I’m not entirely sure, so don’t quote me on this, but I think I remember reading about how people in that part of Asia wear masks to protect themselves from getting colds and such. But I’m not sure if I’m remembering that correctly.

He’s a Ninja. A common occurrence in Japan, yet rarely captured on film.

People in Japan wear surgical masks when they’re sick or afraid of getting sick. Read our post for more info:

http://www.tofugu.com/2012/06/14/why-do-japanese-people-wear-surgical-masks/

if you do a google search spelling his name in katakana (ノッポトッポ) you get lots of his pictures.

Poor RIderman. Doesnt even get a name. Just “A Kamen Rider character”.

A commenter on that article gave some good insight – the masks do literally nothing, so, above all, it is cultural convention above all else.

It’s an element of Japanese culture that people (who don’t live in Japan) don’t know much about. The Japanese are very literal-minded people. Give you an example: the CDC website says that IF someone has the flu, crack open ONE window to let in fresh air. The flu spreads more easily in stagnant, humid air.

In Japanese schools, during the winter, they leave every single window wide open. They even have signs in my kids’ school that say, “Let’s all open the windows to chase out the flu!” It is official school policy. So they took this one, simple bit of advice: “crack open one window if you are sick,” and interpreted it to mean, “Open all windows=no one will get the flu” without even thinking about it. These are the people educating my children!!

I think it might be the same with the masks. Surgeons wear masks. Mask=safe. Never mind the fact that hospitals have dozens and dozens of procedures to ensure a sterile environment, and the mask is only part of that. To Japanese people mask=safe. Open window=no flu. This is honestly one of the most frustrating things about living in Japan, because it is a simple part-whole logical fallacy. This kind of thinking is pretty common in Japan, especially regarding health, and it can be very, very frustrating to deal with on a daily basis.

But why did they start vandalizing it? Was he a controversial figure, or did they do it just for fun?

Ben, if you’ve ever been in a Japanese school, you know that they open the windows throughout the winter, no matter how cold it is. “Cold enough to harm” is obviously debatable, since I’ve never heard of a child dying from it. I have, however, seen heated teacher’s rooms while the students all languish in unheated rooms with all the windows open in the middle of December. I mean, let me ask you: if your child is in an unheated classroom with the windows open in December, not allowed to wear anything but the standard school uniform – and the teachers are sitting in a heated room, would you consider that “harming” the children? Sorry, but I don’t think you understood what I meant by “opening all the windows” because you probably thought I was being hyperbolic – I wasn’t. There is no benefit whatsoever.

“Nobody seriously believes opening all the windows…it’s just a preventative measure.” It doesn’t prevent anything, and, yes, they actually post signs in our school saying, “Let’s prevent flu by opening the windows.” And, yes, my stepson’s class actually had SO MANY children sick with the flu last year that they canceled classes for a whole week.

You may be right that the masks do something, but I’m looking at them in the context of real, actual Japanese culture. Once you look at the whole situation, you realize that the masks are just one component in a huge misunderstanding of how health and safety works. If you lived in Japan, you would know of the interesting, quirky superstitions they have about health. But I stand by my point that it is frustrating, and anyone who chooses to live here will have to work through that frustration eventually.

This is hilarious! Thanks for sharing!

Lol hey at least the students have a sense of humor XD

I lived in Japan for two years, and that whole time was spent teaching at a boarding junior high school (and regular elementary school). I’m not speaking from ignorance–I know what it’s like.

However, I worked at a private school, so we did some things differently. We had space heaters in every classroom (kerosene), which produce harmful gasses so we also opened SOME windows every once in a while to get fresh air flowing. And this was in Okinawa, which gets cold but not nearly as cold as mainland. So I don’t know if it’s all public schools, or perhaps just in your area, that’s so backwards but it doesn’t happen everywhere.

It’s interesting that when you quote the signs at your school they don’t say “Let’s open ALL the windows,” just “Let’s open the windows.” Maybe some people take it too far.

Yes Japan needs to work on the social stigma of taking time off work, among many other things. It probably won’t happen anytime soon though. So in the meantime, I think wearing a mask (which, as I’m sure you know, isn’t just for people who ARE sick, but for prevention too) is better than being sick and NOT wearing a mask.

Because I HAVE lived there (and my wife is Japanese), I know of the “superstitions” they have. Every country has superstitions, and health superstitions are the most common. But sometimes we can learn something from them, and it’s not possible if you’re not open to the idea they might be right about some things where we’re wrong. For example, Japanese people say that stomach pains are often caused by a cold stomach, so they’ll put a hara-maki on to warm themselves up (mostly women). I thought that was a stupid misconception, but it turns out Japanese people may have a physiological weakness that causes this problem. So what I thought was a superstition may turn out to be true. Of course a lot of superstitions are just that, but if we’re blinded by ethnocentrism, we’ll never discover the ones that turn out to be true.

Yes, I have dealt with frustrations too. But strangely, the uniqueness of Japan that makes me frustrated is also the thing that keeps me intrigued and challenged to help things begin to change.

You’re partially right. I am living in the inaka, and a lot of the problems here are inaka problems. People, for example, in the inaka don’t fully understand that tobacco is bad for pregnant women. You see a lot of “redneck” crap out here that is definitely not universal in Japan (I mean, I sure as hell hope it isn’t).

I was researching something else about Kyoto University and just sort of stumbled upon this. Maybe next time you’re in Kyoto you can swing by campus and see yourself :)