Kinda says something about our cultures, no? Today, Japan’s tourism ministry tapped snow-white, uber cutie Hello Kitty as its official tourism ambassador to China and Hong Kong. With the iconic cartoon character’s help, Japan hopes to boost annual international visitors numbers to 10 million, up from a record high 8.35 million last year.

And while her lack of vocal chords (or, for that matter, mouth) may hinder her ability to expound upon Japan’s many virtues, cultural sites and rich history, her ability to bridge economic and social barriers may make up for this. I mean, the girl is just as happy appearing on the side of an airplane as she is on a toaster.

But we do have other concerns about Hello Kitty’s ability to do her job. As this AP story points out, Hello Kitty may hail from Japan, but the button-nosed icon, in fact, lives in London. That may make her new job a little difficult. And as we learned in Hello Kitty’s official Sanrio profile, so might her enrollment in primary school and her habit of eating lots of yummy cookies baked by her sister Mimmy (you know how public figures need to, um, keep an eye on their very public figures).

These might be hurdles for Japan’s latest tourism ambassador, but at least her cartoon existence means she won’t cause an uproar every time she goes through a McDonald’s drive-through. Nor will she, we hope, be allowed to adopt orphaned kittens from less fortunate countries encountered during her travels around the world. She is, after all, still just a kitten herself.

(I was always a Badtz-Maru fan, myself. I mean, come on, the kid has a pet alligator. How cool is that?).

This entry was posted on Monday, May 19th, 2008 at 1:13 pm and is filed under Celebrity Travel News, Travel Industry, Unusual News. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.