Soybeans, Demons, and a Giant Tube of Sushi

Hi World! Welcome to the holidays & holiDAYtrips video blog! (It’s lovely to make your acquaintance.)

Every day, on Twitter, I post a new world holiday; but, I also wanted to create a forum where I could post a weekly video.

The format is definitely new for me, as this is my first stab at blogging; but, I’m a quick study, so I think things will get slicker as we go! I’m also really open to feedback and any hints that you might want to share.

Today’s video holiDAYtrip is Setsubun, the Japanese festival that marks the beginning of spring.

For centuries, on the day before spring (according to the Japanese lunar calendar), the Japanese have performed certain rituals in order to chase away evil spirits and prepare for the new year. (One of my favorites, from the 1200s, involved burning dried sardine heads and using the smell to keep bad energy at bay.) Nowadays, the most popular custom associated with Setsubun is mamemaki, or bean throwing.

Of course, there are many variations on mamemaki throughout Japan; but, in a nutshell, families throw roasted soybeans out of their house via the front door (or at a willing volunteer in a devil mask) and shout: "Oni wa soto! Fuku wa uchi!" (Demons out, happiness in!) Afterward, everyone picks up and eats the number of beans, which corresponds to their age.

Roasted soybeans...reminded me of Corn Nuts

So, for our first order of Setsubun business, Ed (my husband) and I headed to the one place we knew wouldn’t disappoint us, Mitsuwa Marketplace. For those of you who aren’t crazy foodies, like us, Mitsuwa is the largest Japanese supermarket in the U.S. and has most Japanese specialty items a person could want.

For those of you that are foodies, it turns out that the best time to go to Mitsuwa is at 1:40pm on a Monday.

Once inside, while on the hunt for beans, we were promptly asked to stop filming. (Aww, fuku mame!) Though, we did find the small Setsubun section – where all the packets of soybeans had a little devil head on the outside. So, we picked up some of those as well as a devil mask and were on our way…

Ed, with Sapporo and Demon Mask (Our usual date tools)

Now, gaining popularity in some parts of Japan is another Setsubun tradition that we were most excited to try – eating a “Lucky Direction” roll, or Eho-Maki. It’s customary to eat this sushi in a very specific way. First of all, the roll must stay uncut (mmm…sushi tube!) and it must contain 7 ingredients (mmm…fat sushi tube!) and you must eat it in silence while facing the yearly lucky compass direction, determined by the zodiac symbol of that year.

As this year is the Year of the Dragon, the lucky direction is NNW.

Now, all of this would have been fine; however, Ed and I unknowingly stumbled into a sushi restaurant near us that didn’t have a single Japanese person working there! (Aww, makizushi!) So, we ended up schooling the sushi chefs on how to perfectly craft our Lucky Direction rolls – though, this also meant that we were able to build our own.

We decided on: yellowtail, mango (yellow is a lucky color), avocado, cucumber,
spicy red remoulade, tempura flake, and brown rice.

Setsubun was a truly great time. We laughed A LOT and were really excited that this was the first holiDAYtrip that we committed to video! Oni wa soto! Fuku wa uchi!

And, it seems only fitting to leave you with the following…

Ready for the new year and all that comes with it,

Ilana

The “Packing List”

(This section should grow fairly regularly, as we add to/upgrade our arsenal of equipment.)

This week, we were rocking the following:

• Flip UltraHD Video Camera
• Sony a390 DSLR Camera
• Joby GorillaPod Video Tripod