Toshiden: Exploring Japanese Urban Legends: Volume One

by Tara A. Devlin

  The Red Room came about during the era of pop-up ads on the internet, and at its heart is a story about the dangers of the internet. Be careful what you wish for, because you just might find it.

  HISTORY

  This urban legend came about during the late 90s, a time when ad blockers didn’t exist and it was almost impossible to visit a website without being bombarded with hundreds of pop-up ads. Sometimes it was so bad that no matter how many you closed, it was like they just kept coming back. Sound familiar? With the development of ad blockers and other programs to stop unwanted windows from appearing every time you visit a website, this legend doesn’t hold quite as much fear as it once did, but at the time pop-up ads were a very real problem. What if one of those ads was so persistent that if you couldn’t get rid of it, you would die…?

  DEVELOPMENTS

  Urban legends are like those telephone games we used to play as children. One child at the end of the line receives a certain phrase and they whisper it to the person beside them. This continues until it reaches the other end, and often the message has completely changed. Each time a story is retold, the storyteller adds their own flourish, their own embellishment, their own spin on the details. The Red Room is, of course, no different. Let’s take a look at a more recent version of the legend:

  A young boy heard a story from his friend about “A pop-up window you must never close called ‘The Red Room.’” A pop-up window is a window that automatically appears when you look at a website.

  There’s no way something like that could exist, the boy thought, and when he went home, he got on the internet and out of curiosity started looking for it. However, he wasn’t having much luck and was unable to find the website. A short while later he entirely forgot about the Red Room.

  But then suddenly he heard a voice, and at the same time a bright red pop-up window appeared, asking “Do you like?” The boy closed it, finding it weird. It was then that he was suddenly reminded of the Red Room story.

  As soon as he closed the window it appeared again. He immediately closed it. But then it appeared again, and no matter how many times he tried, he couldn’t get it to go away.

  The boy noticed that the letters in the window were slowly starting to change, letter by letter. “Do you like?” started to transform into “Do you like the Red Room?”

  Then the screen changed completely, and people’s names appeared all in a row on the red screen. The boy’s friend’s name was included in that list. Then, right at the end, the boy noticed his own name was being added.

  The next day the boy’s corpse was discovered, the walls of his room painted red.

  This type of development and growth is common amongst urban legends as they age. The original version is very simple, the story of a student who finds a pop-up window on the internet that goes on to crack and then kills him when it breaks. It’s simple, and it’s straight to the point. But over time that’s not enough. People want more. They add details, they embellish, they up the fear factor. “Red Room” has no meaning in the original story. There’s no reason to be afraid of it and it doesn’t relate to anything. But over time the story forces meaning upon it, and the Red Room becomes literal; the pop-up window will kill you, painting the walls of your room red with your own blood. That is a lot more terrifying, and more likely to stick in people’s minds.

  INFLUENCE ON REALITY

  The story of the Red Room became so popular that someone created a Flash version so people could experience the terror for themselves. It plays an animation of the story above, and once it’s finished, if the user hasn’t disabled pop-ups, one resembling the ad from the story will appear. You can still find it on the internet today if you’re brave enough to search for it.

  In 2004, an 11-year-old girl murdered her 12-year-old classmate after accusing her of making fun of her online. The killing provoked debate about whether the age of criminal responsibility should be lowered (again), and it was revealed that the killer was a big fan of the above mentioned flash animation “Red Room.” She had a website with content dedicated to the game as well as fan fiction from Battle Royale. Akio Mori, a physiologist, tried to use this to support his theory that video games and the media make children violent. The meme character Nevada-tan was based on the killer of this incident, and you can find an incredible amount of fan art for her online.

  Hanako-san of the toilet

  If you go into the school toilets and knock on the third door from the end three times, then call out, “Is Hanako-san there?” “Hanako-san, Hanako-san, please come out!” you will receive an answer.

  When you open the door, a girl with a bob haircut in a red skirt will drag you into the toilet.

  ABOUT

  There’s probably no more famous ghost story in Japan than that of Hanako-san of the toilet. You would be hard-pressed to find someone who hasn’t heard of her; everyone knows her. Hanako-san is especially popular with elementary school children as they are the ones she targets, and elementary school kids sure do love a good ghost story. There are almost as many variations for Hanako-san as there are kids in schools, but the most basic form of the legend involves knocking on the third toilet door from the end and asking Hanako-san if she’s there and/or to come out. What she does after that depends on where you live and what version of the story they tell there, but it generally ends in death. She’s well-known for her bob haircut, and she wears a white shirt and red skirt.

  HISTORY

  Hanako-san has been around since at least the 1950s, when her story was known as Sanbanme no Hanako-san, Hanako-san of the third (toilet stall). This story spread to schools around the country in the 80s where it really kicked off, and in the 90s, Hanako-san led the school ghost stories boom. She received an incredible amount of media attention with films, anime, manga and so on. This made it near impossible not to have at least heard of Hanako-san and how she wants to drag you into the toilet with her.

  It’s possible that Hanako-san’s roots go even further back, however. From the Edo Period until the start of the Showa Period (around the 1800s to the 1920s) there was a religion dedicated to Kawayagami, the god of toilets. Kawayagami was generally depicted as a woman who was blind and had no hands. The toilet (not just the porcelain bowl we sit on today, but the room and area itself) has long played an important role in Japanese culture, and has traditionally held strong ties to pregnancy and childbirth. It was passed down that pregnant women who kept their toilets clean and beautiful would then give birth to a clean and beautiful child. As such, these rooms were looked after with the utmost care, decorated with flowers and dolls of little girls dressed in red and white as a sign of devotion to Kawayagami. Red and white have long been seen as auspicious colours in Japan, as you may have noticed from the Japanese flag. After the war this religion died out, but people continued to decorate their toilets with flowers, regardless.

  Flowers in Japanese are pronounced hana, and the kanji is often used in girl’s names, such as Hanako (flower child). It’s not too much of a stretch to see how the flowers and red and white little girls dolls from a dead toilet-based religion might later be picked up as the basis for the story of a little girl dressed in red and white named Hanako-san who’s found in the toilet.

  WHO IS HANAKO-SAN?

  Like everything else, Hanako-san has several origin tales, depending on who you want to believe.

  She was attacked by a pervert while playing at school. She hid in the third toilet stall and when the man found her there he killed her.

  Hanako-san is the ghost of a girl who was abused by her father when alive. The bob cut she’s so famous for was to disguise the scars she received from her father.

  Alternatively, Hanako-san’s mother was abusive. She chased the girl to school where she hid in the toilets, but her mother eventually found her there and killed her.

  Hanako-san was playing hide and seek during the war, and while she was hiding in the toilet, there was an air raid and she died.

  Hanako-san was a
girl who picked persimmons for a senior citizen’s home. She died in a traffic accident one day and her ghost took up residence in the persimmon tree (in this case Hanako-san is known as Hanako-san from the top of the persimmon tree).

  Her real name was Nagatanigawa Hanako, and she was born in 1879. She disliked milk and the colour white, but liked red and blue. She was in the table tennis club and was prone to hay fever. It’s said her grave sits behind the gym of a school in Tokyo.

  There’s a particular story that elaborates on point three. It’s presented as the true story behind Hanako-san’s origin, purported to be a real-life incident that took place in 1938 in Tono Elementary School, Iwate Prefecture. A girl named Ikuko was chased down by her insane mother and found in the toilets behind the school gym. There’s no evidence from newspapers or other media at the time that the event actually took place, however, so it’s most likely another fictional story that was made up long after the supposed events took place, but it goes as follows:

  A family of five lived behind Tono Elementary School. The father was a police officer and breadwinner for the family. The mother, like many other women at the time, was a housewife. The father, however, was a prolific philanderer, and one day he went to a nearby hot spring with a prostitute he was friendly with.

  The mother, of course, was aware of this and was driven insane with jealousy. Unable to bear it any longer, the mother reached her limit and came upon a terrible answer to her problem.

  Family suicide.

  The insane woman first choked her oldest son to death, and then her youngest daughter before burying them both. Her oldest daughter, a fifth-grade girl named Ikuko, ran for her life. She ran to Tono Elementary school, located behind their house. The school was large with many places to hide. She managed to reach the school and began looking for somewhere to conceal herself.

  Her mother chased her into the school. A janitor was working when the mother approached him with a fearsome look on her face.

  “Where is that child?” she asked.

  “Huh? Oh, if you mean that girl, I saw her enter the toilets behind the gym,” the janitor replied. Unfortunately for her, the janitor saw her as she passed by.

  The door to the third stall was closed. Clearly the girl was in there. The mother grabbed her and dragged her back home where she choked and buried her with the other children.

  After her death, the girl’s spirit often appeared in the third stall toilet where she was found by her mother.

  If the girl’s name was Ikuko, then why does the legend state her name is Hanako? One theory suggests that’s because Hanako is a common name and thus easy to remember. Kind of like “Bob” or “Jane” in English, it’s a common name that could be used anytime, anywhere, and is easy to remember. So, rather than leaving the toilet ghost nameless, over time she was given the nickname Hanako-san, and it stuck.

  HOW TO SUMMON HER

  The following is one of the most common ways to summon Hanako-san, although many variations exist.

  After school or on a day off, when there aren’t many people around, go to the toilets on the third floor.

  Knock on the first door three times and ask “Is Hanako-san there?”

  Repeat step two for each door three times.

  Once you have done this, you’ll receive a reply from the third stall from the end.

  Open that door.

  The key, as you may have already guessed, is the number three. No particular reason is given as to why the number three is so important here, but regardless of the variation, they all involve the number three somehow. Usually that’s just the third toilet stall from the end, but in cases like the above it can involve doing a lot of things three times before you can successfully summon her.

  VARIATIONS

  Yamagata: When you try to leave the toilets after summoning Hanako-san, she will reply as usual. However, if she’s in a bad mood that day, her voice will resemble more ogre than girl. Another rumour from Yamagata says that in reality Hanako-san is a giant three metre long lizard with three heads, and it uses a girl’s voice to lure people into its trap before eating them.

  Iwate: After summoning Hanako-san, something terrible will happen in the third stall from the front. Once you enter this stall, a voice will appear from nowhere saying “Hanako-san from the third stall” as a large white hand reaches out and grabs you from the toilet.

  Kanagawa: Hanako-san is most often thought to appear in the female toilets, yet in Shinagawa she appears in the boys toilets. You must walk around the urinals three times calling out “Hanako-san!” Then a giant, bloody hand will appear and pull you in. Another rumour states that Hanako-san can be found in the girl’s toilets while a boy named Yosuke-san can be found in the boy’s. If you don’t run away within three seconds of calling either of them, you will be killed.

  Shimane: If you refuse to play with Hanako-san, she will chase you down.

  Hyogo: In the first stall you’ll find Hanako’s father, the second her mother, the fourth her younger sister, and the fifth her younger brother. In the second stall of the boy’s toilets you’ll find her grandfather. If you call any one of them they’ll ask “What do you want with our Hanako-san?” Another rumour states that she has relatives, also ghosts, called Hanao and Okako. Each year her family gathers in Gunma Prefecture to discuss their plans for the year. She also has a ghostly boyfriend named Taro who can be found playing basketball in the school gym late at night.

  Osaka: When you summon Hanako-san and knock on the door, she will reply in standard Japanese “That’s dangerous, stop it.” (Note: Osaka is famous for Osaka-ben, or the Osaka dialect, which is often used by comedians for laughs. The joke here is that Hanako-san does the opposite, instead replying in standard Japanese in the home of Osaka-ben.)

  Tokyo: In a certain elementary school if you call out “Hanako-saaaan!” in the back of the third floor girl’s toilets, she will reply with “Whaaat?” If you say “Hanako-san, I’m sorry” after 4 pm she’ll reply with, “It’s okay.”

  Gifu: In one school there’s an old-style pit latrine, and if you circle it three times and called out “Hanako-saaan!” she’ll reply with “Yeees.”

  Saitama: Saitama finally breaks the mould. If you knock on the fourth toilet stall 15 times and ask, “Hanako-san, let’s play!” she will reply with “Okay!”

  Nagano: If you knock on the third toilet stall and call out “Yukiko-san” you’ll get a reply.

  Chiba: If you knock on the second stall in the second floor toilets three times and ask for “Mii-chan” while flushing you’ll get a reply.

  Here are a few other variations that aren’t region-dependent:

  If you ask Hanako-san to play, she’ll ask what you want to do. If you answer with “make-believe choking” she will actually choke you to death. This ties in with the Ikuko story where she was choked to death.

  If the sign that marks the female toilets fades away, Hanako-san will take a pen and redraw it. If you call out your thanks to her, she will reply that it’s her way of giving back after scaring everybody all day every day.

  In one school there were twins by the names of Kanako and Kayoko (both names using the kanji for hana). Kanako died in an accident, and after that Kayoko was often mistaken for her ghost. She then ended up killing herself because of it, and now their ghosts appear as the “Twin Hanakos.”

  If you don’t knock on the third toilet stall five times and call out “Hanako-san” three times, the door will refuse to open. If you try to force it you will become paralysed and then spirited away.

  HOW TO ESCAPE

  If you are brave enough, or silly enough, to call Hanako-san in the first place, how can you escape her ghostly clutches? The following are proven methods of escape.

  The moment you open the toilet door, you must show her a test paper with a perfect score of 100. Hanako-san will be so frightened that she’ll disappear. Tests are, of course, a big deal in Japan and children are particularly frightened of them. It’s said that
Hanako-san will be so jealous of that perfect score that she’ll just up and disappear.

  Another method involves throwing a page of unfinished maths drills at her with Hanako’s name written on top. This will freak her out and she’ll run, leaving you to escape.

  If you don’t wish to scare or shame the poor girl into non-existence, you can choose the kinder path of apologising to her. Looking at it from Hanako-san’s POV, people constantly banging on her toilet door and calling her out for their own amusement must get tiring and bring her down as well. If you carry out the ritual and manage to actually meet Hanako-san, consider apologising to her. Those who have met her say this is the most effective method of escape, and probably the easiest for those of us who don’t have perfect 100 point tests to shove in her face.

  Okiku doll

  August 15, 1918. Hokkaido resident Suzuki Eikichi went to a visit a Taisho Era Exhibition taking place in Sapporo. On his way back he bought a Japanese doll wearing a kimono with a bob cut.

  He gave it to his younger sister, Kikuko, only three-years-old, as a gift. Kikuko was most pleased with the doll. She played with it every day and showed her affection by sleeping with it every night.

  However, on January 24 the following year, the young Kikuko suddenly died of a cold. Eikichi, distraught, enshrined both her remains and the doll in the family altar, which he prayed by every morning while remembering his sister.

  It was around that time that something strange started to happen. Surprisingly, the dolls hair started to grow, and what was once a bob started to grow past the doll’s shoulders. Kikuko’s family believed that the girl’s spirit had transferred to the doll.