In the gym, we watched a program about the holiday, which celebrates the harvest and full moon.
The sixth grade staged a play of the Otsukimi legend, called "The Rabbit in the Moon". Here's the simplified version:
In the story, the "old man of the moon" looks down on Earth and sees three friends, a rabbit, a monkey and a fox.
To find out which of the three animals is the kindest, the old man in the moon comes down to Earth disguised as a beggar and asks the three to find food for him.
The monkey brings fruit; the fox brings fish. The rabbit offers to throw himself into a fire and cook himself as food for the beggar.
Hearing this, the beggar turns himself back into the Old-Man-of-the-Moon and invites the rabbit to live with him in the moon. This is why the Japanese people believe that when the moon is shining brightly, they can see the rabbit there pounding rice.
After the play, students waited in line to look at the moon from the school observatory; the moon was behind a nearby building, oh well. Many girls (Japanese and non-Japanese) and their mothers wore "yukata", or cotton kimonos, to the celebration.
The kids snacked on Otsukimi treats - rice-flour balls filled with red-bean paste and rice crackers and made a rabbit-in-the-moon with paint.
Finally, a teacher helped Lucinda fold an origami rabbit for an Otsukimi scene on paper, and Arno giggled when Blaine tickled him.
No comments:
Post a Comment