We Were All Thinking It

As at least 6 people around this wide brown land would know, I'm a pretty multicultural kinda guy. I'll hang out with Belgians, Americans, Sudanese, even Brazilians (especially Brazilians) any day of the week. I can use chopsticks, I've been known to sing Irish drinking songs and I've even been involved in a knife-fight with a girl from the Phillipines. Which is why I'm still struggling to find out why I'm so touchy about the Japanese.

Now don't get me wrong, I love the Japanese. They're a polite and technologically advanced people. Show me any activity on Earth and I could find a Japanese person who has dedicated their life to perfecting it. But to be honest, I think I'm developing a love/hate relationship with the place. I really want to visit, but I'm not quite sure what I'll find there.

Here are a few Japanese things that we should all be thankful for:

- Robots

- Samurai

- Ninjas

- Takeshi's Castle
- Street Fighter 4.

A wide and varied selection by any means. However for every yin, there is a yang, and this brings me to the crux of this blog post. Japan has some seriously strange shit that it's responsible for.

Here are a few Japanese things which frighten me:

- Cat weight lifting

- Dressing girls up as baby seals and baiting killer whales with them
- Sony Corporation, Ltd
- Robots
- Basically all of their pornography

Why is it that every fucking time somebody pushes the envelope, Japan just waltzes in and launches the envelope across the stadium like a human cannonball? Of all things, I'll draw your attention to tasteful photography. Most people could easily find a nice nude shot of an attractive girl artistic (email me, it's for ART) but then some visionary in Japan decided to summon all the rage of his samurai ancestors and bring us this:

WHAT THE FUCK WHAT THE FUCK WHAT THE FUCK

Is this considered art? Social commentary on the plight of tentacled monsters everywhere? I know the Japanese seem to love their tentacles (I'm not fucking going there) but this is just... wow. THEY ARE WEARING OCTOPUSES. Or is that octopi? I don't know. Fuck you, I'm dealing with emotional trauma right now.

The only way this photograph could get worse is if it was a candid shot, and not staged at all.
"Oh hey Natsuki, what's happening?"

"Oh, just wearing an oct... OH HEY I LOVE YOUR OCTOPUS HAT!"

"I love yours too! Which flavour did you get?"

"Oh, salt and pepper squid."

I'm going to stop with the virtual conversation there because... look, I don't need an excuse. LOOK AT THAT SHIT. I could keep on giving examples all day, but I'm sure you don't want that kind of burden on your mind, because the above image is nothing compared to some of their other ideas. I really don't want to bow and shake hands with the guy who thought gymnastics equipment was sexy enough to be involved in hardcore pornography. To all the girls reading this (remember: for art) - remember the last time you went to the uh, ladie's doctor, and he pulled out those salad tong looking things? Substitute that with a POMMEL HORSE

Images not to scale

Now it's not the first time this has happened apparently, but World War II taught us that some things should never be repeated. I'll be starting a support group for everyone who has been exposed to Random Horrific Japanese Stuff over the next week or so. I just hope you all don't get flashbacks the next time you meet a Japanese exchange student at the pub. Sorry Tomiko - you were great fun but that twitching wasn't because I had something in my eye AT ALL.