He is a cat, came from the future. He is blue, no ears, stands on two feet, loves dora-yaki and have a special four-dimentional pocket which there are any sort of gadgets from the future.

 

His name is Doramemon (ドラえもん). He was a yellow cat formed robot but one day, a mouse ate his ears and he turned into blue with fear. Since then, he is so scared of mice.

 

 

 

Like this.

 

So although Doraemon is a cat, a cat form robot, he doesn't hunt any mice.

 

 

 

 

 

Nobita is a school boy who doesn't like studying and wimpy. Very wimpy.

 

One day, Doraemon came to Nobita's house by a time-machine which Doraemon parks inside a Nobita's desk drawer.

 

 

 

Nobita is an absolute looser. He is always bullied by two kids, Gian and Suneo.

Gian is a big fat kid and quite violent, ahem, very violent for a primary school kid, I must say.

One of his phrase is "your things are mine and my things are mine too."

 

 

Suneo is a rich kid whose parents buy him all the new stuff, games, figures, bicycle and any toys.

He's not physically strong so he's always with Gian. Yes, he's just a bum-bag. Also he's mean to Nobita.

Look, he's showing his collection of mini-cars and tells them that they can take any of those they like. But, not Nobita. "Because" Suneo says, "Nobita is not capable to remodel the car". Yes, kids are cruel, I know but how frustrating.

 

But it's true that Nobita has no guts to fight against them, just gets bullied and comes home crying. Especially after Doraemon arrived, he just hopes that Doraemon will solve the problem.

Is Doraemon just a pure dream of all the kids who used to be bullied at school?

Nobita is also not so clever. Doraemon once said to him "If entire Japan lows to your level, that's the end of the world!" I agree. I hope all Japanese guys don't be so wimpy although it seems like the number of herbivorous boys are increasing…. 

 

 

As Nobita is so wimp that even his goodess, Shizuka comes to save him. How embarrassing, really.

He's not the type I'd like to be a friend with at school.

 

Anyways, Doraemon was with my childhood. On Friday evenings, at 19:30 on channel 10. This has been on more than 25 years as far as I know. And even decades later, I still have moments I wish Doraemon was here.

In the four-dimentional pocket, Doraemon has everything and whenever Nobita is in trouble he takes out a special gadget from the pocket.

Here are some of my favorites which I dream I could have them, really.

When Doraemon takes a gadget out, he shout,

Tataaaan!

"Takekopter!!!"

This is a little propeller made of bamboo and is actually a kids' toy. You hold the stick part in between two hands and rapidly rub it. The propeller spins and flies up in the air.

This takecopter's got an idea from this toy. Only the difference is you put this on the top of the head and you can fly.

 

 

 

Like this.

 

They usually get out of Nobita's window. 

 

 

 

 

This is "Honyaku Konnyaku" (Translator devil's tongue)

Devil's tongue taste quite fishy if it's not cooked and it seems like they bite it raw.

I don't know if I'd like that but just eating this a little, you can speak any languages. I won't complain for that.

With this, no more hard time of learning languages and I can go anywhere!

 

This is "Dokodemo Door" (Anywhere door) and this is I want the most.

Before opening the door, you tell the door where you want to go and open it. Here you are, you are there!

Fantastic. We don't need airplane anymore. I can drink as much as I want and I just bring this door to go home straight from the bar, hihi.

Even now, as adults, we talk about all these gadgets of Doraemon and say "oh, I wish I had this and that." Doraemon roots in Japanese' soul.

 

I guess this is so real. It's a little exaggerated but at school, there are wimpy boys, bullies and bum-bags. When we were small, we didn't know that life we had was only temporal and people could change. The life was cruel for wimpy kids and for the bullies, wimpy kids were just easy targets. And this life has been repeated for generations.

I lived and saw Doraemon world. Only difference was there was never be Doraemon. I can't tell you the ending of Doraemon, but the ending of the real world I lived turned out to be a little kind.

10 years later, a bully kid apologized to our Nobita. It was a quite shocking moment according to some friends who were there by accident. I wasn't. I didn't go to that reunion.

I heard that our Nobita accepted our Giant's apology, but as if it was nothing so important. I imagine that actually it was Giant who was suffering all those years but not Nobita.

 

In the TV, they are still primary school kids and Nobita still cries and asks Doraemon for a help. But we have all grown up. We still wishes the existence of Doraemon but also we watch it with some sort of nostalgia.

 

Here is a little bit of Doraemon from the first episode in case you've never seen it.

ドラえもん 第1話 ゆめの町　ノビタランド

 

 

More about Japanese cats

Neko no te mo karitai

Myth of plastic bottles

Cat in the circle