Devils out! Sushi in!

Well, technically it's "Devils out! Good luck in!" but an essential part of this is to eat a sushi roll with seven ingredients. In fact, you're supposed to eat the whole sushi roll without speaking. One thing everyone does try to do is to eat the roll, or at least start to eat it, facing in the lucky direction for the year. How do you determine the lucky direction for the year? Check the newspaper. This year it's SSW.

My daughter thought it might be a good idea to eat her cucumber sticks facing SSW for extra luck.

I didn't make the sushi rolls. I bought them with a crowd of other shoppers at Mama no Mise. They come complete with an 赤鬼　(aka-oni, red devil) picture, just so you know they're special Setsubun maki. I got the regular ones, that taste exactly like everyday maki, passing up the ones with roast beef and other modern variations on the theme.

Lined up and ready to go!

There's a ton of information about Setsubun on the web. The only thing I want to point out that originally Setsubun (that is, this setsubun, the are four, one for the beginning of every season) was part of the celebration of the New Year. When Japanese New Year migrated from the lunar New Year to January 1st, it got separated from the rest of the festivities. Why? I've no idea.

The sushi roll eating custom isn't part of the original Setsubun observances. The original custom, still followed, is to throw some roasted soy beans out the door while you shout, "鬼は外福は内" -- oni wa soto, fuku wa uchi -- "Devils out, good luck in!" You can spice up this custom by having someone, usually a grandfather, dress as an oni (or at least wear a mask which you can get at a convenience store) and throwing the beans at him, driving him away from the house. This part of the custom has been modernized by moving it to the schools and having every student in every class take it in turn to be the oni, trying to catch the beans in the mouth of the big mask.

The beans, by the way, were traditionally roasted soy beans but now are just as often peanuts.

There's another bean/peanut related custom that we're going to skip at our house. You're supposed to eat the number of beans of your age. After eating the whole makizushi, if I ate that many beans or peanuts, I'd be too full for dessert.