The Funny T-Shirts of Osaka — As Seen In Japan

Osaka is known by some people as the comedy capital of Japan. I don’t know if that title is well-deserved because it’s mostly based on a reputation for classic Japanese theater, which I doubt I could ever understand and which is probably not that funny anyway. However, in Osaka and the greater Kansai region, if one looks hard enough, one can find some pretty funny parody shirts.

When you see stuff like these shirts we found in the Tenjinbashisuji area, you may wonder if it’s okay to laugh at it. Are these merely mistakes made by Japanese hucksters trying to replicate well-known brands? Is it racist to laugh at this stuff?

Eriko has confirmed for me that the makers of these shirts DO in fact get the joke, and these items are meant to be funny ON PURPOSE. The word “Nya” is the Japanese equivalent for “meow,” making “Nyaike” a funny play on “NIKE” about cats. It’s okay to laugh and take pictures of these things and even buy them if you want. The Japanese are in on the humor and won’t be offended.

As for these, which we saw in Shinsekai? I’m not so sure. They aren’t so much “jokes” as “random phrases paired with images of animals.” Your guess is as good as mine if the humor is intentional. All I know is I appreciate the juxtaposition of a bear, a skateboard, and a sentence that comes so close to being grammatically incorrect but misses the mark.

It used to be that you’d see hilarious shirts with random English words all over the place in Japan. Just as American kids used to get tattoos of random kanji, Japanese people used to wear T-shirts with random movie lines and stuff all over them. Those days are gone, and most clothing today either has correct language or none at all. But in the right spots, you can still find some pretty fun items.

I leave you with my favorite shirt I’ve ever seen, from a random store in Kyoto, circa 2008: