The hot and humid summer is fading. We feel "a little something autumn" these days like more nice and cozy breeze and the longer nights. We see more seasonal foods thanks to the harvest season, too. Therefore, in Japan, there are several nicknames for the season such as “autumn for sport”, “autumn for reading”, “autumn for a good appetite” etc.
Also, it is the beautiful season to view the moon. We enjoy moon-viewing known as “tsukimi”, particularly, this season.
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| a rabbit pounding rice-cake in the moon |
Speaking of which, would you come up a special motif when you see the contrast between the brighter highlands and darker maria? For Japanese, a rabbit comes to our minds. More specifically, we believe “a rabbit pounding rice-cake” lives in the moon. Isn't that interesting? This explains why the moon or rabbits are often used as a motif for traditional Japanese sweets during this season. Those designs give us the sense of autumn.
Now is the time to enjoy teatime after long-heating sticky summer. Right?
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| rabbit shaped sweets |
Moon-viewing http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tsukimi
