A new tree is growing in the middle of Japan’s sprawling capital: Tokyo Sky Tree, the under-construction broadcast tower that will provide television and radio broadcasting to the area’s 35 million residents. Already the tallest man-made structure in Japan, it will stand an amazing 634.0 meters (2080 ft) when completed in 2012, double the height of Tokyo Tower which it will replace. True to form, the Tobu Railway Line which owns the tower couldn’t resist making an official “mascot character” to serve as the its official face and give tourists something to buy as omiyage (souvenir gifts) when visiting, and the new official character is “Sorakara-chan,” a girl from space with a star-shaped head who happened to notice the tower while passing by the Earth, so she came down to take a closer look. Why everything from the Japanese armed forces to the 1250-year-old Great Buddha statue of Nara require cutesy characters to represent them is one of the great mysteries of Japan. I often wonder what would happen if cute characters like these became commonplace in the U.S. For example, what if the subdued San Diego County Office of Record-Keeping decided to spruce up its image with an official character called Document-kun, who made a little angry face whenever people failed to properly safeguard their personal information? Or maybe not.
Tokyo has a new tree, and a dorky new mascot character.
