1. Knowing someone famous in the past, or before they were famous.
2. That they turned down a chance to go to a famous university or chose to be a “freeter” despite being offered a spot in a big company.
3. That they are actually incredibly rich but for some reason or another are hiding that fact or do not have immediate access to the money.
4. Knowing the secret to some local or historical mystery, “I know where xxx’s fortune is actually buried…”
5. Saying that if they had not gotten injured they would have been on the level of some professional or Olympic athlete, or something similar.
6. Claiming to have dated a woman who is now famous.
7. Having an old dating story that sounds suspiciously familiar (like from a famous movie or drama).
8. Claiming to have been quite a bad boy, even though if the story were actually true he would actually have been a criminal, or in prison.
This study was originally put out in Sugoren Magazine.
I’ll now take the liberty to list some of the ones I’ve heard more than once from different people that make me think they should be somewhere in the top 20 at least.
a. My friend is a computer hacker.
b. My friends are all Yakuza.
c… and a lot of different permutations of “I beat a foreign guy at fill-in-the-blank…” (basketball, took his girlfriend, fighting, drinking, or whatever the popular thing is at the moment)
Maybe we should put together a list of the alternatives… the things I’ve heard non-Japanese guys tell Japanese girls!
Hmmm… I remember a Middle Eastern guy, clearly not a native speaker of English, all of about 165cm in height, telling an enthralled group of Japanese girls about his days playing basketball at the University of Michigan. I let him go though, enjoying both how much and how little he knew about colleges and college basketball in the US. Good times.