Weddingbee Blog

Our engagement photos are in! I’ll be putting them up in bits and pieces because there are a lot. We went to three places: Shinjuku Gyoen, Asakusa, and Shibuya. In Asakusa, we stopped off in front of the famed Sensoji temple. It’s been under renovation for a while now, so we couldn’t get any pictures in front of it, but we grabbed an omikuji!

Omikuji is like a Chinese fortune cookie. You can find them at big temples and shrines all over Japan, and for a small coin (usually 100 yen) you can have your luck laid out for you! There’s usually a canister that you shake, and a little wooden stick falls out of the small hole at the bottom of the canister. The stick has a number on it; find the drawer that corresponds to your number and take out your fortune paper!

Western-thinking countries think of luck only in terms of good or bad—with an omikuji, there are different levels of luck, from the BEST luck, the LOWEST luck, to the WORST curse. Here’s a breakdown of the types of luck:

(source)

If you get a curse, no worries. Just tie the paper slip to what looks like a laundry line, and it should reverse your bad luck.

Mr. Glasses and I did the process together to see our luck as husband and wife. So what did we get?

Dai Kichi! The best fortune! As you can see, not only does the omikuji give you a type of luck, it tells you how all aspects of your life will go:

You will meet good luck by chance just like getting a gem from the rocks while you are digging. Even if you are righteous and have a chance to be successful, nothing can be achieved unless you work hard. *Your wishes will be realized. *The patient will get well. *The lost article will be found. *The person you are waiting for will come. *Building a new house and removal are both good. *It is good to make a trip. *Both marriage and employment are good.

(pictures taken by our awesome photographers over at japanorama)