As it turns out, wearing reflective material has multiple unintended side effects.
If you’re like most people, you’ve probably thought about what you would do if you could turn yourself invisible. Scaring your friends, walking around naked…the opportunities would be endless!
Well, you probably can’t actually turn yourself invisible, but there might be a way to make yourself so reflective that you’ll just blend right into the scenery! Our own Japanese-language reporter Mr. Sato thought he had a genius plan: why not take the light-reflecting mirror paper that you put in the window, and wrap it around your entire body? It’ll simply reflect the world around you, making you look like the a part of the scenery, and no one will be able to see you. Foolproof, right?
So Mr. Sato went to the home supply store and spent roughly 6,000 yen (US$56) on reflective paper, then asked his colleague Yoshio for help:
Mr. Sato: “Wrap this around my entire body. That way I might become like an invisible man.”
Yoshio: “What? You’re 46 years old. What the hell are you talking about?”
Mr. Sato: “Come on, just do it. I’ll show you what a genius idea it is.”
With a little coaxing, Yoshio grudgingly agreed to be Mr. Sato’s assistant in his ridiculous experiment. (Meanwhile, fellow reporter Seiji Nakazawa heard every word, but didn’t lift a finger to help. Did the stay-at-home period change you, Seiji?!)
Anyway, the reluctant Yoshio soon began wrapping Mr. Sato in the reflective paper. Only people who have tried wearing “mirror sheets”, as they’re called in Japanese, would know that they are not actually adhesive enough to stick to people. But Mr. Sato bought really good quality mirror sheets, so the adhesive was actually quite strong, and it stuck firmly to his clothes.
They started with the torso, then moved on to the legs…
▼ Getting intimate
And then his arms.
M. Sato’s mirror costume was nearly complete. What do you think of it so far? Though he’s not quite invisible yet, Mr. Sato felt like he’d gotten stronger by arming himself in reflective paper. He looked like he was from some kind of cybernetic world.
▼ The lack of hands is particularly eerie.
Mr. Sato thought it looked so good that he had to Photoshop a cool image with it.
▼ It turned out looking like an album made by the kind of musical artist that makes good songs but really lame album covers.
But of course that’s not all! His whole body was not yet covered, and therefore he had not yet transformed fully into the invisible man. He still needed to cover his head, but how? Obviously, he couldn’t just stick the paper to his face, or he wouldn’t be able to breath. What to do?
It was Yoshio who came up with a brilliant plan.
▼ “We’ll do this for the head.”
After measuring the circumference of Mr. Sato’s head, Yoshio rolled the paper into a hollow cylinder and secured it with a stapler. It fit perfectly and left plenty of room for Mr. Sato to breathe!
And now we’ve kept you waiting long enough. Here is the final reveal of the Invisible Mr. Sato-man:
We can picture the movie now: “From a galaxy far, far away, traveling across a millennium, a mysterious, unknown life force came to earth.”
Just by putting on a headpiece (face piece?), Mr. Sato’s entire aura changed!
▼Doesn’t it look like the metallic android T-1000 from Terminator 2?
Now for the ultimate test: to go outside and see if he will melt into the scenery! But if he didn’t melt into the scenery, he would melt underneath the reflective paper; it was insanely hot in the costume! The mirror sheets apparently not only reflect light but are capable of absorbing heat, too. Mr. Sato felt like he was baking in the sun, and he was sweating bullets after just a few minutes.
In an effort to speed along the process, he first took a photo in front of a bit of green near the office. How does it look? Is he fading into the scenery?
Yeah, not at all. On the contrary, this kind of weird, creepy robot-like being standing in front of some trees was extremely obvious, maybe even a little ceepy. He had initially planned to walk to a nearby station but…surely his presence would incite panic among the people?
Perhaps he would blend in better with inorganic matter, he thought, so he went to stand in front of a crosswalk.
But no dice there, either. In fact he stood out just as much, looking like a bent-up stainless steel pole, or a creepy alien come to investigate the planet.
Had his experiment completely failed? Desperate to find a place where his metal suit would allow him to melt into the scenery, Mr. Sato, Yoshio, and fellow Japanese-language reporter Tashiro, who had volunteered to be the photographer for the day (and who is also known for his die-hard Disney fandom), walked all around Shinjuku. But it wasn’t until they passed in front of a shuttered business that Tashiro yelled, “Mr. Sato, please stop here!” and began enthusiastically snapping photos with his smartphone.
With his face covered by his reflective paper face piece (headpiece?), little did Mr. Sato know that the light reflecting off of his shining costume was creating a really unique light show on the shuttered shopfront, which looked like it belonged in a modern art museum. “It looks like you’ve sprouted wings!” whispered Tashiro reverently.
This caused the plan to change. Instead of trying to become one with the scenery, Mr. Sato instead decided to become part of the scenery. They spent a long time in front of that shutter taking photos, and they all came out looking pretty cool!
Afterwards, they decided to take photos at a park. Even though he’d known it was useless to try and integrate his distinctly synthetic-looking outfit into nature, Mr. Sato wanted to try it again with the new idea of “making art” in mind. This photoshoot resulted in him looking like a pop-up piece made by an anonymous artist that appeared in the park suddenly one day.
▼ Or, again, like an alien robot, this time waiting for children to capture and eat.
But after that the adventure was over, because Mr. Sato was so hot he had to lay down on the ground in the shade to cool off.
▼ Mr. Sato innocently cooling off in the shade.
Oh yeah, Mr. Sato did make this incredible photo manga for your enjoyment. We expect it to be the next big Shonen Jump serialization.
Though the experiment had an unexpected positive outcome, Mr. Sato strongly encourages everyone not to try this at home! There’s always the threat of heatstroke, and if this summer is anywhere near as hot as last summer, you’ll regret it immensely. Mr. Sato sure did.
Image © SoraNews24
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[ Read in Japanese ]