if cuteness (kawaii) can be measured in spoonfuls of sugar just like sweetness, I would have died of sugar overdose, or at least be down with diabetes! Japan is replete with kawaii-ness, so much so that it's hard to avoid being diabetic. Everywhere I go, I felt myself being assailed by sugar lumps (big ones!) and splashed with diabetic juice (a la the Songkran in Thailand)!
This is evident in the people, the houses, the temples, the toys, the food and even the toilets! Here're a few cutesy ones that made me feel like kidnapping them home:
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| never knew carrying something as unglam as a broom can even be associated with cuteness, by a little monk some more! Maybe they should get little boys and girls to be the cleaners and road sweepers here -- sure to turn Singapore into kawaiiland! They will become tourist attractions overnight, with tourists snapping their pics! But the UN will prob come after us for exploiting little children. |
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| Here's a life-sized one on the grounds of a Kamakura shrine. Even praying is cute! |
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| this trio are doll-sized ones located beneath a tree...looks more like an acapella bunch singing Christmas carols.... |
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| I molested its ears! the big one lah, of coz, I'm no paedophile!....incidentally, the little kids look extra cute, all bundled up in their winter wear, as shown in the one here on the right... |
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| this caught my eye, a figurine in a shop that bows and bows hypnotically....the sales people are probably tired of bowing non stop so they used a battery-operated doll instead. For some reason, the sight of the geisha doll bowing and bowing is so hauntingly mesmerising that I could not tear my gaze away from it. maybe it has to do with the 'bun' sticking out of the middle of her head! |
Indeed, the Japs have honed the art of kawaii-ness to perfection. Even the food sold in the shops are wrapped in paper so beautiful that you would have thought u were in some art gallery or museum instead of a regular shop selling Jap eatables! Was that a lost Monet or Picasso being used to wrapped that box of biscuits? No, no, it looks more like a van Gogh! Even I could not resist grabbing a few boxes.
And hey, that was just the outside...when u remove the wrapper (not tear ok, it's a painting! sacrilegious!) and lift open the box, you will draw a sharp intake of breath, and maybe even shed a tear or two out of sheer delight at what greeted ur sight! In the anime world, it'll be like rays of light have burst forth from the box, lighting up ur face and suffusing it in its ethereal glow. GASP! such exquisite pieces of biscuits and buns (and that ubiquitous sticky chewy mochi) that look too kawaii to be made by human hands! They must have been made by the hands of God! (or at least human hands guided by God's!) One thought went into my head -- they are not food; these are pieces of art! I could barely bear to eat it as I held it delicately in my hand, afraid of quashing it if I applied too much pressure or -- god forbids -- dropped it onto the floor!
I wish I had left it as that, dangling from the ends of my fingers. Alas, the practical and baser side of the animal in me prevailed, and I had to put it into my mouth and sink my teeth into it -- only to have the magic shattered! Honestly, it tasted nothing like the way it looks! After waxing lyrical about it, it's a real anti-climax to discover how the taste is such a far cry from the promises of its looks. This sentiment applies to all the three lovingly-wrapped boxed tidbits and sweets which I bought from different places. Sigh, sometimes, it's better to just enjoy the chocolate cake from the confectionery showcase rather than buy it home to eat it.
Kawaii food-wise, there is another aspect of it which I found a tad disturbing! and it has to do with religion. Some of the cookies and buns sold have the image of the Buddha imprinted on them, some are even in the shape of the Buddha! and these are sold as souvenirs on the grounds of the temples! So what's the message here? When you're eating the biscuit, you're 'eating' the Buddha along with it, so that he is transported into you and you can carry him everywhere u go like a walking talisman?
And it is here that the pics of the little monks above start to become a tad disturbing also. Since when has religion been associated with cuteness? You don't spread religion and convert people by making it cute....and you certainly shouldn't use it to attract tourists or make money. Associating monks with 'cute' is like the sexualisation of nuns in the West! Imagine people buying little figurines and soft toys of monks home, but not for any spiritual or religious reasons, but because they find them cute and want to cuddle them to bed at night! All these, coupled with the selling of admission tickets into popular shrines (so are they shrines or museums now?), selling of amulets, figurines of the Buddha, Buddha cakes and biscuits (with his face right smack on it! as if u will attain nirvana if u eat more of it), bespeak of a commercialization of religion, and its subsequent debasement.
