The example of the straw rope demonstrates that certain cultural forms may become obsolete, while others are replaced with new products that fit in better with people’s changing social and economic circumstances. In turn these forms might be replaced by yet others that might consequently be invented anew or disappear altogether. The market both responds to and plays an active role in this incessant process of obliteration and innovation.
Food: Auspicious Rice Cakes
The main New Year’s decoration inside the homes studied was the so-called kagamimochi (mirror-rice cake) display which consists of two large pounded rice cakes of different sizes placed on top of each other and a number of decorative elements with auspicious qualities. The rice cake display, a typical New Year’s offering, is generally placed on top of auspicious plants such as seaweed and fern leaves, while paper festoons are draped across, and the display is topped off with a mandarintype fruit. The various auspicious ingredients vary according to regional as well as household preferences (Matsushita 1991). In the Kuwaharas’ home in Itami City, for example, the kagami-mochi was placed on top of a large piece of dried seaweed and further decorated with a chestnut, a dried persimmon and a clay bell in the shape of a sheep, the zodiac animal celebrated in 2003 (Figure 11.3). The whole display sits
180
Inge Daniels