Hey guys!
Today we have an interesting subject to talk about.
This is actually one of the biggest things I had a culture shock about
when I first came to Japan.
Was it that surprising?
Yes, because I'd never heard of it before I got here!
I don't know how I didn't know.
I watched so many YouTube videos about Japan before I came here.
But apparently, something that's a really big thing here about attractiveness
is the size of your face.
Kogao (small face)
Or like the size of your head.
Yeah, they say face, but they're actually talking about the size of your head.
Japanese people will say, "Oh, you have such a small face!"
which is a compliment.
It's really good here to have a small face, or a small head,
and it's not so good to have a- -Huge head. -...larger head.
And that's a real thing. This a real, nationwide,
everyone-in-Japan-knows-about-it thing here.
This isn't one of those trendy "HURR JAPAN'S BEING SO WEIRD RIGHT NOW"
"But actually only a dozen people are doing it!" things.
Like whenever you go out shopping, you get comments like "KAO CHISSA!"
which means like "UAGHH HER FACE IS SO SMALL!"
You guys might be really confused. I'll try my best to explain it.
In general, and I don't know how far this extends,
like I don't know if it's all East Asians,
but Japanese people tend to have larger sized heads
in proportion to the size of their body, compared to Westerners.
When I went to America, everyone seemed to have smaller faces.
How do they measure it, though?
Well, I did look up some research on this.
Oh, you did?
Of course I would look up research.
But when you get on Google Scholar or Google and you start trying to look up
scientific articles on the size of heads compared to races,
you get a lot of people trying to prove that certain races have naturally higher IQs
than other races because they have larger brains and cranial capacities.
Oh, because they have larger brains?
And I did not get a good feeling from those articles so I don't know if I trust them.
I just kind of pushed them aside.
But almost all of them did end up saying that East Asians had the largest head size.
Oh, really?
Yeah, they looked at cranial capacity, so I think that's like the
overall volume inside where you could have brain space.
And I have to warn our Japanese viewers watching this!
Do NOT go to America and say, "Ugh I have such a big head."
Because that has a completely different meaning!
We have nothing like this in America.
If you're talking about the size of your "head", you're referring to something else.
So don't talk about the size of your head in America.
So I think the average was 57 centimeters.
57 centimeters? Head size? Do you want me to measure your head?
We're gonna measure our heads.
From here to here.
You're 58cm.
Oh really? So it's a little above average.
Yeah, you're 58.5 cm.
Okay. It's not like I'm 60cm.
I'm sorry.
So that's average Japanese?
Male.
Oh, average male Japanese head size. Yep, I looked it up. Yep.
I'm sorry, Jun!
No, I'm not embarrassed at all. I don't care anymore.
Did you care? Did you ever care?
No, not really.
Until I met you.
Really?
You have a freaking small head!
Okay, for female it's 54.5 cm.
53 maybe? [It was actually 52 cm]
Yeah, it's tiny.
So your head is... 5.5 cm bigger than you.
You're just slightly above average, and I'm a little below average.
Yep.
But I'm also a lot taller than Japanese women.
That makes it even worse.
Can we compare our head sizes?
Okay. Look into the camera. Okay. Let's compare.
You need to know how small your head is. It's freaking tiny.
I know it's small...
It's tiny!
If I had a larger face, would you still have been attracted to me?
Yeah, I think so.
Really?
Yep.
What if my face was like this?
Are you indirectly offending me?
That's my face size.
Okay, I won't do that, then.
Okay well I don't care about your face size.
Okay. I'm glad.
I like you the way you are.
Thank you.
Some Japanese people who have the smaller, Western-sized heads,
They're considered to have very attractive head sizes.
Like an idol, celebrity, and model.
Yeah, people like that often tend to be like models or actors or actresses
because they have such an attractive head size.
The first time I came to Japan, that's when I learned about this head size/face size thing.
And at first I had no idea what they were talking about.
I couldn't tell that there was any difference.
But now that I've gotten used to it and I've seen it so much, I'm able to see the difference.
But I still don't care!
Because I wasn't raised in a society-
I'm jealous.
-where people talked about the size of your head.
I don't care.
I don't care, and I feel really uncomfortable when I take pictures with my Japanese friends here.
Because they'll look at the pictures afterward and they'll be like,
"Oh, I'm so embarrassed! My head's so big!"
And I'm like, "Don't be embarrassed! It's a nice picture! I'm happy to take a picture with you!"
And they'll be like, "Oh your face is so small. I'm so embarrassed."
And I feel bad because they feel bad about it.
But I don't care at all.
I want to explain this to our Japanese viewers
because I don't think we have anything in America that you guys just never cared about.
So I've been thinking about how I could make Japanese people understand,
and I had to come up with a fake example.
So this is not a real thing in America.
All right, let's hear you out.
But how I would compare the head size/face size thing in Japan would be
is: if you went to America and found out there's this thing where
people with pointy elbows were really embarrassed about their elbows,
but people with SQUARE elbows... Those are attractive elbows.
And whenever you took a picture with your friends, the people with pointy elbows
would hide their elbows so they didn't show up in the picture.
Or if they showed up in the picture, they'd be like,
"Oh, I'm so embarrassed about my pointy elbow!"
You wouldn't care at all!
You wouldn't care.
And then if people were just constantly saying to you on the street,
"Ah! Your square elbows are soo attractive! Geez."
Like how do you feel about that?
Like... thank you...? But... I don't know.
So if you're Japanese and you have a larger head,
you don't have to be embarrassed about it
because when you meet a foreigner, they're probably not going to care at all.
It's probably not going to affect their attraction for you at all.
It's just not a thing.
So today was a little cultural lesson on face here in Japan.
I hope you learned something!
Thanks for watching! I'll see you guys later! Bye!