2018 Bainbridge Island Japanese American Community Mochitsuki CelebrationNEW

This event is free. Due to enthusiastic demand to attend this event, pre-registration is required this year. No walk-ins will be accommodated without a ticket.  If there are no tickets available, you have the option to join our Waitlist.  Please note all guests you intend to bring must be wait-listed - including children.  As tickets become available, we will release tickets to the wait-listed guests in queue.  We appreciate your understanding as we work to deliver a safe and meaningful event for our community. Donations to the Bainbridge Island Japanese American Community (BIJAC) will be gratefully accepted at the door. For more information about this organization, please visit www.bijac.org

For over a millennium, making and eating the sweet rice treat mochi has been a celebrated New Year's tradition in Japan, with generations of families and communities coming together to wish good health and prosperity for the new year. Each year BIJAC brings this celebration to Bainbridge Island. We invite everyone, young and old, to bundle up against the crisp winter air, and enjoy the tradition of mochi tsuki (moe-chee sue-key), or "mochi-making."

Mochi-making involves a centuries old method of first steaming the sweet rice over an open fire, then placing the cooked rice into a warm stone or concrete bowl called an usu. Using large wooden mallets, two people rhythmically pound the rice in the usu while a third person uses his bare hands to swiftly move the rice between each mallet crash. After several minutes of vigorous pounding, the rice becomes a thick, smooth dough: mochi. While traditional pounding takes place outside, back in the kitchen modern mochi-making appliances are also running. Once cooked and pounded, people of all ages hand form the steaming-hot mochi into small cakes. Some are filled with a sweet bean paste called ahn. Guests can then eat their mochi warm and fresh, or bring them home to be later roasted and dipped in a sweetened soy sauce.

IslandWood has generously provided its beautiful, spacious grounds for this event, held from 11:00 AM to 4:00 PM on the Sunday closest to New Year's Day. BIJAC's acclaimed Kodomo no Tame Ni-For the Sake of the Children-pictorial history is on display, as is the latest in news about the Bainbridge Island Japanese American Exclusion Memorial. Other activities typically include performances by Seattle Kokon Taiko (please be sure to book your tickets for the performance time of your choosing), and various films about our community.

According to IslandWood's campus policy, please no dogs unless they are a service animal

Date
Jan 7, 2018

Time
11:00 am - 4:00 pm

Location
IslandWood, 4450 Blakely Ave. NE, Bainbridge Island, WA 98110

Costs - Click to Register
This event is free. Due to enthusiastic demand to attend this event, pre-registration is required this year. No walk-ins will be accommodated without a ticket.  If there are no tickets available below, you have the option to join our Waitlist.  Please note you must wait-list all members of your intended party - including children.  As tickets become available, we will release tickets to the wait-listed guests in queue.  We appreciate your understanding as we work to deliver a safe and meaningful event for our community. Donations to the Bainbridge Island Japanese American Community (BIJAC) will be gratefully accepted at the door. For more information about this organization, please visit www.bijac.org