ひな祭り

今日は三月三日、ひな祭りだ。

Yep, 3rd day of the 3rd month. Hina Matsuri, also known as "Girls Festival". This is celebrated because the parents want their girls to grow up strong and healthy. During hina matsuri girls wear kimonos and they eat hina-arale, drink ama-sake, a rice wine that has no alcohol in it (what? no alcohol?). On this day parents of the girls get a doll shrine, as shown below *whoa*



Well, apparantly, the cost of one of these doll shrines is enough to feed yours truly for A MONTH here. I say its Japanese consumerism. Look what we get bombareded at everyday when we enter the supermarket:



Well, a country with people willing to spend S$50 on an average melon can afford to spoil itself. Nice towering monolith full of goods: ready packed and pink and reflective of spring? (think: sakura) Buy, buy, buy, its a good way to spend yourself out of a recession. So, hows everyone back home with their prosperity packages? I see something like this in the supermarket, I spend 0.5 seconds going "Whoa, sia la!" then I walk on to look for discounted bentos. muhaha. >:D