{"id":799,"date":"2013-02-04T23:58:10","date_gmt":"2013-02-05T07:58:10","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.alljapantours.com\/blog\/?p=799"},"modified":"2013-02-04T23:58:38","modified_gmt":"2013-02-05T07:58:38","slug":"setsubun","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.alljapantours.com\/blog\/2013\/02\/04\/setsubun\/","title":{"rendered":"&#8220;Setsubun&#8221;"},"content":{"rendered":"<p><a href=\"http:\/\/www.alljapantours.com\/blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2013\/02\/02042013-1.jpg\"><img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" src=\"http:\/\/www.alljapantours.com\/blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2013\/02\/02042013-1.jpg\" alt=\"Setsubun\" width=\"1006\" height=\"749\" class=\"aligncenter size-full wp-image-800\" srcset=\"https:\/\/www.alljapantours.com\/blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2013\/02\/02042013-1.jpg 1006w, https:\/\/www.alljapantours.com\/blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2013\/02\/02042013-1-480x357.jpg 480w, https:\/\/www.alljapantours.com\/blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2013\/02\/02042013-1-600x446.jpg 600w\" sizes=\"auto, (max-width: 1006px) 100vw, 1006px\" \/><\/a><\/p>\n<p>In Japan, February 3rd is called \u201cSetsubun\u201d (\u7bc0\u5206) which is according to the lunar calendar, winter ends on this day or before the beginning of spring. On Setsubun, Japanese participate events to expel evil spirits and attract good fortune. One of the most common practice is\u201d Mame maki\u201d or \u201cbeam-throwing ceremony.\u201d People shout &#8220;Oni wa soto\u201d (\u9b3c\u306f\u5916) or \u201cDemons out\u201d as they are throwing roasted soybeans from their front door toward outside, then shout \u201cFuku wa uchi\u201d (\u798f\u306f\u5185) , or Luck in!&#8221; as you are throwing the soybeans inside their houses. As part of bringing luck in, after \u201cmame maki,\u201d they eat the number of soybeans as their age plus one, wishing for bringing more good luck in the coming year.<br \/>\nBut, nowadays, the soybean is not touted as the leading player in Setsubun. Instead, \u201cEhou maki\u201d or a thick sushi roll became more popular than \u201cmamemaki, \u201cand it is eaten, while facing in the year\u2019s auspicious direction which is south-southeast for this year.<br \/>\nThis custom was practiced only in the kansai region. So, when I was working at a convenience store 20 years ago in Tokyo, I never knew about this. In 1998, Seven-Eleven started to sell Ehou maki around Japan. Now many people all over Japan eat \u201cEhou Maki.\u201d <\/p>\n<p>Why not you!!<br \/>\nWe all can feel something good is going to happen in 2013.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>In Japan, February 3rd is called \u201cSetsubun\u201d (\u7bc0\u5206) which is according to the lunar calendar, winter ends on this day or before the beginning of spring. On Setsubun, Japanese participate events to expel evil spirits and attract good fortune. One &hellip; <a href=\"https:\/\/www.alljapantours.com\/blog\/2013\/02\/04\/setsubun\/\">Continue reading <span class=\"meta-nav\">&rarr;<\/span><\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":3,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[1],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-799","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-uncategorized"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.alljapantours.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/799","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.alljapantours.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.alljapantours.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.alljapantours.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/3"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.alljapantours.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=799"}],"version-history":[{"count":2,"href":"https:\/\/www.alljapantours.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/799\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":802,"href":"https:\/\/www.alljapantours.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/799\/revisions\/802"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.alljapantours.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=799"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.alljapantours.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=799"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.alljapantours.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=799"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}