There are two great reasons worth celebrating today. Most importantly, it's my 23rd birthday! I celebrated today by teaching my normal classes and then... teaching an Eikaiwa (adult conversation) class in the evening. Yay! Luckily I'm headed to Sapporo tomorrow to check out the world-famous Yuki Matsuri for the weekend. Me and Justin are planning to head to a maid cafe to check it out (for my birthday.. of course..) and there are a bunch of other things going down in Sapporo this weekend.

The other great reason to celebrate is because today is also the Setsubun holiday here in Japan. The custom is to throw beans at someone dressed up as an Oni (demon or ogre) and say "Oni wa soto! Fuku wa uchi!" (Demons get out! Fortune come in!) in order to purify a home by driving away evil spirits. It's more of a kids holiday, but today at my Junior High School my JTE bought bags of peanuts (they use peanuts here in Hokkaido instead of beans), put on an Oni mask and let the kids pelt him with peanuts to celebrate Setsubun. Hilarious! They also have to eat an "Eho-maki" (which is basically a huge sushi roll) all at once, without speaking, while pointing North-Northwest (and the direction changes every year). I love Japanese holidays :D