You Are Average Beautiful (Japanese Ghost Stories)

You know what's really scary when your knee cracks or pops. You're just worry like, is pain gonna follow this? Or is yeah? Is this my life now? Am I dead? My knee popped? Am I dead? No, that's just your youth dying. Welcome to Scary Mystery Surprise, where we talk about scary things that surprised us around the Internet. I'm Edwin. I'm Michelle on our Instagram and our DMS. We got a message from Wren. Last name T because I'm gonna mute that because for privacy reasons, Wren recommended the story. I think all japan things to me are like I agree. You know, when they go scary, they go scary, they go real scary. It's like really different from Western what we grow up with. And then you get over there and it's like, holy shit, and that's what we have today or some holy shit tails from Japan. Shitting your pants is guaranteed by the end of these so warning. We guarantee it. We guarantee it here at Scary Mystery Surprise that you will ship your pants. I'm ready, I got my diaper, Edwin. You're walking along at night on a Japanese street maybe you're singing a little song, did no tune? No dude, this is Halloween. This is Hellen. Well, that's right, that's that's my default right there. That's where I go That's what that's what I go to. That's what's flaying in your head all the time I wake up in the morning. This is Halloween. This is Halloween. So anyway, Edwin's singing this is Halloween. You know, there's a slight drizzle, and you know, you're just taking in the sights in the shops of Tokyo. You're walking down the street. City sounds start to fade and you kind of realize no one's around. But this is Japan. It should be fine. It's safe. You see a woman coming toward you in a trench coat and a surgical mask, and this is part of everyday custom there. I mean, we just went through COVID. We know what it's like. Everybody everybody wears masks like here, we just like to sneeze in each other's mouths here. That is the American way, you know. After COVID, I started noticing all the things that are nasty that we do just naturally. Oh yeah, people that you know do this touching their nose and then they shake your hand. It's so common and I see it every time. You know, how you've have to blow candles on a birthday cake. Yes, yeah, it's not exactly the most cleanly thing you could do. Double dipping your fries, sticking your hand in like like the peanut jar at like work, yes, which I've done and then realized it was a faux pot afterwards. You just put your hand in, You're just picking the peanut you want, You're like, And then I was just watching my coworker stare at me like insanely. They were just like and then I knew I'd made a mistake, and then I learned, and then I learned to use a napkin. Then you wonder how many people have put their hand in there? Yeah anyway, oh yeah, so many things you notice. Yet I still do them. And yet I'm trying to come back to normal to them. It's okay to spit on your hand and shake hands. I don't know how normal it is. What are we in like, what are we in the nineteen thirties little Rascal cartoons? I mean, not normal, But I'm trying to be like on that level where it's like, okay, a doorknob, I'm about to touch a doorknob. I'm about to touch a handle that everybody's touched. We could learn a thing or two from Japanese people, you know. Agreed and like, there's nothing unusual about this woman. She's walking towards you, and she has her mask on, and you're just you know, doing your things, singing your little song down the I mean, you seem like the weird out here. This is Halloween, this is following. Then you hear am I beautiful? And you're like, uh, excuse me, you don't think you heard right. It's just you and her on the street. But then again, am I beautiful? Or maybe more like, am I beautiful? Any answer? Because you're confused? Uh sure, uh? Maybe this has got that weird woman away from you. Slowly, she takes off her mask, revealing that her mouth has been slit open from ear to ear, blood dripping for her elongated mouth. I like beautiful, and you're like, uh yes, you scream. It's like oh god, oh God, oh god, yes, And she pulls out a pair of scissors and slices your mouth from ear to ear to match her scars. You lay on the street bleeding to death because the wounds caused by kitchisak Ona can never be healed. That is that is creepy. That is a very creepy thing you've come into contact. It's kuchisaka Oa, the slit mouth woman. Yeah. Also this is also caused called like a Glasgow smile, which I thought was really bizarre that that's called a Glasgow smile. I guess if you go to Scotland to go to Glasgow, they'll just cut your face. So it's a Glasgow smile. That's just what it's called on the internet, Like you know, that's what it looks like. Yeah, so it's yeah, it's the cut between the mouth all the way up to her ear. No stitches, nothing, it's just like just skin, just like uh uh huh open. Yeah. Can you imagine you take the mask off and it's like joker like it's like for anyone who didn't picture that, imagine the joker with a big you know, but open not healed scars from you know, the corners of your mouth going all the way up to your ears. Is she beautiful though, Well, I guess we'll find out, because she was beautiful at one time. About a thousand years ago. She was a beautiful woman, the most beautiful woman in her village, and she married a powerful samurai and he went off to war. And while he was gone, and he was gone for a long time, she got lonely. And because she was the most beautiful woman in the village, she had a lot of admirers, and she'd walk through town and ask people, am I beautiful? Am I beautiful? I mean how many times can you say? Yeah? Sure? Sure? Why not? So she's insecure. I'd go full of herself on this. Oh like vain. She's very vain. And so as she grew lonely, she started to have affairs with men around town. Samurai heard of this. He was outraged, and as a punishment for her infidelity, her husband made her bite down on his samurai sword, slicing the corners of her mouth from ear to ear. Okay, that's messed up, of course, it's messed up. Do you You just have to move on? Man? Yeah, you don't need to cut anybody's mouth open. Like, it's not worth it, king, No, move on, It's not worth it, dude. Women have not had it easy, That's all I'm saying. Yeah, that's terrible. I mean, I think the cool part is probably just the fashion, right, Like people like women, they say they missed a fashion of the olden days, but I think, like you wouldn't want to be living back then, no, thank you. But obviously it's a cautionary tale, right, Like you know a lot of these weird stories are always cautionary tale to keep letting you know, like stay faithful, blah blah blah blah blah. You know, this was a tale in the Endo period, so yeah, like about a thousand years ago, and then around the end of look at you endope here, I know, I looked it up. It was just like, oh, around the end of nineteen seventy eight, we're in more recent times now, a rumor circulated that an old woman in a farming family i'll just skip the town because I can't pronounce it, spotted a woman with a notorious slit in her mouth standing in the corner of the garden. The local newspaper printed an article about the story, and the legend spread and grew through repetition among the children in the area. Because, of course you're scared shitless. Of course you are. This is so creepy, like this is intense. It's intense. I mean that's scary shit like that is Yeah, I don't know. I mean here we have what slender Man, like the Sire what the Rake Siren had. It's like, yeah, they have like a version of a slender Man. I just didn't do it in this episode. But they have like it's called like the eight foot tall woman or something like that. Why is it a woman? Why is that creepier? Mishell? Why? Yok they come back as yoki, which is like an evil spirit, which is what Pokemon is based on. Weird Lena, Oh, it is all the weird Yoki ghosts. That's why Christians. One time I got a lecture from Christians about Pokemon college. It's so funny. They were like, you know, they come from evil stuff and spirits. They do come from they're inspired by that. But wow. But yeah, so they're all part of the Yoki Yoki how did I say it? Yokai? So there were all these different variations. Of course, because you know, kids, kids are talking at this point and we're in the seventies, so you know they're actually talking and out on their phones. The schoolyard gossip is going crazy, like they might say that she wore a mask or a red coat, that she carried a sickle. They'd say that she could run one hundred meters in six seconds, that she hated wow, that she hated hair palmates, so specific, even more specific. Or if you gave her hard candy, that's like a caramel hard candy, then you could get away. So if you threw candy at her, she'd let you get away. I don't know, So you always carry candy with you just in case. Yeah, obviously, I mean duh. So six months later, the rumor had spread nationwide and what yeah, so okay, so it went viral. It went viral, and it was in the newspapers, and people kind of trace this back to like a number of children were going to this thing called Cram schools at the time, which is like you go to another school after school and you study more, and it's at night. So a lot of kids from different jurisdictions were coming together and like spreading this rumor through Cram school and they were taking it back to their neighborhoods and stuff. But also because Cram school got out at night, people kind of figured that kids were getting anxieties about passing people on the street that they wouldn't normally pass like like a girl going to a club or like a drunk. So it's like groups of kids coming home in the middle of the night pretty much, and so they're seeing all these weird characters, street characters, normal the normal night people, just normal night people who are just doing stuff, you know, out for their entertainment jobs, out for a night out. But it's helping, you know, kids are anxious, so they're helping spread these rumors. So anyway, teachers and parents were so worried that they started conducting patrols and arranging for children to return home in groups. But by nineteen seventy nine, the rumors had died down, and you know, everything had pretty much gone back to normal, except the fact that people were now terrified of a slit mouthed woman. Just the idea of it lingering in the shadows had like come back into everybody's consciousness. So, by what we've learned, how to save Edwin's life? Candy? Wait, no, well, well there's candy, but I mean, odds are you don't have any candy since you're just wandering around singing a song in Japan? Uh, this is totally so that's not how it goes, Michelle. So if you come face to face with kuchisak Ona, here's what you do. If she asks you, am I beautiful? Well and you say no, she'll just follow you home and stab you to death. What okay? Intense? Yeah, it's not gonna work. Also, if you say yes and then answer no when she reveals herself with the mask, she'll stab you to death. So the trick is to say, there's a few little trick phrases to say, Number one, I don't have time, and then she'll apologize for bothering That's normal. That's an American response right there. Yeah, it's like I don't have time, I don't have time, and she'll apologize for bothering you. What which? I love that the spirit is still so polite for some reason, so polite. Well, sorry about that. Sorry, sorry, you're right. You're right. I shouldn't be bothering you. You're right. I'm sorry I shouldn't have bothered. How dare I ask if you think I'm beautiful? I'm sorry, you're right, And then b which is the easiest probably answer, And you could use this whenever anybody really asks if they're beautiful or not. You just say average so so. But it confuses her because she only kind of registers yes or no. So if you say average so so, this confuses her and you can run away. Also, you can distract her by throwing money at her or throwing hard candy at her, because she'll stop and pick it up and uh. And then of course by saying saying Paul made three times, palmade, palmade. Yeah, like the hair product palmade. This is so like a little manual to know what to do in these cases. Oh, it only gets weirder after the break, It only gets weirder. So I'm like on the ground. My mouth is like, you're slit and you're you're probably bleeding to death. But that was just a dream. Oh thank you. Okay, But you're back on the streets. You're back walking streets of Japan again. It's gloomy out, it's a light rain again. It doesn't really matter because you're still enjoying the sights and the sounds, and you get to the train platform and it's quiet, and you think Edwin would have learned his lesson by now, But no, or not just be in my own places, not walk around at night. I don't know. I don't know. What lesson you should have learned is not to walk around at night, I guess. So anyway, you're standing on the platform and it's nighttime, and then you hear it, how you look around? I think I would be more like, what is that? Yeah? That's good, that's good. Yeah yeah yeah, and then it goes So why is that getting you chilled the show? Why? Oh it's not good. You see something crawling towards you on the platform, crawling a girl missing her bottom half, dripping blood from where her legs and her hips should be. Shut up, Michelle, this is creepy ass. Heck, I told you you were gonna ship your pants in this episode. It's it's it's coming out turtle turtle head seeping. Oh no, that is so creepy. Okay, right, okay, So a girl seeping is so descriptive, like it's so visual, like so auditorial, oraitorial, nos atorial so much. There's a lot of seepage happening. Oh okay, that's so nasty. That's so nasty. I mean, I mean, so sary, so creepy and nasty. Imagining that this is a mixed I feel, I feel really weird right now, I mean Japanese ghost man. There's something there on another level. Something's crawling towards you on the platform, a girl missing her bottom half. Blood dripping from where her legs and hips should be. Is the noise she's making with her long razorlike fingernails as she's stratch. It's just her way towards you, leaving a trail of blood. Edwin's having a great time in Japan. You have run into teka techa. That is what this ghost is called because of the sounds that she makes. Rumor has it she was a very introverted young girl who is a victim of a bullying prank gone wrong. Waiting for the train one day, some bullies decided to play a prank on her and put a bug on her shoulder. Trying to shake it off, she fell on the tracks and was cut in half by a train. As an angry, vengeful spirit, she crawls around ready to cut anyone she meets in half with her long nails or a scythe lots of scyths. What's a scythsent Japan? I mean, oh, why would she be carrying that? That is so Some drawing show her like using her nails to crawl, which makes sense, you know, like they're long, she's chosing them to walk. But then when she has a scythe, she's kind of standing up and it looks like she's kind of just hopping on her spinal core. I think that would be really hard to swing without legs, I think, yeah, I think you're right. I think you're right. She would just scythe and just spin around like that. Yeah. I mean you're just hopping on your spinal cord, like with blood dripping out of you, and you're like little intestines like you're dragging a little bit, and then you're like trying. It would be hard. There's no getting the momentum, right, Yeah, you would just end up spinning indefinite like forever, like a little one of those things what do they call that? You spin them like this and they just go a top. It would just like which makes her even more dangerous with just maybe that's her power. So she spins like a top with the scythe or her nails, and then she can just like tornado at you. Oh no, like Taz like the just like the Tasbybia devil. Yeah, she makes everyone the same height. But it's just her deal, you know, it's just her deal. That is so creepy, man like, I mean, it gets weirder. There's another part of the there's another version of the tail. It's just as weird. There's another version of Teke Teke, Kashi Marico. It's very similar to Teke Teke, and it's kind of like a version of Teke Teke because it's also like a ghost at the train station. I think Teke Teke can technically wander, but Kashi Mariko days at the train station. So, Kashi Mariko was a young woman who was brutally attacked in a bathroom by a group of men in a bathroom stall at a train station. She was left for dead and tried to crawl and get help, but she crawled onto the train tracks and was cut in half by a train. That's a terrible death. It's a terrible death. But now she haunts bathroom stalls at train stations. Actually, on the darkest nights of the year, she knocks on doors and asks the occupant, where are my legs? Where are my legs? The victim has to answer on the Mishin Expressway, which is the train, and then she will ask who told you, and you have to say, Kashimi Riko told me. But then she will say what is mine? Do not say Kashimi Riko? Tell her mask Death Demon? Like it's such a really specific thing. It's like it's like a script you have to follow. Yeah, you have to like follow it exactly. But some other stories say she asks who told you and you have to say mask death Demon. So remember mask death Demon because if you don't, she'll crawl under the stall and take your legs for herself. Oh no, what I imagine like a Japanese woman, you usually smaller, imagine her just like chopping off my legs. Yes, walking around. That's what you get for taking a shit in the stall at night. Did Jeopardy stalls have that gap, that awkward gap under it? I don't know. I'm just assuming they have the gap, but you know, it could just be a door. I changed it to the gap because I thought that was scarier to have the wood crawl under it. But it does say that she just opens the door and comes in and rips your legs off. It's when you're most vulnerable in the toilet. I always think, like, even if somebody wants to steal your wallet. Doing it at a urinal would be like so easy, because I don't think anybody would just stop the stream to go ye. It would be hard. It would be really hard, so vulnerable there, but to cut off your legs and then you die. You bleed to death in a toilet, the worst, worst way to die. Yep, you'd bleed to death, just like her. I don't know. There's one other tail about, but this feels like tech teke because it's a school. It happens at a school, but uh, just the creepiest places, Michelle, what is up with it? I know, I don't know, but it's this is definitely tech a teke. But there was a guy who had stayed late at school and probably one of those cram schools. So he was leaving and he forgot his keys, but he looked up at the window and he saw a beautiful Japanese girl looking down at him, and he was like, oh, who's that And then as he's looking at her, she jumped out of the window at him with a scythe and cut him in half. The next day they only found his legs. They didn't find the upper half. So a part of me is like like did they run off together? That's like, I'm kind of romantic. They just kind of jumped towards the sunset taka tech away they take a which I think is kind of mantick in a way. You know, she got her she got her other half, she got a other half. If this is a cautionary tale, would what would that be? Don't look at pretty girls? Yeah, don't stay don't work too hard, maybe like you stayed too late at school, and or don't be forgetful, like always remember your keyth like it could be something asinine like that, but uh yeah, don't go to school. Yeah, drop out. Definitely drop out. There's only tech a techas at school. So don't forget your legs. Don't forget your legs, and remember that script when you're trying to take a ship in Japan, like oh my god, can you imagine I mean honestly, even just to fuck with someone to be like where are my legs? Like could you have oh my god, especially because this is so like in the Zeitgeist, someone asks you where are my legs? We would you say to that, just be like fuck you man, just you're in that makes sense. You can tell that to anybody, and they'll be like, oh, yeah, I'm in here, I'm in here. I'm obviously in here, busy, busy, I'll be out in a minute. Then you have to wait for them to leave so you can finally drop it, because then it's awkward if they hear you. Yeah, it's a really complicated dynamic. And to add like a ghost that will steal your legs to uh people with already phobias of like public toilets, yep, just makes things worse. That's why I think Japanese people, I think they also have these really cool techy toilets, right that make noise and they sing for you. That makes it so pleasant, like the sweet little robot will save you. Maybe the toilets are rigged to save you from tech tech k right, maybe maybe? Yeah, it'll give you the script. There's a button. It's like, oh, tech a techy's here, like the emergency button. And then it's like, here's a script you have to read. Here's some hard candies in case you run into Kuchisaki. Oh no, you know, here's some hard candies in case you ran into kuchisake. No, oh no, or not. But yeah, that's all I got I loved this one. Thank you ren t than you. Yeah, it's a great suggestion. I mean this is like the tip of the iceberg with Japanese tails. These are like two simple female ghosts stories. It's interesting. It's interesting like how because also the ticket ticket technically isn't copyrighted, right like you can just they can make movies out of it. They can make all these characters out of it, and so like it's wow, it's like kind of it is. There's a lot of comparisons to Lairona, like as this being like they're Japanese Lairona or a version of it. And then there's sad stories, even the the slit mouthed woman, that's I mean, it's a sad story, like even though she you know, she cheated, but she doesn't deserve to alver no one, no, no one deserves to have her mouth cut like that for cheating. That's crazy. That's a crazy escalation. It just doesn't work. You just divorce somebody, just leave them. Yeah, probably the summer I guy, you cheated too, I mean wore anything goes. That was the other That was the other version of that tale is that he had heard rumors of this woman who would sleep with whoever. H Well, they used to term courting, who would court whoever, whoever the strongest, she'd take on whoever. The strongest suitor was basically anyone who impressed her. And then he was going to go visit the house. And then he got drunk and realized it was his house, and then he showed up, but it was his wife in bed with someone else, and so he was like, oh, you know, so he was going to go cheat and then he, you know, got if you want in your kilata, It's true, that's true. Do you think that couple was happy together after they found out they were cheating on each I don't know. I think it would be just so awkward to be like, oh uh, like, I guess we'll just stay together now, even though we both tried to cheat on each other. Just tell her she's beautiful. Wait, no, she'll sta Yeah. You got to say so so or average. That's the only way you get away. So if anyone ever asks if they're beautiful or am I pretty, you have to say average. And then she takes off her mask and they're like, oh no, no, you know you have to still be like average. And then you could go because she don't know what to do. She's like average, what does that mean? She's just like turns around hard. Candy Glitch is out now. I've made all these jokes and cursed us if we ever go to Japan. But if any fans want to send us to Japan, we gladly yes. So be sure to rate and subscribe wherever you get your podcasts so we can go to Japan someday. Yes. Please please subscribe and leave us a comment. We'd gladly go to Japan for any podcasts. Just putting it out there in the world. I know some people are out there, that's all the universe is listening, and we'd gladly answer. What are we gonna talk about next week? Edwin? I don't know. I think it'll be a surprise hot dog. Bye guys, Bye,