Hatsumode at Washinomiya Shrine

First, Happy New Year everyone!
Did you all take good resolutions for 2015? Mine is to continue working on the one I had set for myself in 2014...

Today for the first time I did Hatsumode in Japan.
To know more about it, go read the wiki article linked or google it, but I'll give a simple explanation here.
Hatsumode is the first visit of the Shrine of the year. It is usually done in the first 3 days of the year, and is an important japanese tradition.
Most shrines are really crowded at this time of the year, even smaller ones.
I decided to go to Washinomiya shrine (the shrine in Lucky Star) once again, because it's kinda my favourite shrine, and I love Washinomiya, plus they had a special even with Lucky Star goods and cosplay.

I guess most cosplay was on the night of the 31, as I saw some on the first, but not many. Even without the cosplay, I still enjoyed this event a lot. The was a lot of things to see, a lot of smiling people, and a lot of food to eat.
For this kind of event, the food stalls that you can see during matsuri were out on the shrine grounds.

The great thing about Washinomiya is how the pop culture of Otaku, and anime mix so greatly with the traditional one. So while this specific shrine had otaku stuff going on, the shrine is still a very traditional place, and traditional rituals were performed.

(BTW, my normal lens broke, so I was using a zoom lens for all those shots, that's why some of them seem like they should have been taken wider, but I couldn't sorry.)

After lining up to the shrine, and doing our prayers for the new year, we got to draw our Omikuji, a paper that tells you how your luck will be in the next year. By mistake, the box I picked from was for love Omikuji, but I decided to go with it, and apparently I'll have great luck in love. That's just perfect!

After that we bought an Ema, a piece of wood used to write our wishes on, and attached it with the others.
Once again, this is Washinomiya, so the display of Ema didn't disappoint, with even the author of Lucky Star, Kagami Yoshimizu, leaving his own.

Ema by Kagami-sensei

Here are ours:

I can't draw without a draft D:

After that we ate some more and went back home. It was a relatively short time, but it was really fun, I really enjoyed Hatsumode in Japan. And I suggest that if you're in japan around new year, you should totally try it too.
And if you're a Lucky Star fan... do I need to say more?

Here's my loot from today:

The white arrow is supposed to ward off evil!

And here's the full album from today, with a little more cosplay and Ema pictures: (Google+/Picasa)

That's all for today, don't hesitate to ask questions about this event in the comments, I'm sure I forgot important stuff you might want to know.