Monday, January 14, 2013

(Only in Japan) 1,200 Attend Coming-of-Age Ceremony at Tokyo Disneyland


The official adult age in Japan is 20. These 20-year-old boys and girls celebrated becoming an adult at Disneyland on January 14, 2013, a national holiday of "coming of age".

Here's Mainichi English, quoting Kyodo English News (1/14/2013):

1,200 attend Coming-of-Age ceremony at Tokyo Disneyland

CHIBA, Japan (Kyodo) -- Around 1,200 people turning 20 years old attended a Coming-of-Age ceremony Monday, a national holiday, at Tokyo Disneyland in Urayasu, Chiba Prefecture.

Amid falling snow, Urayasu Mayor Hideki Matsuzaki told the new adults, who were wearing festive dress, "We live in difficult times, but I hope you will change this country in cooperation with your peers."

Takeru Hirota, a 20-year-old college sophomore attending the ceremony, said, "I don't think it's hit me yet that I've come of age...I don't know about my future, but I want to make my own decisions about what I do."



It's fitting in a way for a country where young boys and girls fashion themselves like anime/manga characters with long layered hair cuts (boys) and extra-big eyes augmented by color contact lenses (girls).

(H/T reader Vyse)

8 comments:

Apolline said...

Hi Ultraman,

Is this "coming of age", similar to "majority" (or legal age), allowing voting like in France (today 18, before when I was young, it was 21) ?

Thank you.

arevamirpal::laprimavera said...

Hi, Helios, yes. These boys and girls can now vote, drink, and smoke, officially.

Anonymous said...

This setting really underlines the fact that the adult population has been thoroughly infantilized. I doubt that any of these new adults even sees the irony of celebrating coming of age at Disneyland.

Anonymous said...

Coming of age will also allow these young adult to help pay for the future. Maybe some of them will be lucky enough to get jobs in decontamination if not they can always apply for straight Fukushima duty. Whatever there future vocation these 1200 can look forward to supporting 600 retirees.

Anonymous said...

I have this feeling that it will be the retirees (i.e. their parents) who will be supporting them for life...

VyseLegendaire said...

They are graduating in a long career of collecting Gundam models and searching for internet porn.

Anonymous said...

Disneyland? just shows how immature these Japanese are... its sad really that immaturity is rewarded in Japan... no future at all there

JAnonymous said...

I usually travel around Tokyo with my bicycle.

I went to Haneda by train the other day, and was rewarded with this really retarded advertisement about Disneyland: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=clFq7xwxV-Q

I hope (and know for certain) that not every japanese girl's dream is to spend each important step of their life in this specific theme park.

I felt it was funny how you hardly get to see the man of her dreams... About as much as her though, as soon as they get married.

Also, the quality of the animation was seeming quite good, which makes the message even more dangerous.

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