Today, in Japan, there's a tradtional festival called Setsubun, pronounced as "setsu-boon", which means "spring division". The date of this festival is according to Chinese Calendar, which is around 1 month different from the Calendar we use today.

The sign of Setsubun is soybean and devil. It is from an old story.  Long time ago, a devil came to very beautiful woman's home to ask her to marry him, when the woman's husband was out. The woman pretended to accept his proposal. After the woman arrived the devil's home and got all his treasure, she threw soybeans to the devil to kill him.

Becasue of this, there's a ceremony on Setsubun: folks use masu (a wooden measuring cup) with roasted soybeans and throw the beans all about the room, shouting "Oni wa soto! Fuku wa uchi!" meaning "out with the goblins and in with fortune!" After the mame-maki is over, everyone eats the same number of beans as their own age, as a symbol of luck.

-Cong