Interest
Precure Characters Donate School Supplies to Needy Children
posted on by Eric Stimson
An anonymous benefactor has donated school supplies in the name of Smile Precure! characters to ward offices in Yokohama throughout the past year. (Wards are subdivisions of Japan's major cities that handle local administration.)
In March, copies of The Diary of Anne Frank and paper bags with stationery were left at the entryway to the Kanagawa Ward Office. The bags included a note signed by Miyuki Hoshizora, Smile Precure!'s protagonist, reading "Congratulations on getting into school. I hope you'll be smiling everyday." In August and September, notebooks, erasers and library cards were donated at the offices of West, Isogu, and Kanagawa Wards; all were left by Smile Precure! characters. Nobuo Okada, Kanagawa Ward's general affairs section chief, said, "The writing on the letters is soft. They're from someone who understands kids."
Kanagawa Ward, in cooperation with non-profit groups, sent the supplies along to local child-rearing support organizations. The kids received them with joy.
Every November since 2011, Tsurumi, Kanagawa, and Kouhoku Wards have been receiving donations of backpacks from Naoto Date, the hero of the 1969 anime Tiger Mask. Gifts from Tiger Mask and other cultural icons like Rei Ayanami and Haruhi Suzumiya have been common across Japan since 2010.
[Via Nihon Keizai Shimbun; Images via sasu343rai-no Blog and 47 News]
