively and say thank you for everyone’s hard work.
However, just like in the States, people also rush around shopping to prepare for the new year. Such preparations include a big cleaning of houses to ensure the purest possible beginning and also making new year bento boxes called osechi (おせち) while many rush home to their parents’ houses where they will spend at least three to five days with family. Usually, within the first three to five days people go to the shrine to say their first prayers of the year and relax at home.
Therefore, during this period almost everything nationwide is shut down. Sounds great, right? Well, if you’re Japanese and have a family to go home to it’s awesome, but what if you’re a foreigner with no family in Japan? Most likely you will spend the New Year alone (unless you have some compassionate friend willing to spend it with you) which can be depressing as hell and seem never-ending.
The Practice of Uchi and Soto
I was lucky the first year as I had a friend willing to go to the shrine with me at midnight because her family didn’t have plans that year. But from the following year until I met my husband, I spent the new year alone.
As an American, who could never allow anyone to spend a holiday alone, I couldn’t understand why none of my Japanese friends would invite me to their home (even though I would have felt awkward intruding). In America, if someone doesn’t have a place to go for the holidays, they invite them to their place!
Later, after understanding the concepts of uchi and soto, I also understood why I had not been invited to my friend’s house for the holidays. Soto consists of distant relationships such as coworkers, bosses, friends, neighbors, etc.
In essence, uchi is a very intimate concept as it consists of the things that concern your household, which isn’t shared with outsiders. Matters and people within your household, such as family, your spouse, and your best friend, belong to you. Therefore, you often hear, “uchi no shujin” (my husband), “uchi no ko” (my child), and so on. You behave accordingly to your household rules and obligations some of which were most likely passed on from other generations. What outsiders do is irrelevant.
As one gets older their uchi extends to their school, workplace, and social circle, which most likely consists of people from these two places. But the same rule applies to anything concerning their school or workplace, which is relevant only to them, while other schools, workplaces, etc. are not.
In contrast, all other households, schools, workplaces, and social circles to which one is not intimately connected are appropriately termed soto or outside. Of course, we frequently interact with people whom we do not have personal relationships with, and it is these people we would never consider part of our uchi. Their actions and behavior are their own and should not influence your uchi.
Something one must understand about the Japanese is that they internalize their feelings and don’t always show or share their feelings. Uchi is another element of this internalization.
As for myself, my friends are like family to me, so it was difficult for me to accept that they did not consider me as part of their uchi. However, I had never interacted with their family, which meant I was not close enough to them to be part of their uchi, so they could not feel comfortable inviting me to their family’s house for the New Year.
Moving Forward
Despite the irony that I love oshōgatsu (お正月 — Japanese New Year’s) and all of the traditions, I can’t express how lonely and miserable I was every year when the new year came. Most public places were closed for about three days and my friends were all at their family’s homes, so it meant not having anyone to talk to and having very few outlets to distract me from my loneliness. Even when I went to the shrine at midnight to say my first prayers of the year, I was still alone despite all the people around me.
However, from that time, I vowed that if I heard of anyone who would be alone for the holidays, I would resolve to invite them to my home. I’m happy that I could fulfill this vow once and host a friend at least once and that she didn’t have to be alone that year. The year after hosting my friend, I met my husband, so I’m glad we can spend every new year together with our two cats!
