Who can clean up the neighborhood and look good doing it? The garbage man can!
If you are a fan of offbeat Japanese culture, then you are familiar with the phenomenon that is “deko tora”, which means decorated truck. Truck drivers will pimp out their rides so that they are impressive to look, with a small caveat being that they are kind of distracting, or rather, very distracting, on the road.
Another common truck has also been getting decorated, however the results are less “Las Vegas” and more “friendly neighborhood suburb”. You may not have noticed them before as they rumble along, picking up bags of trash as they go about their business. But you might not be able to ignore them when they look like this.
The colorful trucks are part of a public relations campaign that will hopefully make them popular with children. If you feel a little bit happier during your day because you came across one of these fun-looking trucks, then mission accomplished!
▼ We wonder if the tiger was chosen because the word for “tiger” in Japanese (tora) sounds like the word for “truck” (torakku).
Since this is Japan we are talking about, there are bound to be a few trucks with an anime theme, right?
▼ Sometimes they might feature a local celebrity, even if that celebrity is a historical figure.
▼ The writing on this truck appears to be manga-style sound effects that describe what the truck is doing (the writing at the rear reads “go go go go”)…or the sounds of disbelief uttered by people who are seeing the truck for the first time.
We’d love to see this sort of thing get popular all over the world. Although, it isn’t likely to happen in the U.S. as the garbage trucks there are probably bound by strict government regulations, and governing is serious business (just ask Japanese Donald Trump).
Source: Naver Matome
Featured image: Twitter/Mohno