February 3rd, Setsubun Day in Japan - Make a Demon Mask

Today is Setsubun Day, a Japanese holiday marking the first day of Spring, according to the lunisolar calendar. Japanese people all over the world celebrate this day by opening the doors of their houses and driving out the demons (and thereby driving out bad luck).

The way they do this typically involves the father (in this case my husband), wearing a demon mask and running around the house while the rest of the family throws a special type of dried soy beans at him and shouting "Demon out!" in Japanese. Eventually, the demon (father) goes out the door and the family throws more beans at him. This symbolizes driving out the demons. You can see a picture of the soybeans at the very bottom of this posting.

Next, each person in the house eats the same number of the beans as their age. So a 10 year old would eat 10, a 40 year old would eat 40 and by the time you get to 80, your entire day would be spent eating beans, I guess. I ate fresh beans. I made my husband eat the ones off the floor. That is proper.

Some pictures of this event around my house.

Yamaha Motors has put up instructions on how to make your own mask. They are kind, aren't they? If you want to try some other types of Japanese crafts, buy some origami paper and try some of these origami projects like this box.

Below are pictures of the making of the mask.

Cut it out (20 minutes and harder than it looks). They say to glue it. I used tape on the inside as well because it was too hard to hold together otherwise. It came out great this way. More scary than any mask you can buy, I think.

Nose, eyes and mouth.

Forehead.

Setsubun beans.

Enjoy other cultures.