If you’re also thinking of going to this small railway town in Hyogo Prefecture, here are some tips!
train otaku
Relationship is derailed as rail geek girl uses her amazing powers of deduction to catch her boyfriend in a lie.
Rock to the beat of station names and level up your knowledge of Japan’s railway system while you’re at it.
Japan’s feel-good story of the year takes a depressing turn as the lone passenger who made headlines is harassed by camera-toting otaku.
An obvious tetsudō otaku, or “train nerd”, did he accomplish his dream of becoming a train driver?
The word otaku in Japanese isn’t just limited in use to fans of anime and manga. It can be used to refer to fans or enthusiasts of a number of things, and with the abundance of trains weaving throughout the country, it’s not surprising that Japan has a fair number of “tetsudou otaku,” or train enthusiasts. Within that group there are also “toritetsu,” who enjoy taking pictures of trains.
Recently, a video surfaced on YouTube which shows a Tokyo Metro train driver scolding one toritetsu for taking a flash photo of the train, and while most Japanese netizens seem to be in support of the driver, there are some of the opinion that the driver could’ve handled the situation differently.
On the evening of 19 September, JR Osaka Station became the scene of unseasonable weirdness as dozens of photographs of an unknown teenage boy seen sitting on the train fell from the sky like giant snowflakes of randomness.
Upon investigating the incident, Osaka Prefectural Police found this to have been an act of revenge by what is fast becoming Japan’s most oddball sub-culture: train otaku.
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