Anime in Japan

Anime is very popular in Japan, in fact it has an entire district, known as Akihabara, Tokyo, centered around Anime and Manga. To put it simply,  Anime is the Japanese version of our cartoons (TV or Movies) , and manga is the Japanese version our comics (comic books, read like a book). 
Anime and Manga both originated from the same source. The Tale of Genji is Japan's oldest known written tale and one of their most popular stories to this day.
(http://www.gopixpic.com/tale-of-genji/)

The Tale of Genji was later turned into a scroll of pictures known as an "emakimono". This form of storytelling led to the creation of "giga" which translates to Funny pictures. Japan later began experimenting with shadow puppetry and continued this path even after Disney had already created the first Mickey Mouse cartoon. It was not until after WWII that Japan's first anime and manga were created. Osamu Tezuka is the creator of the first anime and manga. He created the first manga, "New Treasure Island", after watching Disney's creation of "Bambi". This would later lead him to make the first anime, "Tetsuan Atom". This animation became so popular that it was later dubbed into English and renamed "Astro Boy".
(http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Astro_Boy_(1963_TV_series))

We will be going to Akihabara on our trip specifically stopping at a famous anime and manga store known as  Radio Kaikan. It contains a series of shops that sell almost everything relate to anime and manga, such as books, dvds, figures, cosplay costumes, and other goods based different anime. (If  you don't already know, cosplay is short for costume play, in which people dress up as their favorites anime and manga character)  It might not be a surprise if we see some cosplayers while in akihabara as well.

Also, in case you were wondering, Anime is not something only for little kids like a lot of American cartoons. People of all ages watch anime. Pretty much any theme you think of has an anime to go along with it. There are of course, anime meant for children like :

• Shugo Chara - deals with fairies, main characters are elementary school aged

• sailor moon - a middle school girl who fights crime as a superhero in a sailor uniform

• yumeiro patissiere - about younger kids making sweets with the help of cooking fairies.

Picture of the Sailor Moon Anime

(http://sciencefiction.com/2014/07/06/tv-review-sailor-moon-crystal-usagi/)

But there are also many anime that are intended mainly for adults, such as:

•  Elfen Lied - a physiological fantasy story with a lot of heavy violence and a bit of a romantic plot.

• Vagabond - a very adult manga, heavy violence, and mature content. Set in the 16th century/sengoku era

• steins gate - also a physiological story about time travel, it is much more light hearted than the first two but would be a bit difficult for younger kids to understand.

 Picture of the Steins Gate anime

(http://supernovo.net/livros-hqs/jbc-publicara-manga-de-steinsgate-e-seven-deadly-sins-no-brasil/)

I'm interested to see just how frequently we will see anime or manga in the different stores we visit on our trip.

We will probably see many billboards and ads in Japan about Anime because of it's popularity, so if you have not seen or read anything like it before, I encourage you to give it a try. 

- Emily W. 2016 -