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Kawaii Domo-kun
11/APR/2010 on air

Tokyo Kawaii TV has learned that Madonna loves Japanese kawaii from its exclusive interview with her!
Taylor Swift likes deco. Che’Nelle loves Domo-kun.

Speaking of Domo-kun, it’s been 11 years since he was born. Domo-kun has been so popular in the U.S. At a toy store in New York, for example, Domo-kun is the most popular character. Surprisingly, Domo-kun is used as an icon of a major convenience store chain in the U.S! Nintendo DS’s game (for the U.S only) also has Domo-kun inside the game! Actually it’ not only the U.S but around at 150 countries, Domo-kun appears on TV!!

Who created Domo-kun? It’s Goda-san, an animation creator. He however is worried if Domo-kun is well-received by the teenagers in Japan. He wants to know how to promote Domo-kun to the people in their teens. How Domo-kun is received by the people in Shibuya? While some people find it cute, others say it looks like a mole, dowdy, no way to be cuter, and etc. Then how can they make Domo-kun cute enough to make young girls in Shibuya say “Kawaii!!”.

It was in February 2010 that Taylor Swift visited Japan for the first time. She loves deco. Her guitar’s got fully decorated with swarovski stones. 3 Japanese deco artists had a chance to promote their works to her. Watanabe-san, who has Ayumi Hamasaki or Ai Fukuhara (table tennis player) as his customer, made deco hina doll for Taylor. Suzuki-san, a flower deco specialist made flower deco slippers, and Saeki-san made a guitar strap for Taylor.

Che’Nelle visits Harajuku several times incognito. She comes here to shop sneakers of its sales only limited to Japan. She also enjoyed shopping at Atmos Girls.

Which Domo-kun is most kawaii?
Shibuya-kei Domo-kun seems popular in the city.

*The last part is a preview of the next episode.

Kirin’s opinion:
I’ve heard Domo-kun is well-known in the U.S but I didn’t know he was this popular~~! Why only Domo-kun can be so well-received by American people while there are many other cute characters in Japan? They just don’t know the rest of them? Just Hello Kitty and Domo-kun? Or maybe its our fault that we, the Japanese may have failed to market our cute characters in the world. Only Domo-kun and Hello Kitty have so far succeeded in expanding in the world?? (How about Rilakkuma~~?)
BTW, I found cute Domo-kun deco stickers!

Domokun deco stickers (a set of 3) designed by Tokyo Kawaii TV¥3,550more details

Do you know Domo-kun? Why do you think he was so well-received by American people? What do you think of Domo-kun?

Disclaimer: Tokyo Kawaii TV is a TV program owned and broadcasted by NHK Japan, and has nothing to do with this blog.

***There are archives of episodes listed under the page titled “Tokyo Kawaii TV” that is just located under the title banner of this blog.
***If you want to know the music that was used in the episode, please refer to this page and help yourself to find it by selecting the date when the episode was on air in Japan.

I’ll share my everyday walking with Pi-chan in this post. It’s my favorite season. I wish autumn were longer and summer were shorter…I took those pictures on some different days. Leaves turned red and gone in 10 days. (It’s been a while since I took those pictures, so now it’s more autumn.) Autumn is leaving so soon, and end of the year is just around the corner. I started to schedule my trip to Osaka in Feb. as usual, but this time it’s combined with a trip to Kyushu. I’m dying for a vacation, I’ve kept working on and on this year…^ ^;

I live somewhere between Shibuya and Yokohama, but my house is located within 15 minutes of bicycle ride from the main train station. When I was a company employee, I was unhappy with this distance. Especially when it rained I had to take a bus but sometimes I had to wait for a bus for over 20 minutes or more especially at late at night. But since I started to live with my dog “Pi-chan“, I got to like the location. (I decided to keep a dog because I started to work from home, quiting my previous job as a house renovation planner.)

Since then, it meant more to me that my house is closer to green space than a train station.

Now that I work from home, I don’t have to go to the train station everyday, but I have to come here to walk Pi-chan everyday. It was a bother at first, especially I didn’t like washing and drying her paws every time after the walk, but it has become a routine and I think I can keep my balance with this. I guess I feel as frustrated as she is when we cannot go out for a walk, due to bad weather or something.

Pi-chan looks less feminine when she becomes fluffy. I think she looks like a boy. lol

It’s so nice to be able to hear birds singing while we are walking.

The green area are spacious, free from cars, and various options of walking courses.

I always feel like bringing my bento and have it here or some other places in the park but somehow I always forget that while I am at home. ^ ^;

I noticed the character drawn on the sign was kind of cute!

Moreover, each sign has different message, and this one has another character! As you can see, here is not Tokyo, to be exact. It’s a river across Tokyo, and is a city named Kawasaki. It’s about 15 minutes (or less) to Shibuya and 15 minutes to Yokohama by train.

It was a post from my daily life. I received requests from my readers they want to see my neighborhood. So this was the green space near my house. My house is in a walking distance from there and the Tamagawa river that lies between Tokyo. ^ ^

I’ll write about supermarket or the neighborhood around my area later.

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Can you believe it’s almost a month before Christmas?!

Tokyo Kawaii, etc. would love to share kawaii, cool, beautiful, nice, heart-warming, funny or any Christmas decorations or illuminations you find in your area from now till 25th Dec. 2010!

Send your pictures to kirin at tokyokawaiietc dot com with your comments to your photos, your name or nick name, URL or twitter or your facebook account or anything you want to link to, if you prefer. Your pictures and descriptions (your comments) will be published in this blog that can be shared with our readers around the world!

*Please do not make your photo size too big. 480×360 preferred. We don’t upload big pictures because not all the readers have big screen.

1) Take pictures of nice Christmas illuminations or decorations in your area as small as 480×360 pixels, or resize them later by Photoshop or something.
(It’s OK if you cannot resize them, but please avoid making them too large.)

2) Send them by email attach and write to kirin to her email address with your comments or explanations of your pictures. (You cannot attach pictures on the contact form. Thus please email directly to Kirin!)

3) You can also include the URL of your twitter or facebook account or your blog so we can publish with your pictures, if you prefer. (It’s a chance to let the other readers of Tokyo Kawaii, etc. know you!)

4) Your pictures and comments will be published under Tokyo Kawaii, etc. just like Kirin’s one below.

It’s not a contest but just to have fun sharing something nice (kawaii) among the people who gather Tokyo Kawaii, etc. from around the globe!!
Your post will appear like Kirin’s one. (without the copy right)

It’s Kirin‘s post from Tokyo.
Location: Omotesando Hills, Tokyo
Follow Kirin on twitter or facebook if you like this post!

It’s “Omotesando Hills Christmas 2010 with swarovski elements” from 8m hight of the Christmas tree decorated with swarovski.

It’s full of swarovski stones, great light works and a mirror ball with some visional music or sound and that somehow creates glittering, blinging and shining stereoscopic images in the space. I thought I’d never be bored of watching them.

I went down to the lowest floor and then looked up the tree and thought wow…

So it’s the tree. I could have observed it better, but somehow I thought of other people who may want to take pictures of the tree or the whole thing. I can be an obstacle. ^ ^; (This is very Japanese way of thinking!)

Look at the swarovski stones around the tree!!

At the entrance, there is a rather small simple tree.

I’ll post more and more whenever I find something nice. So please do let us have yours, too!! It’s easy, just send the nice pictures of Christmas illuminations or decorations in your area and please explain with your comments. If we can enjoy this project, we will continue this kind of project so that the readers of Tokyo Kawaii, etc. can interact one another more! Thank you for your participation in advance. We are all looking forward to your entries.