Soccer Station

You've probably never heard of Captain Tsubasa, despite its world-wide acclaim in the manga/anime spheres. We hadn't either, until we chose to live in Yotsugi. The author of this manga, which ran for 43 years, grew up in this area, set his manga in a fictional yet referenced and similar world. Captain Tsubasa has also been made into anime series, movies and over twenty video games. 

Suffice to say, it's a thing. 

So much of a thing that the train station in Yotsugi is decorated in honour of Captain Tsubasa. 

I can't believe we accidentally chose such a cool place to live. The whole station has scenes of the anime on the walls, the characters painted onto the ceilings and stairs, and the floor is a soccer field. When the train is coming, the music played is the theme song from the anime and the announcements are made in the voices of the characters. 

We actually find it so fun to dance along to the music just before the train announcements start. 

Fun right?! There is also a section of the station that has soccer team shirts and art work signed by various famous people. We see a lot of tourists get off here to take photos with them. 

Outside the station, the Main Street has light posts with soccer balls on them. 

There are statues of the characters from Captain Tsubasa all around Yotsugi and maps for you to find them all. We weren't particularly bothered by this, but Rachel challenged me to find and photograph each of them, so I ended up doing it.

Which character is this? I dunno! Maybe Captain Tsubasa himself!

Another fun thin you can get is seaweed precut into a strip of hexagonal shapes so that you can make rice balls (onigiri) that look like soccer balls. We aren't really a soccer family, but it was too much fun to pass up. 

Hilarious right! Just a bit wonky, but the girls thought they were great. 

The author of Captain Tsubasa, Yoichi Takahashi, was commissioned to design the new school logo when they decided to combine two primary schools into one. You can read about the logo here, along with the three verses of the new school song that they had a local singer/song writer compose. 

We see Captain Tsubasa and his soccer team on many a thing around Yotsugi but thus far, the girls have rejected having photos with any of them. Don't know what their deal is.