Japanese Prime Minister Fumio Kishida recently made headlines by making a surprise visit to Kiev to meet with Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy in the midst of the Russian invasion. The visit further deepened Japan’s moral and technical support in the form of four billion yen of non-lethal defense equipment.
โผ A news report about Kishida’s secret entry into Ukraine via train from Poland
While many news reports, like the one above, focused on Kishida himself boarding the train with his bodyguard, some cameras stuck around a little longer to watch the rest of the preparations and capture this scene.
โผ โBreaking: Kishida delivers Umaibo to Zelenskyy. Is it the taste of yakitori chicken?
That box might be a little hard to make out unless you’re a Japanese snack lover. It turned out to be Umaibo, a type of flavored popped corn snack that is very similar to what in some areas are called “cheese puffs” or “cheesies,” except that it is shaped like a long cylinder.
โผ A corn soup-flavored Umaibo, both in and out of the package
Image: SoraNews24
It seemed strange to carry out such a clandestine mission and the internet quickly went wild with speculation.
โIt’s for national defense!โ
“I was hoping he took the taste of corn chowder.”
“Maybe it’s an Umai gun.”
โIt’s a good, cost-effective travel snack. They cost 12 yen each and five is enough.โ
โMay the delicious taste of Umaibo turn the tide of this war.โ
“Does…Zelenskyy like those things?”
“Is Carlos Ghosn in the box?”
โMaybe the Ukrainian word for ‘mortar’ sounds a lot like ‘Umaibo.’โ
At the time it was truly a mystery. Umaibo is certainly tasty, but it is common knowledge that giving it as a gift to anyone over the age of seven is unlikely to yield great results.
After the visit, reports finally emerged explaining the Umaibo box and informing the public that it was not in fact filled with popped corn sticks. Rather, it had a very large rice scoop, known as a shamoji inside.
Okay, maybe it doesn’t seem so obvious, so let’s travel back to the year 1904 when Russia and Japan were engaged in a war over each country’s influence in northeastern China and the Korean Peninsula. At that time, Japanese soldiers made ceremonial offerings of rice spoons at the famous Itsukushima Shrine in Hiroshima Prefecture, where the first shamoji was said to have been made.
A Japanese word for โcatchโ is meshitoru, which resembles the Japanese words โtakeโ (toru) and โriceโ (meshi), So rice spoons were used as symbols of victory in battle and used in prayers for it.
You might even see fans of the Hiroshima Carp baseball team making some noise in the stands with rice scoop-shaped clappers.
And since Japan was declared the winner of the war with Russia, it seems Kishida hopes it will bring the same luck to Ukraine. Moreover, Kishida’s family was originally from Hiroshima, and when he was elected prime minister, he was gifted a 50-centimeter-wide shamoji with the word “success guaranteed” written on it by his party’s Hiroshima branch.
โผ It is said that the scoop given to Zelenskyy is very similar, but not as big. This news item shows Kishida with his own rice scoop.
Arrangements were also made during their meeting for Zelenskyy to be present online at the G7 meeting in Hiroshima in May. A visit by all the leaders to Itsukushima Shrine is also being considered and if they are lucky, they might get some huge scoops of rice and maybe even some Umaibo.
Source: Sankei news, Twitter/@nalltama, Hachima Kiko
Top image: Wikipedia/้ฆ็ธๅฎ้ธใใผใ ใใผใธ (Edited by SoraNews24)
Read more stories from SoraNews24.
— Japan’s prime minister should commit suicide by using seppuku, says a Russian politician
— The Ukrainian message of gratitude and friendship is becoming very uncomfortable towards Japan
— Japanese snack Umaibo asks fans to choose their favorite flavors in the first Umaibo ranking
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https://soranews24.com/2023/03/25/japan-pms-cheap-corn-puff-box-for-ukrainian-president-has-kind-of-logical-explanation/
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