Hello, welcome back. It’s been a while since my last video, but my channel has suddenly blown up.
Thanks to all the new viewers – it means so much to me.
I’ll talk more about this at the end, but for now, let’s get into the memes. I’m going to try going a
bit more in depth in this video. Please let me know how you feel about that in the comments.
This Tweet is showing off how strange the toilets are at the famous ramen chain Ichiran.
The walls are seen covered in toilet paper rolls. It’s not just one location either.
The replies are full of pictures from different Ichiran locations’ toilets as well.
On the wall beside them, the poster reads: “We have installed multiple toilet paper
rolls so that it will never run out. We also check and replenish all of
them every day at least once per hour. Therefore, we are confident that we
will never let the toilet paper run out. However, our company representative has
been so insistent, saying “What if we still run out, inconveniencing our customers?” – to that,
we have prepared our secret weapon. If, in the remote chance that the toilet
paper does run out, please rip this paper.” It has some extra toilet paper stored behind.
Ichiran also has locations outside of Japan. There’s one in New York. Here’s
some pictures from their toilet. They even have the same secret weapon ready.
If any of my viewers are from New York and have seen this, please let me know.
One more thing. This person in the Twitter replies claims that he saw a show where they
claimed that a lot of toilets in Okinawa are like this. It has no Likes, and I couldn’t
find any information to substantiate it, so if anyone lives in Okinawa please let me know.
カラオケ, or karaoke is Japanese, if you didn’t know. Unlike the west, Japanese karaoke is
generally done in private rooms. You choose an amount of time you’d
like to be there for (there are sometimes “Free Time” options where you can be there
as long as you want until a certain time) and generally can get free soft drinks and
ice cream. Also you can order food to your room. Anyways, when you have 10 minutes left the front
desk always calls you to let you know your time is almost up, and ask if you want to extend.
This gentleman decided to… well, just watch and see.
I found this one hilarious. I’m sure the employee was shocked by his speed.
Yamato Transport AKA Kuroneko (meaning black cat) is probably the most famous delivery
company in Japan. They’re called Kuroneko because of their logo, created in 1957,
featuring these two cute black cats. Interestingly, while researching for this video,
I found out that their logo was inspired by this American advertisement for a company
called “Allied Van Lines”. The Kuroneko logo was completely unchanged from 1957 to… 2021
actually. They just changed it, making it so the larger cat’s ear doesn’t extend beyond a border,
and simplifying the limbs of both cats. I think it was a good change, personally.
Their famous delivery service is called Takkyuubin,
which they write stylistically as TA-Q-BIN for some reason. Surprising to me was,
Takkyuubin is a trademark. I honestly thought it was just a word for home delivery,
but that’s actually 宅配便 (same meaning I guess). The reason I thought it was a normal vocabulary
word is because, actually, the movie you might know as Kiki’s Delivery Service
is actually called 魔女の宅急便 (which I am going to cheekily translate as “Witch’s TA-Q-BIN”).
The 1989 movie is based on a 1985 book of the same name,
and according to this article I found, the book author mixed up 宅急便 and 宅配便. The Studio Ghibli
staff assumed because the book was published with that title, there would be no problem
using the same name. After Yamato Transport told them about Ghibli staff, and especially Miyazaki,
famous for being stubborn (quote from the article not me OK), refused to change the
name of the movie. Eventually, Yamato Transport decided to sponsor the movie
as long as they were given permission to use it in advertising materials. Which they did.
Anyways, now that the little history lesson is over, here’s the meme again.
You know how some logos can have little easter eggs in their design?
Like how the FedEx Logo has an arrow in it, or how the Tobelrone logo has a hidden bear in it,
This Twitter user realized that the logo for Takkyuubin actually has a secret in
it too. This is the word 宅急便。 Look at the middle kanji. In this case it means “fast”.
Look at the bottom “radical” (that’s what us Japanese Learners call ‘parts of kanji’,
it is a translation of a Japanese word 部首). This radical is the character kokoro
/ “heart” . When it’s on the bottom like this it’s actually called Shitagokoro (literally
“bottom heart”) but please ignore the first meaning which mostly isn’t relevant here… haha.
Now look at it in their logo. Notice a difference?
The Takkyuubin logo’s shitagokoro radical has been altered to have a little leg coming out,
emphasizing, I guess, how fast they will deliver it to you.
This tweet is a quote from an imageboard, where this image was posted saying
“What happens when a Chi-gyuu gets into bodybuilding.”
If you don’t know what a Chi-gyuu is, it’s a great meme. I talked about it extensively
in another video called “The Japanese Slang Term You’ve Never Heard Of: Cheese Gyuudon”.
I highly recommend you check it out for more context. Anyways it basically means nerd.
Some of the replies are hilarious.
This guy added a body pillow into his arm, to which someone replied “Keep going!”,
“More, more!” – “Add a T-Shirt!” – and here’s the final masterpiece.
Here are some other replies…
And this one, parodying the original text of the Chi-gyuu meme, says
“He looks like he eats 3-flavour protein gyuudon.”
This one shows Sakurai Sho of the mens idol group Arashi looking hilariously
like he’s wearing shoulder pads, because of the chair behind him.
There are three major Convenience Store chains in Japan.
Seven Eleven, Family Mart, and Lawson.
Today, I have two Lawson-related memes to show you.
The first one is about this guy, the CEO. The tweet says “The CEO of
Lawson’s son’s rebellious phase is so cute”. I guess this is an excerpt from an article.
It highlights a story that the CEO himself told about how
his son made a big scene about how delicious their competitor Family Mart’s Chicken - Famichiki was,
and was showing off his T-Point card, which is also a Family Mart thing.
This reply is an ex-Lawson manager confirming that Family Mart’s chicken is better.
Here’s the second one. It’s a super old meme that I think a lot of Japanese
people have already seen, but I love it. It says “There was a Lawson working at Lawson!”
with a picture of this happy looking fellow. Yup, his name is Lawson.
And here’s a bonus Family Mart meme since we’re talking about convenience
stores.
Originally, I had an Abe-related meme in this video. But recent context has obviously changed,
so I’ll show you this tweet from yesterday that got 500,000 likes.
The high school girl asks him to do a heart with him. He does it, asks “is this okay?”,
they freak out, and he asks “is this a trend?” Everyone thinks it’s super cute.
This was in Kobe, the day before his death. Rest in peace Abe.
I have an idea to tell a funny or interesting story from my time in Japan at the end of every
video. I’m going to start now! Today’s story will be an exception because it’s not from Japan,
but it did just happen to me and it fits the video, it’s kinda a “meme”.
Cocoichibanya, generally called Cocoichi, is a Japanese nationwide curry chain. It’s delicious,
I love it, I ate it all the time when I lived there. I love spicy food, and at Cocoichi,
you can select your spiciness on a scale of 0-10. It kinda can go “negative” as well.
It’s not a linear scale. A 5 is 12x the spiciness of a 1, and a 10, 24x, for example.
Like I said, I love spicy food, and Cocoichi can be really really spicy.
Apparently you’re not allowed to eat above a 5 without eating a 5 before…
but I was never asked. A 6 is what I’d eat for a pleasurable dining experience,
but it’s probably inedible to the average layman. After tons of quote-unquote “training”, I’ve
managed to finished a 9 before, and made it about 3/4 of the way through a 10 before giving up.
Anyways, I haven’t been in Japan since before the pandemic, and I’m travelling around Europe
currently. That’s why the videos have been sparse recently, if you were wondering.
In London, they have a Cocoichi, so I decided to go. There’s always a line outside,
so I waited, and took a look at the menu. There’s a stereotype that British people
can’t eat spicy food. So when I saw the menu only went from 1-5, I was confused.
When my Japanese server came over, I asked him in Japanese how they convert
from British scale to Japan scale. Is British 5 equal to Japanese 10? He told me they don’t – a
British 5 is a Japan 5. They can make higher than 5 if you want… They just don’t put it on the menu.
So I got a 9 and it tasted like a Japanese 3. Also, to add more fuel to the British vs
American rivalry, I looked up the menu for the Cocoichi in Los Angeles. It goes up to 10.
Alright, so let’s talk about my
channel. Thanks to all my OG viewers who waited 4 months for this video.
To all my new viewers, thank you as well. In around a week, I’ve gone
from 400 to more than 5000 subscribers, I can’t believe it. I’m so grateful.