Last year I came down with a bad cold after Christmas so I didn’t go to a shrine on New Year’s Day. This year I went to Sumiyoshi Taisha. It is a very popular shrine and was very crowded. There were stalls everywhere selling various kinds of food. Most people were particularly keen to enter via this bridge.

It is rather picturesque but I didn’t fancy the crowd so I opted to go in via another entrance. There were a lot of people praying for a prosperous new year and generally crowding around enjoying bringing in the new year.

To eat I ate Tacosenbei. It is an octopus cracker that is topped with rice crispies, sauce and, in this case yakisoba noodles and a fried egg.

Sorry for the quality of the picture. It was a bit of a balancing act and holding it in one hand while taking a photo with the other was quite a challenge.