A Bizarre Superstition and Snow Shoes! (Patreon)

I'm a genius. 

My plan for our two-night getaway started with looking at places in Izu and around the Fuji Five Lakes. Nature and a little spring warmth was my plan. I got totally overwhelmed and ended up closing my eyes and poking a map. Karuizawa! That's where we'll go! 

Spent weeks planning the mountain hikes we'll do to the centuries old temples and shrines.Somewhere along the line, I forgot it SNOWS in the mountains of Japan. Better yet, Karuizawa is known to be a ski resort. I *just* remembered that a week ago. Genius. Add, they just had a heavy snowfall a day or two ago. I guess, most concerning is my tiny, lightweight, non-snow-tired car. Second, I own two pairs of sneakers and that's about it. But, hey, I do have a coat!Tragedy (potentially) averted. Richard found a place that rents snow tires, so I'll be having those put on and I managed to find some cheap (albeit hefty and waterproof) shoes capable of trudging through the snow.

Those hikes might possibly still be on! Not sure. We'll play it by ear. 

All that to say, you know how Japanese homes have a genkan? The below photo is from a cute (old?) blog by a Japanese artist living in Australia. 

You have to take your shoes off in the genkan before stepping up into the house proper? So you never have street shoes INSIDE the house...

Unless! You just bought a new pair of shoes and it's after noon (or especially at night). Then you should never, ever, ever place them on the floor of the genkan. Keep them inside where the slippers are, lest you invite a heap of bad luck. 

Or as long as they don't touch the floor, you're safe. Something like this will do.

I was told this quite a few times by my mother-in-law, but I never knew the reasoning behind it.I just now learned there are a couple of theories: 

1) You should always offer new things to the the altar before using them. I've seen this done with my grandmother-in-law. Anything she'd buy or get as a gift, would be placed on the family altar for a few hours before using, eating, drinking or whatever. You let the spirits/ancestors have whatever spiritual essence they want before you enjoy the thing.So at night, the altar (gods?) is (are) basically sleeping, so you can't offer the new shoes, meaning you can't use them either. You must wait until morning then. 

2) During the Edo Period it was pitch dark after sunset so you wouldn't go wandering around at night. Unless someone died and you needed to attend their wake. Wakes (otsuya) happen at night and you wear nice or new clothes and shoes. 

Your nice (new) shoes are put away usually. The rare occasion you take them out and put them down on the genkan floor at night would be because someone died. So death is associated with placing your new shoes on the floor at night = Bad luck. 

and 

3) Another Edo Jidai death practice that involves shoes is that the deceased was given a new pair of straw sandals to help them travel in the afterlife. Again, new shoes, the wake, and night are connected with death, so keep those shoes off the floor! 

But what if you HAVE to go wear a new pair of shoes at night? Well, you can break the bad luck spell by making the new shoes NOT new shoes.People of old used to rub some ash from the kamado stove on them or paint a little ink on the soles or put some soot from the bottom of a nabe pot on them. Not new anymore! 

If you think this is an old tradition that isn't around anymore, there are some modern adaptations of the above. 

These days, to make your shoes not new and to avoid misfortune you can write and X on the sole of the shoe with a pen or you can hold a lighter under the sole and make a little soot there. Soot was believe to dispel evil and bad spirits. 

It really is a thing!

Another possibility is to put them on the floor before noon on a sunny, good luck (taian) day. 

I found it interested that it's believed new things have the power to absorb a lot of energy from their surrounding environment. Shoes absorb the energy of the earth, so lets try and fill those new shoes with fresh sunny day energy, not dark, dangerous nighttime energy.I'm on the road! I'll report all interesting things.XO, 

t

Addendum!! Okay, you know how I'm obsessed with my crow couple? WELL! I just learned that a 30-minute drive up in the mountains from where we're staying is a CROW SHRINE!! A yatagarasu shrine (three-legged crow) to be more specific. Now I'm thrilled to be going there and will forge up those snowed covered steps so I can pay my respects and procure me a crow omamori/amulet. More details soon for those interested in the shrine and maybe making a visit.