Happy New Year!

We celebrated the New Year with a quiet evening at home. Aaron opted to go up to the village shrine at midnight to take some photos of the ceremony there. Ridge had claimed he wanted to go to, but oddly enough, when awoken at 11:30 p.m., he changed his mind.

Here are a few shots of the folks at the shrine getting their new year’s blessings.
Praying for good luck
Meeting and greeting old friends

The following day, we joined the Kamaya family at their house for a lovely afternoon of traditional foods and some games. I brought black-eyed peas and corn bread this year. Everyone loved it and I was so glad to be able to share some traditional American food with them.
Lion Dancer; they travel house to house to bring good luck on New Year's Day. If their are children present, they lion will "eat" the child's head. Ridge and Holt declined.

Dancer

Mr. Kamaya's new year's shrine