Ensure your fruit never rolls away with pentagon oranges2

From creepy pears in the shape of a baby to heart-shaped lemons and watermelons, Japan has the market cornered on unusually shaped fruit. Now we’ve come across a five-sided orange produced in Ehime Prefecture. What’s more, these pointed fruits are supposed to help you pass your school exams!

The pentagon-shaped iyokan, a Japanese citrus fruit similar to an orange or mandarin, were grown by the Hizuchi Tachibana 4H Club. Not only do they have a unique shape, the fruits have a cute play-on-words name, as goukaku iiyokan can mean “pentagon iyokan citrus” and “to have a good feeling about passing” depending on the Chinese characters used. It seems the oranges were created as a good luck charm for students gearing up to take their exams.

▼ Pentagon oranges and their happy inventors.Ensure your fruit never rolls away with pentagon oranges

The idea was conceived five years ago and it took a full three years for a successful crop of pentagon oranges to be produced. Farmers must carefully encase each fruit in a mold, which presses up against the fruit as it grows to form the pointed sides.

Ensure your fruit never rolls away with pentagon oranges5

Ensure your fruit never rolls away with pentagon oranges4

Packed with vitamin C, good for cold prevention and equipped with a clever good luck name, these pentagon oranges are sure to be an exam season staple in the coming years.
[ Read in Japanese ]