When my kids were young, they used to love a popular Japanese cartoon called 「それいけ！アンパンマン」 (“Go! Anpanman“).
This cartoon is in the Guinness Book of World Records for having the most characters. A new one is constantly being introduced by the 90-year old artist!
I wrote a post about the world record. Click here to read it.
Anpanman‘s artist, Yanase Takashi, grew up in the city of Kochi, Japan.
Last month, the city decided to honor Mr. Yanase and the characters he created that have become a part of Japanese culture by renaming a street “Yanase Takashi Road” and placing large, stone statues on the street of the cartoon’s six main characters.
Well, late last Sunday, someone destroyed the statue of the cartoon’s main “villain”, 「バイキンマン」 (“Baikinman“).
Baikinman has two antennae on his head. But some cut off one of the statue’s antennae. In Japan, vandalism isn’t very common.
Here’s what the statue used to look like:
And this is what the vandal did to it:
Tokyo Five 
I just detest vandals ..they’re just a bunch of irresponsible and sad bunch, putting that in a polite way.
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I think the worst thing about most crimes in general is that someone victimizes other people who did nothing to them.
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Absolutely agree
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Thanks.
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When “we” turned 16, some of my friends were really into playing MAILBOX BASEBALL. (Where you hang out the window of a car with a baseball and try to hit mailboxes while you drive by.) I refused to participate. It just seemed really weird to take pleasure in damaging something that someone else has worked for.
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“Mailbox Baseball”. I think that’s another one of those “only-in-America” things!)
And although, I was driving a car in America when I was sixteen…I think now that that age is much too young to have a driver’s license!
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I’m not saying I CONDONE stealing, but I understand. You get something as a result of it.
What do they get for destroying something that belongs to someone else?
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I didn’t think you were condoning it. I know what you meant.
I think we feel the same way about it. I think most people do. 🙂
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I’ve never understood vandalism. Theft I can get…you want/need something but don’t have the money to get it.
Vandalism is destroying something so that nobody else can have or enjoy it.
That sucks.
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I don’t understand stealing either.
But I know what you’re saying.
How could someone destroy something that was made to honor someone who gave so much to make children happy for so many years?
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That is sad. Why would someone do that? My kids love Anpanman.
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Do they show Anpanman in America?
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