Links
Funny Hats Explained
An army of child-like statues with their faces worn off, stretching roughly to infinity.
Monday January 31, 2005
We came across these frightening statues late at night on a quiet side street near Tokyo Tower. The reason that many statues like these around Japan are given hats is from an old legend:
An old man and his wife lived in the country. They were very poor. One day, the old man gathered together their hats and decided to walk into town to try and sell them. On the way, he came across seven statues. They had nothing to protect themselves from the elements. The old man put his six hats on the heads of the statues, and took off his own hat to give to the last statue. He came home with no money and no hats. In the middle of the night, he and his wife heard noises outside. The statues had come to their house bearing food, clothing, and money because of his generosity.
Most of these statues have hats, shawls, flowers, and other gifts around them as New Year's offerings. The ones who have nothing come to your house in the middle of the night and kill you.
Wow, they went from appreciating gifts to killing you for not giving?! Statues are evil!
Posted by Shannon on February 2, 2005 02:05 AM
How would they know if you gave a gift or not? You could have given a gift to another stature somewhere else. It's not like the statues get together every once in a while and decide on whom to kill for lack of gift giving.
Posted by Nuke on February 2, 2005 12:33 PM
I think that's exactly what it is ... Look at the statues in the picture that don't have hats or presents. Doesn't it look like they're going to kill you?! Even the ones who have presents look like they're thinking about it. Don't piss off the army of faceless statues, I'm telling you.
Posted by Lisa on February 2, 2005 03:12 PM
I think the killer hatless/presentless/faceless statues are just overcompensating. However, not being one to tempt fate, the next hatless statue I see will find themselves fully clothed.
Posted by Nuke on February 3, 2005 12:51 PM
Hilarious!!!!
Posted by Dad on February 16, 2005 06:34 AM