Ninja Train, originally uploaded by [douglas japonicus].

In case anyone still had any doubts about whether pirates or ninjas were better, the little town of Iga Ueno in Mie prefecture puts forward its argument - the Ninja Festa 2008. JapaniCan describes it thus -

Wearing loaned ninja clothes, you can have an experience of learning ninja skills at ninja schools.

And you even get free travel on the Iga Tetsudo (see picture) if you’re dressed up like a ninja. Sweet.

Beat that pirates.

The Ninja Festa 2008 started on April 1st and runs until May 6th. Break out dem shurikens.

You can also see a rather mad video by going to the Iga City website here.

(WARNING: contains mind melting images of dogs dressed as ninja.)

Anyone else see this and think of Evangelion?

Do you have a longing in your life? A longing for a companion that will sit by you while you read manga and watch anime? She says nothing, does nothing and will submit to your manly will?

Well, it seems that Orient Trading has the product for you. You’ve heard about RealDolls, but here you can get models that look well under the legal age - if that’s what you want.

And now, we have an opportunity to go through a Candy Girl showroom and factory - that’s because we love you, loyal readers. Yes we do - just not in the candy girl way. Thank God.

Segata Sanshiro (せがた三四郎 )is a freaking legend, and I don’t know how I’ve managed to live in this country for 4 years without hearing about him and his devotion to gaming. Being a gamer myself, I bow down to his dedication and enforcement of good gaming practices. Wait - Enforcement? Yes, you read correctly.

Segata was created by Sega to advertise its Sega Saturn gaming console. Although the console ultimately flopped, the legend of Segata Sanshiro lives on. He is a judo master and his name is a play on “Sega Saturn, shiro!” - or “Play Sega Saturn!”.

His videos can be found on YouTube, but this user has most of them. Also, click here for an English explanation of the history, origins and a lot more Segata commercials.

if it was like this -

via Gusto In Japan which will take you to Nya Nya(?), a Japanese blog with two more sumo videos in a similar vein.

So you’ve come up with a camera, named it Kiss for reasons best known to yourself and/or your marketing department, and you need a cool commercial to show the world how rocking it is.

The logical step would be to get four kids to get made up just like Kiss, have them sing a song to the tune of “I Was Made For Loving You” while touring stereotypical and invented Japanese scenes. And you have to conclude with the kids learning to breathe atomic death rays like Godzilla.

Wow.

It’s not often TV entertains me this much -