Thursday, March 28, 2013

POST#7: Urban Legends: Some Popular Japanese Urban Legends

There are numerous legends and stories that were circulating around the internet and even in the real life; nevertheless that not all of the people knows that particular story, there is still some who knows them and keeps on being entertained by those certain stories.

Japanese Urban Legend seems to be really popular and can be seen through the internet lately, and in fact, most of them were about terrifying stories. So because of that, I searched for different stories and legends that came from Japan.

One of the legends that I found and was written on wickedbones’ blog is about Kuchisake-Onna, or also called The Slit-Mouth Woman, is a Japanese Urban Legend about a woman with a slit-mouth who wears a surgical white mask to cover her mouth.

Kuchisake-Onna wanders around the streets of Japan, murdering mainly children with a pair of huge scissors but she appears to ask them questions before killing them. She asks them “Am I pretty?” and if the victim answers “Yes,” Kuchisake-Onna will remove her mask and will ask the same question, “How about now?”If the victim says “No,” she will kill him and if he says “Yes,” she will get her scissors and cut the victim’s mouth, making him have a slit-mouth just like hers, but she will let you live. It is said that it is almost impossible to escape Kuchisake-Onna because she can move at a super-human speed.

However, there are few ways to escape her:

One is, if you tell her that she looks normal, she will be confused and you will have enough time to escape.
Second is, if you ask if you’re pretty, she will be confused and will leave.

And the third and the newest answer is tell her that you have to attend a previous engagement, she will pardon her manners and excuse herself from her presence (Isn’t she a bit polite?)

Some says that Kuchisake-onna got had her mouth like that because her surgery gone wrong, some says that she is a mental hospital patient who was so insane that’s he cut her own mouth. But the most popular legend is her husband sliced her mouth with a sword because she was cheating on him and he yelled “Who’ll think you’re beautiful now?!” on her.

Around 1979, the rumors started to spread like a wildfire in Japan about the sightings of Kuchisake-Onna, hunting down children.

Another story is about Tek-Tek or Teke-Teke. Teke-Teke is an urban legend about a girl who fell under a train and was cut in half. She took a long time to die while crawling and now, her ghost roams through Japan, dragging her top body part using her claw-like hands, and every time she moves, she will make a “Teke-Teke” sound.

Once there was a young boy who was walking from school. As he turned his head back, he saw a beautiful girl sitting at a window. He wondered why the girl was there, because the school was an all-boys school. When the girl saw him, she smiled and suddenly leaped out on the window, realizing that the girl does not have legs, and started crawling fast towards him. Because of the boy; filled with terror, he wasn’t able to run and got cut in half by Teke-Teke.

Not all of the Japanese Legends is about horror and terrifying stories; there are also about fantasy and meant to be told for children. And for non-terrifying legends, here comes Momotaro.

There was an old couple who lives in the country of Okayama. While washing clothes, the old woman happens to saw a big peach, floating down the river. It looked delicious so she decided to take it home and eat it. The old couple cut the peach into two and to their surprise, they saw a small boy inside, and called him Momotaro, which means “Peach Boy”

They raised Momotaro and one day, he decided to defeat the Ogres who trouble the villagers. On Momotaro’s journey, he met a monkey, a dog, and a pheasant and made them help Momotaro to defeat the ogre, in exchange of the Millet Dumplings which is the old woman made for him.

When they reached the Ogre’s harbor, they fought the Evil Ogres and defeated them as the Ogres started to cry for mercy. They gave Momotaro their treasure and he returned to his village, and Momotaro and the old couple lived happily ever after.

There are still numerous of different kinds of Japanese Urban Legends that has been told, read and heard. Japan is rich at stories and legends. However, all of them can catch your attention and interest and some can really scare you, and that is the best of their Urban Legends.

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