The Great Buddha's Nose Snot

I am a big fan of the BBC television show QI, hosted by Stephen Fry. QI has an amusing Twitter account where they dispense nuggets of obscure and informative trivia. Recently they tweeted this:

Yes this is indeed true. The Japanese name for it is 大仏様の鼻くそ　(だいぶつさまのはなくそ　daibutsusama no hanakuso). Sold at the gift shops in Nara and online, the company that makes it describes it as a puffed rice snack, coated on the outside with brown sugar, with size brown sugar kompeito candies rattling around inside. The puffs are made to look like The Great Buddha's nose snot, and the kompeito are supposed to bring you luck. Yum.

Not only is the Great Buddha's nose snot available in snack form, so, apparently, is a gorilla's.

(photo by umbrajp)

While The Great Buddha's Nose Snot sounds rather dry, the Gorilla's Nose Snot is more, let's say, sticky. It's made primarily with kuromame amanatto, or black beans cooked in sugar.

As a matter of fact, there are different words for nose snot in Japanese depending on its state. I've often heard it said that the Inuits (Eskimos in non-PC parlance) have lots of words to describe snow, because they live with it all the time. In Japanese there are lots of words to describe stuff that is produced by your body, as I talked about previously. Which may mean that Japanese people are generally comfortable about their bodies, or at least find them humorous.

For nose (鼻　はな　hana) snot, there are two main states:

• 鼻水　はなみず　hanamizu - runny, watery snot (mizu is water)
• 鼻糞 はなくそ　hanakuzo - solid snot (kuso is a rather rude way of saying poo or feces, so this is literally 'nose poo'.)

In manga and anime you will often see a character dozing off with a 鼻風船　(はなふうせん　hanafuusen), literally 'nose balloon', protruding from his nose. This is rather viscous snot with air trapped inside; in manga it's a shorthand way of depicting that someone is sleeping, often while snoring too.

When I was growing up, I was often warned to stop putting my finger up my nose to scratch out my snot (you know, as kids do. You mean you didn't....?) If I kept doing this, I was told, my nostrils will grow huge, and I'll look like a piggy. I must have believed this because I did stop putting my fingers up there for exploration. Japanese girls are somewhat obsessed with having cute little noses - a 'piggy nose' (ブタ鼻　ぶたばな　butabana)　is considered to be very unattractive. In manga and anime shorthand, an ugly girl is often depicted with a butabana.

Back to the snot snacks. Both the Great Buddha Snot and the Gorilla's Nose Snot are derived from traditional Japanese sweets that are sadly no longer that popular amongst kids. The re-purposing of these traditional sweets with names that would make a kid giggle and try it, is a rather ingenious way of introducing them to their cultural food heritage, I think.

Comments

[Jon E.]

Hahah, thanks for the information. I love this blog. :)

[Ha1ku]

Hehe, that seems to be a popular marketing tactic. Remember Garbage Pail Kids?

[kim]

Oh yeah, in Nara there was a round hole somewhere in the great Buddha's temple, of which was said that it was the exact size of the Buddha's nostril. If you could get through the hole you were guaranteed to a spot in Nirvana. I had a lot of fun watching schoolkids squirm through this hole, but didn't attempt myself. Too bad I didn't see the candy, it would have been a great souvenir of the nostril fun :)

[Rei Yano]

interesting. thanks for posting that. love this blog I always learn so much about the culture that I adore.

[sev]

You are back, I'm so happy !!!

[Polly]

Great, albeit disgusting, post!

I am interested that you are a fan of QI, as I saw the 'French' episode last night, which mentioned Paris Syndrome, specifically in relation to Japanese tourists. I was wondering, as I am aware that you have travelled to France from following your blogs, what your feelings are on the 'culture shock' nihonjin supposedly feel when in Paris.

Love all your blogs, keep up the wonderful work!

[maki]

Well, Paris Syndrome is just another word for culture shock really. It's supposedly experienced the most by young, idealistic Japanese women who grew up in upper-middle-class homes, who have these fantasies about la belle Paris from the media and movies, and move there only to discover it's a big old messy city! I suppose that culture shock is suffered by anyone who travels to a foreign country, especially if they had unrealistic expectations prior to going there, regardless of the destination or ones origins. Go to any online expat community, and you see plenty of culture shock/homesick victims....