Sushi is a popular Japanese diet food and you are perhaps its fan yourself. Most Sushi are fish-based and now available outside Japan and there even are in the market a variety of Westernized versions with fruits and all for toppings.

One of the Sushi versions is what is called Norimaki, nori for roasted seaweed sheet and maki for rolling, with a variety of stuff rolled up with a sheet of roasted laver. Norimaki comes in handy for family picnics and outdoor occasions and functions an essential family diet outside the realm of Sushi proper.

Now, one of its variations is Ehomaki, eho for lucky direction and maki, of course, for rolling. Some clever merchant came up one year with the idea of marketing Ehomaki to highlight a key traditional event known as Setsubun, or the day before the calendrical beginning of spring. It was one of those local dishes limited to certain regions but his idea served to make Ehomaki a sort of national event.

You know the Japanese are strangely superstitious and half-mindedly believe certain directions are luckier than the others and such lucky directions are believed to alter year to year. Ehomaki is supposed to be profitable merchandise at Setsubun, thought the clever merchant.

So, most supermarkets will grab the opportunity to prepare thousands or perhaps millions of Ehomaki at this time of year. A gang of Guinness-record hunters somewhere down south put up an event successfully rolling up a 30-meter-long Ehomaki to highlight the occasion.

Here’s the crucial part of the story. Those grocery stores rolled too many Ehomaki rolls and at the end of the day ended up throwing away in waste just as many rolls of Ehomaki they sold – for two years in a row, it is reported. What a shame!

People talk about disasters to watch out for and short of food elsewhere in the world to tend to. Japan is supposed to be a land of sanity; we ought to be aware of what never to do. Thrifty is one of our meritorious traits. Ehomaki is hardly a vehicle for wasting resources. Mark you, marketers, let not Ehomaki be a trick to waste the luck it promises.

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