<P> The Japanese New Year (正月, Shōgatsu) is an annual festival with its own customs . Since 1873, the official Japanese New Year has been celebrated according to the Gregorian calendar, on January 1 of each year, New Year's Day (元 日, Ganjitsu). However, many traditional events of the Japanese New Year are still celebrated on the first day of the year on the modern Tenpō calendar, the last official lunisolar calendar which was used until 1872 in Japan . </P> <P> Prior to the Meiji period, the date of the Japanese New Year had been based on Japanese versions of lunisolar calendar (the last of which was the Tenpō calendar) and, prior to Jōkyō calendar, the Chinese versions . However, in 1873, five years after the Meiji Restoration, Japan adopted the Gregorian calendar and the first day of January became the official and cultural New Year's Day in Japan </P> <P> Japanese people eat a selection of dishes during the New Year celebration called osechi - ryōri (御 節 料理 or お節 料理), typically shortened to osechi . Many of these dishes are sweet, sour, or dried, so they can keep without refrigeration--the culinary traditions date to a time before households had refrigerators, when most stores closed for the holidays . There are many variations of osechi, and some foods eaten in one region are not eaten in other places (or are considered inauspicious or even banned) on New Year's Day . Another popular dish is ozōni (お 雑煮), a soup with mochi rice cake and other ingredients that differ based on various regions of Japan . Today, sashimi and sushi are often eaten, as well as non-Japanese foods . To let the overworked stomach rest, seven - herb rice soup (七草粥, nanakusa - gayu) is prepared on the seventh day of January, a day known as jinjitsu (人 日). </P> <P> Another custom is to create and eat rice cakes (餅, mochi). Boiled sticky rice (餅 米, mochigome) is put into a wooden container usu (臼) and patted with water by one person while another person hits it with a large wooden mallet . Mashing the rice, it forms a sticky white dumpling . This is made before New Year's Day and eaten during the beginning of January . </P>

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