Crazy Toys from Japan Part 1.

This post and the next few will document some of the fucking weird toys you can buy here in Japan. This one is my favourite - Russian Roulette by Play Avenue. What a great idea to plant in the mind of small children. Bought from Toys R Us too, not a dingy little local toy store (though those ones sell the replica AK-47 and Uzi toy guns Toys R Us won't touch @_@!).






















The gun works by blowing up a ballon and placing inside a ring extending from the gun chamber (there is no barrel as such). A pin in one of the chambers pops should you be so unlucky. Actually I haven't actually played with the toy yet - its just looks to good in its packaging for me to open!

And how about the dodgy skull graphics! Copyrighted in 1994!

Warning - don't over-inflate the balloon!






And as a compliment to this wonderful toy for a ripping party, I suggest this bottle of Russian Roulette vodka I picked it up in Mejiro. The vodka is really from Russia too, but the packaging is American. The label on the back says (in bold caps) "THE NAME RUSSIAN ROULETTE IS NOT INTENDED TO ENCOURAGE THE FIREARM GAME OF CHANCE RUSSIAN ROULETTE."























Postscript: FYI, in case anyone is under the misapprehension Russian Roulette is a joking matter, I just spent a few very enjoyable days with my father, who visited me in Tokyo. He told me a story about when he was a young British RAF officer stationed in Eindhoven, Holland. A young recruit had been drinking and decided to try and impress his friends by playing Russian Roulette. As my father tells the story, the man had obviously not been in the RAF very long because he was not familiar with the technique of greasing the barrel so that the weight of the bullet will cause the loaded chamber to fall to the bottom when the barrel is spun. He ended up killing himself. My father was the officer charged with making a report; he went to the mess and, while the body had quickly been removed, he was struck by the enormous size and shape of the blood stain on the wall. This was just post WW2 and my father remarked that there was no enquiry, nor investigation. It was quickly put down to incompetence and a short respectful, but blunt, letter was written to the man"s family.