Japanese grandparents create life-size Totoro with bus stop for grandkids (2020)
29 comments
·July 14, 2025spandrew
A future where Miyazaki prefecture become littered with grandparent-fueled Ghibli characters and quickly become overrun with tourists...
Or kids at this specific stop are treated to a moment of joy while waiting for their train to come...
Time will tell...
bobthepanda
Kyushu is quite far off the beaten tourist path, so I doubt it would get a lot of non-domestic traveling.
muststopmyths
I believe you’re underestimating the rapacious hunger of the click economy
WarOnPrivacy
This is awesomeness happening because copyright can't sabotage it.
sidebar: The opposite of this awesomeness is counterproductive absurdity. The latter is what copyright always devolves to when it is insufficiently restrained.
p_j_w
I love that this happened on Miyazaki Prefecture.
thrownawaysz
Quintessential "Thing, Japan" content
colpabar
No it's not. "thing, japan" implies that the "thing" wouldn't be special outside of japan. Where else is there a totoro bus stop?
thrownawaysz
>Where else is there a totoro bus stop?
No, the question is 'Where else there are decorated bus stops?' and there are countless examples of that. But no one cares (= no one will make a HN post about it) if you see that in Poland [0] or in the UK [1]. So 'Thing, Japan' + HN has a very strong Japanophilia
0, https://www.whitemad.pl/en/bus-shelters-as-painted-anna-wojt...
cafeinux
I concur. This would have been awesome anywhere. The fact that this is in Japan is not surprising, although it's clear that if one were to go check out a lifesize Totoro statue, having in Japan makes it nicer because it's its "natural" environment.
im3w1l
Platform 9¾ at King's Cross Station
jacquesclouseau
this is so incredibly cute.
i swear tourists better not ruin this
hhoover
Here it is on Google Street View/Maps
dartharva
It's made of concrete, which now that I think about it must have been the obvious choice, but I can't help but feel a bit disappointed that it's not soft and fluffy like in the movie.
layer8
Now they need to make a cat bus to stop there.
vinceguidry
Try that here and city regulators will be all over your ass, smh.
tokai
Disney would sue the hell out of you first.
dylan604
This was my initial thought just from reading the headline and was not dissuaded from seeing the permanence of the structure. I'd imagine some fines for your effort as well.
ANewFormation
And don't forget the inevitable graffiti. The uncreative will simply spray random words and letters, but the deep thinkers among us may have the wit to draw a penis on it.
cafeinux
Ah, I see you're a man of taste as well.
toast0
Eh, depends where the bus stop is. Around me, the transit busses don't have marked stops, and will stop anywhere on the route, and there's no sidewalk, so landowners can put up art/sculpture at the edge of their parcel or the road easement, if they want. School busses stop at specific places, but many landowners have put up shelters for students to wait underneath. In town, there are bus stops and city managed sidewalk; you can't block the sidewalk, but a landowner could put up art at the edge of the sidewalk. Commercial signs are regulated regardless of where installed, but a sculpture such as this isn't commercial.
Your city may be different, of course, but I wouldn't expect this to cause a problem, if installed by permission of the owner, in most cities. HOAs might throw a fit, they like to do that.
This sculpture isn't particularly tall, but height restrictions are popular. A sculpture that does not appear to be stable, or appears particularly flammable might be reviewable as well. There's no utility connections, so there's no need to review those.
vinceguidry
The night the bar I went to shut down, we got some spray paint and wrote messages all over the building. Few weeks later they're having an estate sale. I notice it was painted over. Asked the owner, he said the county got on his ass about it.
All the land around a bus station is typically city-owned, I wouldn't give it a week before a work detail is despatched to remove it.
toast0
> we got some spray paint and wrote messages all over the building ... he said the county got on his ass about it.
No surprise, messages in spray paint are generally discouraged. Had you drawn a mural, it may have been treated differently.
> All the land around a bus station is typically city-owned, I wouldn't give it a week before a work detail is despatched to remove it.
When the bus stop is on a gravel road next to a field, as depicted in the article, I doubt the land is city-owned. But yeah, no surprise, the city doesn't want you to dump your stuff on their land, and they'll remove it.
Edit: from the google maps picture, it's not even on a gravel road, it's next to gravel parking for a small building. What municipality is going to give you shit for putting a sculpture next to your parking lot, unless the sculpture is obviously dangerous, offensive, or subverting building codes (if your sculpture is occupiable space, it needs to meet building codes)
onetokeoverthe
[dead]
konsalexee
Those grandparents are the best.
The my neighbour Totoro theatre show has a 18ft soft moving puppet built by Jim Henson’s Creature shop. It’s incredible how they pulled it off.
https://muppet.fandom.com/wiki/My_Neighbour_Totoro