JUST NOT THEMSELVES ANYMORE

When I was a teenager, the last person I wanted to be was me. I was so uncool that the cool guys didn't think of enough of me to even make me their punching bag, which is pretty sad if you think about it.

Your average Asian would say,
"This is what I look like?!"

As desperate as I was to become another person, it never occurred to me that I could just wish it to come true. I mean, that was fairy-tale stuff there. But now there are those who truly do believe fairy-tales can come true, at least when it comes to their race. What we used to call "nutty" are now practitioners of RCTA -- short for "Race Change to Another". And the race they've chosen is Asian.

These kids swear that listening to subliminal messages and staring at photos of Asian people will make them wake up not just looking Asian, but possessing Korean DNA as well. I listened to the latter instructional video, but I couldn't hear any tips. I know: subliminal, duh! Geez, why not do it the way Warner Oland did in the Charlie Chan movies and wear make-up? 

Gimme some of
his DNA.

I'm all for people wanting to "change" themselves -- if "change" means improving themselves physically and mentally. If I want to be big and strong like the guys at the gym, I better start pumping iron! That kind of thing is achievable, even if I'm too lazy to pursue it myself. But changing your looks and genetic make-up because you like J-Pop? If that kind of thing were true, I'd have started listening to subliminal Ricardo Cortez messages a long time ago.

So what do people in Japan do when they tire of their skinsuit? Well, a guy known only as Toco has fulfilled his lifelong dream of being a collie not by wishin' and hopin', as Dusty Springfield sang, but by dropping $14,000 on a custom-made dog costume. I'll leave the "we're going to the dogs" jokes to you.

Lassie Toco, go home.

It won't come as much of a shock to learn that Toco has his own YouTube channel sharing his daily walks among baffled dogs and their equally baffled owners. I hope wherever he lives in Japan isn't going through the same heatwave the rest of the world is experiencing. Otherwise, he's going to need a kennelful of water bowls to get through the day.

Oddly, for a guy who seems proud to share his alter ego with the world, Toco is strictly on the down-paw when it comes to letting his friends and colleagues know who the guy inside the costume really is. His reasoning is sound: "They think it's weird." 

And I like sushi!

Thank you, Toco, for even admitting that much. See, growing up in a seaside town, I thought that if I had to be an animal, I'd choose seagull. They seemed to have it pretty good, seeing that they hung out at the beach and stole food from picnic baskets when people weren't looking before gliding back over the ocean, laughing loudly. But I never thought of buying a seagull costume and learning to fly by flapping my wings! 

I don't know what I'd do with the $14,000 it cost Toco to achieve his dog-day dreams, but off the top of my head "buying an animal costume" wouldn't be among them. Now, I could buy an original Dracula lobby card for that kind of dough, and have enough left over to buy my wife a nice necklace. Unless there was a Frankenstein lobby card available, too. Nothing crazy about that.

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