TsukuBlog
For the Winter Solstice (冬至)- Yuzu Baths, Pumpkin, and Fire-Walking (火渡り) – on Sunday December 22, 2019
20 December, 2020
By Avi Landau
Up here in the northern hemisphere, we have been watching our daylight hours grow shorter and shorter by the day. It can be startling to leave work at the usual time and find ourselves immersed in complete darkness where just a few weeks ago it was perfectly bright. For the ancients, this gradual waning of daytime was the cause of great apprehension, and a wide assortment of rituals and ceremonies (including human sacrifice!) were conceived of and performed by various peoples around the world to make sure that the sun didn’t continue to weaken and ultimately disappear altogether.