Crazy NHK Kids Show Cactus Character

A new Kids show called “Mitsuketa” or “I found it” has started up on NHK. For some reason, the show’s main theme is…

CHAIRS!

There are skits of interactions between a real live girl, a giant talking cactus, and a chair. The cactus plays kind of a fatherly role, settling little arguments between the little girl and the chair.

Please don’t get me wrong. It’s a great kids show… funny, colorful, educational, and well thought out.

There is just one aspect of the show that I can’t seem to understand….

It doesn’t happen every time, but the Cactus, which is usually quite manly (referring to himself as “ore” and speaking in masculine Japanese), sometimes gets excited. When Sabo-chan (the cactus’s name) gets excited, a flower on his head blooms, and then…

he becomes extremely effeminite, using feminine language and gestures.

The first time I saw this it was kind of surreal.

Anyway, here’s a video of Sabo-chan getting excited. The story of the video is Sabo-chan explaining how electricity flows through the wire, into the lamp providing power. When the little girl asks how a remote control works, Sabo-chan, who apparently doesn’t know the answer… blows a fuse. The flower blooms and he gets girly.

Let’s watch.