Japanese New Year

We Japanese prepare "osechi" boxed food and "mochi" rice cake for the first several days in the new year so we don't have to work hard in the kitchen.
There is an idea that the first day of the year  represents the year, so if you work hard on the new year's day, you might have to work hard through the year.
We also eat "mochi" in soup, which is called "zouni" or "ozouni". You can tell where people are from in Japan by their zouni soup.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Osechi


photo from wikipedia

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ozouni

photo from Japanese cooking site "ouchi-de-gohan"
http://www.e-furikake.com/