History of Hatchan

So I have this stuffed octopus that has basically followed me around for the last 8 years. So where did Hatchan come from? Well, he originated in the fall trip to Osaka in 2008, but as a quick summary… I bought him at the Kaiyuukan aquarium in Osaka, shortly after which my friend went and copied me and bought an evil twin brother. The name Hatchan comes from a combination of several things. 八 (hachi) is the Chinese kanji for the number 8 and -chan is the Japanese suffix for something that is cute, so I combined the two to make 八ちゃん （はっちゃん), Hatchan. Upon arriving back in Tokyo and telling my Japanese friends his name, they told me that there is a One Piece character with the same name. *shrug* It was creative and original to me when I thought of it. I also thought that Hatchan was a fitting name because, he worked so well as a hat (in a very unfashionable sense of the word). I had always wanted a sort of stuffed animal sidekick that wasn’t super big, but wasn’t super small, someone who could travel with me. My sister had this stuffed monkey (that was originally mine) that she had always been with and traveled with, I sort of wanted something like that. So Hatchan sort of became that of me. My sidekick in crime. I think the timing was good too, because earlier in the same month, my first girlfriend broke up with me, the same day I bought an umbrella, which sort of in some ways represented a recovering, protecting myself period in my life, the day before I got Hatchan, I lost that umbrella on a train I believe and then Hatchan came into my life, and I think that particular trip to Osaka is when I sort have came out of my metaphorical chrysalis and became the adult that I am today. So Hatchan sort of represents who I am, the guy who travels and loves himself.

Fast forward a little bit, Hatchan followed me to Spain when I studied abroad there. During that same summer, I started a photo blogging website called DailyBooth, where I blogged everyday with a photo of myself, a few months later, I also created a separate account for Hatchan, especially during the fall of 2009, there were a lot of entries of him and his everyday life and battles with his arch-nemesis Pon de Lion (of Mister Donut fame), another plushie which I picked up in my first trip to Japan. I would go on to not update it as much, but especially when I traveled, I would upload a picture of Hatchan somewhere where I was traveling, as wherever I went he followed.

Hatchan has been to Japan, America (a plethora of states), Spain, Korea, Thailand, Malaysia, New Zealand, Philippines, and Taiwan and when I remember I always try to put him in my backpack on days out and take pictures of him wherever I am. Although as often as I remember, there are just as many times that I forget to get a picture of him. He has been on more than thirty people’s heads over the years and anyone who has been close to me knows about him. I can’t believe he’ll have been with me for eight years this year. I hope by the time I have kids, he can grow up with the kids as well. I’ll leave you with a few pictures of various costumes, he’s had over the years, a hachimaki (red headband) which lasted for about a year in 2009, a santa hat, and a monkey mask that I put on him yesterday for a bit.