Japan has a pet food distribution center that’s shaped like a giant wiener dog!【Photos】

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And if you think it looks cute like this, wait until you see it from a different angle.

In much of the West, describing a professional undertaking as “cute” can imply a sort of disdain for the project’s unrefined or childish characteristics. That’s not really the case in Japan, though.

Here, companies long ago decided to go all-in on the concept of using cuteness to enhance their marketing campaigns. As you might expect from its playful name, Osaka-based pet food maker DoggyMan can really get behind this philosophy, but rather than just design a loveable mascot character to serve as spokesperson for its good and services, DoggyMan decided to go for cuteness on an even bigger scale.

Just how big? Five stories tall.

Japanese Twitter user @jamchain recently shared some snapshots of DoggyMan’s Kansai Logistics Center, which is located in Osaka’s Izumisano City. With roughly 8,195 square meters (88,210 square feet) of floor space sitting on a lot with ample parking, the facility looks plenty big enough to handle the task of keeping clients’ shelves stocked with dog food. But more importantly, it’s shaped like a giant wiener dog.

Honestly though, it only looks like a Dachshund from certain angles. From others…

…it looks like three Dachshunds, with a parent accompanied by its two pups!

The building was designed by Toky0-based architectural firm, which also created Osaka’s Park Tower and the Nikkei building in Tokyo. The architect’s attention to detail is adorably truly impressive, as the DoggyMan logistics center even has a gently curved extension that protrudes from the wall where the Dachshunds’ tails should be.

Although construction on the building finished in 2011, @jamchain, an Osaka resident, had never noticed the clever design until a few days ago, despite driving right past it multiple times. It’s further proof that whenever you’re out and about in Japan, you shoul always keep your eyes peeled for a massive dose of cuteness that’s staring you right in the face.

Building information
DoggyMan Kansai Logistics Center / ドギーマン関西ロジスティクスセンター
Address: Osaka-fu, Izumisano-shi, Sumiyoshi-cho 31-11
大阪府泉佐野市住吉町31-11

Related: Nikken
Source: Kinisoku
Top image: Google



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我安蕾尔今天就要用小拳拳捶你胸口！

我安蕾尔今天就要用小拳拳捶你胸口！


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The Sanrio Boys, the guys who love Hello Kitty and Co., are getting their own anime series

Sanrio’s marketing comes full circle, then keeps on going.

This probably won’t come as a shock to anyone, but Sanrio is really, really good at marketing. Hello Kitty’s parent company more or less conjured out of thin air the perpetually profitable “character goods” section of Japan’s economy, where fans happily plunk down cash to buy merchandise featuring characters who were created with the sole purpose of selling merchandise.

Sanrio’s talents are such that the company can even score a hit with a character merchandise line starring characters who promote other character merchandise line, which is exactly what it’s done with the Sanrio Boys, or Sanrio Danshi, as they’re called in Japanese.

First introduced in late 2015, the Sanrio Boys aren’t an attempt to macho up Sanrio’s products. On the contrary, they’re a group of five high schoolers with physiques and fashion sense that would have them right at home in an anime targeting female fans of Japanese animation. Each member of the group has a particular Sanrio character he’s got a soft spot for.

▼ The Sanrio Boys’ official Twitter account is full of “selfies” by the boys posing with cool merch, which is either shameless advertising or a faithfully realistic recreation of many real-life social media accounts.

The Sanrio Boys’ steadily growing popularity led to a mobile game dating simulator last autumn, and now Sanrio has announced that there’s a full-fledged Sanrio Boys anime TV series on the way.

The company is withholding details until after the upcoming Sanrio Expo fan event. The producers have, at least, released the title, which is to be Sanrio Boys: Never Without My Favorite Friend.

▼ Whether said “favorite friend” is referring to the boys or their personal Sanrio spirit animals is unclear.

While no official premiere date has been given, a start date sometime in 2017 seems the most logical, since while the Sanrio Boys have amassed a sizeable following, they’re not quite a big enough pop cultural phenomenon to string fans along for a whole year after promising them an anime. Going into further speculation, storylines are likely to involve the boys’ hanging out in fashionable surroundings while gushing over various Sanrio products.

Oh, and also touching each other a lot, but that’s become sort of a given in anime with Sanrio Danshi’s target demographic.

Source: Hachima Kiko
Featured image: Twitter/@Sdan_sanrio



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Undead train station in Yokohama is beautifully nostalgic, poignantly desolate

Mr. Sato visits a virtually abandoned station that continues to operate in Yokohama.

Hardcore fans of our Japanese writer  Mr. Sato will have learned by now that he is actually a country boy from the rural prefecture of Shimane. Far from the trappings of urban life, it is not uncommon for him to come across an “unmanned” station in the community surrounding his hometown.

These are stops along a train line that have so few passengers getting on an off that they don’t justify the cost of human staff. So instead the railway sets up automated ticket machines and hopes everyone plays fair. In this way, many country folk view train stations as utilitarian only, except for the odd sentimental time that they stay open to help a single person get to school.

▼ Deep in the heartland of Japan, stations sometimes offer little more that a roof during bad weather, if that.

It wasn’t until moving to Tokyo that Mr. Sato realized that in major cities a station can also be the cultural center for a community. Whether decorated by the glitz and glamour of fashion outlets or drenched in the aroma from lines of food stalls, it’s easy to see an area’s character by the activity around its station.

So it was with surprise that Mr. Sato heard about an unmanned station in the Greater Tokyo Area. Located in Yokohama’s Tsurumi Ward, it’s called Kokudo Station and services the Tsurumi Line which runs along an industrial stretch of Tokyo Bay just south of Haneda Airport.

Yokohama is well-known as a bustling city, so when Mr. Sato approached the station, the quiet atmosphere surrounding it made him feel as if he were somewhere else.

A gaping entrance such as Kokudo’s which ran under the elevated tracks is usually full of storefront lights and echoing with the chatter and clanging of businesses. However, the entrance to Kokudo Station was ominously dark and quiet like an abyss.

Kokudo Station was first built in 1930 and after surviving a violent a tumultuous part of Japanese history, it was converted to an unmanned station in 1971. Inside were some relics of that era trapped in time. Shop signs with outdated printing hung here and there but none of the businesses they advertised were still running.

The only people working in this cavernous corridor were the cleaning staff, preserving these modern ruins. There was no talking to be heard, just the footsteps of these custodians amid the electric buzz of vending machines, automated ticket booths, and fluorescent lighting.

Mr. Sato stood and wondered to what end these people were occupying themselves day after day, maintaining this unused space. All along the walls sheets of wood boarded up doors that haven’t opened or closed in a long time… Maybe they never have?

One might assume that this location was the site of some heinous tragedy to keep people from occupying its space all these years, but Kokudo Station has no such stigma. It’s as if the station had a life force of its own, and it was dedicated solely to keeping people away.

Mr. Sato occasionally ran across other visitors to Kokudo Station. These weren’t customers though. They were like him, armed with cameras to document this peculiar black hole of Yokohama. They could also have been movie buffs though, as this location was used by Akira Kurosawa in his 1949 film Stray Dog.

Making his way to the elevated platform, the bright sun of the afternoon stung Mr. Sato’s eyes and the sounds of life in the city gradually crept back into his ears.  Although there was no specific reason Kokudo Station was the way it was, Mr. Sato could assume why.

These days stations are constantly getting upgraded with better earthquake protections or improved access for physically challenged people such as elevators. The railway companies have no incentive to invest in stations like Kokubo where nothing happens, and as a result no one wants to set up shop there either. For decades this vicious circle of mutual indifference has continued.

As he waited for his train, Mr. Sato wondered if people will ever clear the bleakness out of Kokudo Station. Anything is possible, but he learned that stations don’t make their communities around them, the people do. If no one steps up to revitalize Kokudo Station, either in the public or private, nothing will ever change.

There is always a risk involved in taking action, but if we don’t take it we face the stagnation and gradual decay of our surroundings.

Original article by Mr. Sato
Photos ©RocketNews24



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发现婴儿门已经关不住他家2岁的娃了， 于是。。。

这户人家发现婴儿门已经关不住他家2岁的娃了， 于是干脆再上面又加高了一层….. 然并卵~


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2020 Tokyo Olympics introduces its official ambassadors in new video, anime fans rejoice

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Some of the most famous faces of anime are ready to welcome you to the 2020 Games!

There are still three years until the much-anticipated 2020 Olympic Games takes place in Tokyo, but already it’s all everyone can think about. Hotels, convenience stores, and businesses of all kinds are trying their best to make their services more foreigner-friendly in time for the Games, from providing menus and food descriptions in English to making little changes to maps in the hopes they will be little easier for foreigners to understand.

Some of the 2020 Olympic’s official ambassadors have been selected now too, and fans of Japanese pop culture are very excited about the reveal. The Olympic Channel of Facebook recently introduced the characters in a video that has already been viewed over two million times!

The ambassadors are Astro Boy, Sailor Moon, Luffy from One Piece, Naruto, Goku from Dragon Ball, Crayon Shin-chan, two of the magical girls from Pretty Cure, and Jibanyan from Yokai Watch. Since many people with an interest in Japan and Japanese pop culture were first drawn in by some of these iconic characters and their respective anime, there has been a lot of excitement surrounding the announcement, with foreign fans leaving comments such as:

“My female dog is called Serena (Usagi’s name in Brazil!), and my male cat is called Naruto… I’m very happy they are in Olimpics [sic] Game!”
“Looks like I’m definitely going to the 2020 olympics now”
“Astro Boy! The whole reason I got into anime & Japanese culture…”
“GOKU AND SAILOR MOON! Only in Japan haha I love it!!”

Still, it looks like some would like to see other well-known characters added to the lineup.

“Where’s Pikachu?”
“I’m kinda surprised Shin-chan made it up here. His humor…isn’t for kids lol”
“I was hoping they could use some of the anime sports stars too… Haikyuu characters and some Slam Dunk or Kuroko.”

It’s true, there are many more prominent icons that could have made the cut, and with it being the Olympics it would make sense for a few characters from sports-related anime to be selected too, but as the video says at its closing, there may be more to come! You can also find those official goods on the Tokyo 2020 online shop.

Let us know who you would like to see as a Tokyo Olympics ambassador!

Source: Facebook/Olympic Channel via Curazy 
Top image: Facebook/Olympic Channel



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The best part-time job in Japan? Get paid $440 per day to take naps!

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Celebrate the upcoming release of anime film Hirune Hime (“Napping Princess“) by winning the job of a nap.

Japan, like the rest of the world, has its share of both awesome and terrible part-time jobs. But no matter how cool anime McDonald’s makes it seem like it would be to work there, the reality of most part-time jobs is that they’re just a way to make cash.

Recently one part-time job has been quickly gaining praise online as the best-part time job in Japan: being paid to take naps.

▼ Stuffed animal and schoolgirl outfit not included.

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The part-time job is part of a contest that is being held for the opening of the upcoming anime movie Hirune Hime (“Napping Princess”) directed by Kenji Kamiyama. The movie follows the story of Kokone Morikawa, a high school girl whose special talent is “taking naps.” But when she starts having the same dream over and over again, she has to go on a journey to find out what it means.

▼ The trailer for the film, which opens on March 18 in Japan

The job being made available for the movie’s premier is a simple one: to take naps, just like the protagonist. It pays 50,000 yen (US$440) per day, covers transportation costs from anywhere in Japan to designated theaters playing the film, and provides a pillow, eye mask, earplugs and snacks. You even get a pillow signed by all the members of the movie’s cast.

Of course, there is one other responsibility that the job entails: dressing up as the robot “Hearts” from the film.

▼ They need you to don the suit at the premier and welcome guests,
stand on stage with the cast, and pose for photographs.

nap-job-03

There is no experience required for the position, and anyone of any age or gender is welcome to apply. The contest encourages those to apply who “want to dream,” “are good at napping,” “want to go on a journey to discover themselves,” or “haven’t been getting enough sleep.”

If that sounds like the perfect position for you, then head over to the contest’s official website and put in your ballot. To apply you just need to scroll down to the bottom of the page, follow the group on Twitter, retweet their tweet about the contest, and then click the big orange “apply” button. That’s it! The contest is open until February 13, so be sure to get in while you can.

We just have one question though: will a bed be provided for the naps, or will we have to sleep on the floor Japanese-style?

Source: Tumblr/hirunehime03 via Hachima Kiko
Images: Tumblr/hirunehime03



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