My friend Elizabeth came through with an explanation of Sanrinbou, which I wrote about on April 13th. Elizabeth’s lived here for 35 years—she knows everything!

“SAN RINBOU… written with the characters for “three” (SAN), “next door” (tonari, also pronounced RIN) and “dead” (shinu, also pronounced BOU). part of a larger, very complicated system of superstitions. especially bad news for building houses (thought that 3 houses to rt, left, front, back would all burn down to the ground if built on such a day.”

It sounds a little bit like my mother’s cursed lasagne—every time she makes lasagne, the neighborhood suffers a catastrophe, usually a house on fire. Posted by kuri at April 17, 2001 06:05 AM