The proud self-professed farmer speaks and acts like an old man trapped in a young boy’s body.

If you’ve ever spent more than five minutes in the company of a small child, you’ll know that they’re just like sponges. Not only do they soak up all the words and actions from the adults they hear and see around them, they’ll wring them out at random moments, catching people off-guard and making them spit-laugh at the comedy.

Sometimes it might be a cuss word uttered by a child at an appropriate moment, or maybe a perfectly worded high-level nugget of vocabulary. Or, in the case of a young six-year-old Shunsuke Nakamura, an entire outlook on life that’s more suited to a 70-something-year-old grandfather.

Shunsuke is a proud self-professed farmer, who’s learnt everything he knows from his grandpa, and he’s currently going viral online with this television appearance shared on Twitter. Even without understanding anything he’s saying, his deadpan delivery is masterful.

▼ “This kid is more mentally advanced than me.”

In the above clip, Shunsuke is seen at a sports festival, where the interviewer asks, “Do you attend the sports festival every year?” Shunsuke replies with the tone of an older man who doesn’t bother to use polite language, saying curtly, and a little condescendingly, “I’ve been doin’ it since I was small“.

Then, when the interviewer remarks, “It’s really lively, isn’t it?”, Shunsuke replies with the sage wisdom of a man who’s been attending the festival for years. “Most of ’em are farmers. Farmers.”

Then, he delivers his best lines yet, by asking the interviewer, “D’ya know how come so many gather here?” When the interviewer says he doesn’t know, Shunsuke says “Look over there. There’s a lotta young people, right? Well, what’s called a sports festival is really a gokon.”

For those who don’t know, a gokon is a get-together where singles mingle to find a partner, in a similar way to speed dating. The fact that a six-year-old not only knows what a gokon is, but knows how to use the word in such an outstanding context, has blown people’s minds around the country.

“He’s really an old man on the inside.”
“I love the way he swigs his water bottle like an adult.”
“How on earth does a six-year-old know about gokon?!”
“It’s like an old man got reincarnated into a boy.”
“Boss baby.”
“This boy’s presence is amazing. Wonder how many times he’s been reincarnated?”
“I have to agree with this wise man’s comment!”

As it turns out, Shunsuke was actually a popular guest on television, appearing in a number of episodes on Sanma no Super Karakuri TV, where he became known as “Nougyou Shonen” or “Farm Boy“.

A whole playlist of his appearances can be found on YouTube, where Shunsuke can be seen planting rice, drying strips of gourd, and discussing the difficulties of farming during the war.

In this episode he teaches us how to knock on watermelon four times and listen for the sound of “ta-be-go-ro” (“time-to-eat”).

If the episodes look a little dated, it’s because they were filmed between 2008-2011, which means that Japan’s adorable Farm Boy is now 16 or 17. And according to this Twitter account that’s said to belong to him, he’s still got the same sense of humour that made him a star when he was younger.

▼ “#NewProfilePic“

Now that his six-year-old self has become popular with a whole new generation of viewers, here’s hoping we get to see a “where-are-they-now” update on Farm Boy.

After all, he’d be the perfect poster boy to help solve the massive workforce shortage in agriculture, forestry, and fishery industries.

Source: Hachima Kikou
Featured image: Twitter/@kanna_kitune
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