Megane Kitsune - [Yokai 1945]

Today's story was brought to my attention & translated by my Yokai friend: Minemori H! its a fairly mundane tale as far as kitsune stories go, but when i saw the charming illustration that accompanied it (last slide) I simply had to illustrate a sticker to go along with it. This story is Originally From the book “Omi Mukashiwa” – 近江むかし話 – edited by Shiga Prefecture Federation of Elderly Clubs and Shiga Prefecture Council of Social Welfare, published by Tokyo Ronchi-sha in 1968. (In the text, people’s names have been replaced by pseudonyms. the story is told from Mr O’s first-person perspective! – I’ve done some slight editing and paraphrasing so that the sentence structure reads a little more clearly from their translation, but I didn’t change much else! -

Onto the story... 

A Fox with Glasses...
“It was a day in September 1945. Mr. O, who lived in Nagahama City, was invited to dinner by his friend Mr. F from Karakuni, Torahime-cho. Although the food situation was bad after the war, Mr. O was treated to a lot of food, snacks and alcohol. On the way home, he was given a basket of boiled deep-fried tofu, water melon and boiled fish to put on the back of his bicycle.
　It was eight o’clock in the evening when Mr. O left Mr. F’s house, it was supposed to be a six-kilometre bike ride home in about thirty minutes. On the way, however, they took a detour to the east due to renovation work at Tagawa Bridge on National Route 8, and that’s when  Mr O found himself lost. The sound of the bicycle pedals was accompanied by the sound of a fox’s cries “Kon!-Kon!” He thought it might have been an auditory hallucination, When Mr O came to, he found himself in Uchiho, Asai Town, five kilometres east of Torahime. He rushed to the steering wheel and pedalled like crazy. he felt like he was being chased and broke out into a cold sweat.
　Just when Mr O thought he had arrived in a familiar town, but it was Senda, Kinomoto, the complete opposite direction of his home (14km from Uchiho). Disappointed, he pulled himself together and rode back to Kunitomo Bridge in Nagahama. Exhausted, he stumbled and fell into the river, leaving his bike on the bank. When he scrambled to the shore, he realized that he had lost his shoes and glasses in the river!!
　When he looked, he saw a fox in the middle of the river, wearing his glasses and a pair of shoes. (Or maybe it just looked like that.) At the same time, the anxiety that had been haunting him for a long time left, Mr O actually felt very refreshed! Mr.O looked at his watch and saw that it was 0:30 AM in the morning: It seemed that he had been turned around by the fox for four and a half hours!!! - What was even stranger, was that the only thing missing from his bike was the thick piece of tofu & the platform paper from the basket on the back of the bike.
The End!”

Sticker Art by @Samkalensky (yo thats me!) - Part of my Night parade of 100 Demons - Yokai & Japanese folklore sticker collection, weather-resistant 4" Glossy sticker. Check my shop & follow @samkalensky for many more!