{"id":712,"date":"2008-02-03T22:57:13","date_gmt":"2008-02-03T13:57:13","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/regex.info\/blog\/2008-02-03\/712"},"modified":"2008-02-03T22:57:36","modified_gmt":"2008-02-03T13:57:36","slug":"setsubun-and-mememaki-driving-out-the-demons","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/regex.info\/blog\/2008-02-03\/712","title":{"rendered":"Setsubun and Mamemaki: Driving out the Demons"},"content":{"rendered":"\n\n
<\/a>\nNikon D200 + Nikkor 70-200mm f\/2.8 @ 200mm — 1<\/sup>\/<\/big>640 sec, f\/2.8, ISO 800 —\nmap & image data<\/a> — nearby photos<\/a><\/span><\/span>\nMean, Nasty Demons<\/span>\n<\/div>\n\n

The Heian Shrine (a huge shrine in eastern Kyoto) had Setsubun<\/i>\nevents today (Wikipedia on\n“Setsubun”<\/a>). The main event<\/span> associated with Setsubun is mamemaki<\/i>\n– \u8c46\u6492<\/span>\u304d, literally “bean scattering” – which involves throwing dried\nbeans at demons while yelling “demons out! Good fortune in!<\/i>”<\/p>\n\n

As you might expect of any event that involves the throwing of beans,\nkids love it.<\/p>\n\n

<\/a>\nNikon D200 + Nikkor 70-200mm f\/2.8 @ 200mm — 1<\/sup>\/<\/big>1600 sec, f\/2.8, ISO 800 —\nmap & image data<\/a> — nearby photos<\/a><\/span><\/span>\nNasty Demon Threatens Docile Camera-Toting Population<\/span>\n<\/div>\n\n

Kids love it unless<\/i> they think the demons are real...<\/p>\n\n

<\/a>\nNikon D200 + Nikkor 70-200mm f\/2.8 @ 70mm — 1<\/sup>\/<\/big>500 sec, f\/2.8, ISO 800 —\nmap & image data<\/a> — nearby photos<\/a><\/span><\/span>\nHiding Behind Mommy<\/span>\n<\/div>\n\n
<\/a>\nNikon D200 + Nikkor 70-200mm f\/2.8 @ 110mm — 1<\/sup>\/<\/big>2500 sec, f\/2.8, ISO 800 —\nmap & image data<\/a> — nearby photos<\/a><\/span><\/span>\nMr. Whitehair-and-Orangepants Heads Away<\/span>\n<\/div>\n\n
<\/a>\nNikon D200 + Nikkor 70-200mm f\/2.8 @ 86mm — 1<\/sup>\/<\/big>640 sec, f\/2.8, ISO 800 —\nmap & image data<\/a> — nearby photos<\/a><\/span><\/span>\nCautiously Emerging, Still Wary<\/span>\n<\/div>\n\n

The demons eventually headed up toward the main building of the shrine,\nwhere unbeknownst to them, beans awaited.<\/p>\n\n

<\/a>\nNikon D200 + Nikkor 70-200mm f\/2.8 @ 200mm — 1<\/sup>\/<\/big>1600 sec, f\/2.8, ISO 800 —\nmap & image data<\/a> — nearby photos<\/a><\/span><\/span>\nMenacing the Good Townsfolk<\/span>\n<\/div>\n\n

The parent in me was surprised at how few children attended the event.\nThere were a lot<\/span> of people of every age, but I would<\/span> have expected a\ndecidedly<\/span> kid-heavy crowd.<\/p>\n\n

The camera geek in me was thrilled with how many beefy, hunky SLRs were\nin attendance. I saw a<\/span> huge Leica SLR (an M9, I think<\/span>). There was one big\nCanon pro-level SLR with a big<\/span> hunk of white zoom lens. And I saw<\/span> about 100\nNikon SLRs – mostly D200 and D2x, but I also<\/span> noticed the occasional\nconsumer SLR and film SLR as well. Nikon and Canon compete in many\ndifferent markets, but it was evident today that Nikon had won the\nbean-throwing crowd. (As for me, I'm agnostic: I have<\/span> one of each\nbrand.)<\/p>\n\n

The shrine guy in the upper-left of the next shot (wearing purplish lowers)\nis wielding a Nikon<\/span> SLR with a humongous<\/span> lens, although you can't\nappreciate the lens size from this angle.<\/p>\n\n

<\/a>\nNikon D200 + Nikkor 70-200mm f\/2.8 @ 200mm — 1<\/sup>\/<\/big>1250 sec, f\/2.8, ISO 800 —\nmap & image data<\/a> — nearby photos<\/a><\/span><\/span>\nLotsa' Cameras<\/span>\n<\/div>\n\n

Eventually, the demons wore out their welcome, and they were met by half\na dozen<\/span> bean-throwing dignitaries, who promptly drove them out of the\nshrine area.<\/p>\n\n

<\/a>\nNikon D200 + Nikkor 70-200mm f\/2.8 @ 200mm — 1<\/sup>\/<\/big>250 sec, f\/5.6, ISO 500 —\nmap & image data<\/a> — nearby photos<\/a><\/span><\/span>\nI Bean<\/span> Thee<\/span>(If you look carefully, you can see the beans mid-flight)\n<\/div>\n\n
<\/a>\nNikon D200 + Nikkor 70-200mm f\/2.8 @ 200mm — 1<\/sup>\/<\/big>180 sec, f\/5.6, ISO 500 —\nmap & image data<\/a> — nearby photos<\/a><\/span><\/span>\nDemons Get 0wn3d<\/a><\/span>\n<\/div>\n\n
<\/a>\nNikon D200 + Nikkor 70-200mm f\/2.8 @ 90mm — 1<\/sup>\/<\/big>250 sec, f\/5.6, ISO 500 —\nmap & image data<\/a> — nearby photos<\/a><\/span><\/span>\nTriclops Looks For Help<\/span>(ain't gonna get it)\n<\/div>\n\n

A kind man gave Anthony some beans to throw at the demons, but he was\nreluctant to do so (even though he was sitting on my shoulders by this\ntime). I knew that<\/span> he was a bit<\/span> scard by the event – that's half the\nfun – but I didn't<\/span> find out until later that he truly thought that\nthe demons were real. We looked<\/span> over some of the 400 pictures I took,<\/span> and\nfound signs that perhaps they weren't real – they had people shoes\ninstead of demon shoes, people hands, etc. – so he knows now that\nthey were people dressed up as<\/i> demons, but I'm not sure he really\nbuys it.<\/p>\n\n

Anyway, the beans in setsubun<\/i> are meant to symbolize goodness and\ngood fortune, which is why they can drive away the demons. On the other<\/span>\nhand, those same qualities are beneficial to people, so the next part of\nthe event involves having beans thrown at you. I'll leave that for another day's post<\/a>.<\/p>\n\n

\n\n

Before ending this post, I'd like to<\/span> revisit this shot from above:<\/p>\n\n

<\/a><\/div>\n\n

In it, you can see an out-of-focus lantern hanging in the background\nright above the demon's head. In this post from 2006<\/a>, you\ncan see a new<\/span> bride standing under that very lantern. I love the<\/span> lanterns\nat the Heian Shrine since first photographing them<\/a> a\ncouple<\/span> of years ago. One of the<\/span> gifts that an interest in photography has\ngiven me is the ability to notice more of the simple beauty that surrounds\nus, a visual<\/span> form of “stop and smell the roses”, if you\nwill.<\/p>\n\n

Continued here...<\/a><\/i><\/p>\n\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

The Heian Shrine (a huge shrine in eastern Kyoto) had Setsubun events today (Wikipedia on \"Setsubun\"). The main event associated with Setsubun is mamemaki – \u8c46\u6492\u304d, literally \"bean scattering\" – which involves throwing dried beans at demons while yelling \"demons out! Good fortune in!\"<\/p>

As you might expect of any event that involves the throwing of beans, kids love it.<\/p>

Kids love it unless they think the demons are real...<\/p>

The demons eventually headed up toward the main building of the shrine, where unbeknownst to them, beans awaited.<\/p>

The parent in me was surprised at how few children attended the [...]","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[2,3,10],"tags":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/regex.info\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/712"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/regex.info\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/regex.info\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/regex.info\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/regex.info\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=712"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/regex.info\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/712\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/regex.info\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=712"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/regex.info\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=712"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/regex.info\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=712"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}