5000 yen Leek
Wedge Holdings has announced that they will be selling 5000 yen ($45 USD) Leeks through the shopping site tanomikomu. These Leeks aren’t real, they’re plastic and for display purposes. Apparently they started selling these because of Hatsune Miku, the webpage even looks identical to Hatsune Miku’s page…
Each leek is made by hand by craftsmen so you can be assured of the highest quality leek spinning.
Via: Digimaga net
November 13th, 2007 at 7:16 pm
What is the story behind the spinning leek and Miku anyway? I thought it came from Lolituma but it’s Hatsune Miku veggie now.
November 14th, 2007 at 7:20 am
I assume it’s because the first bright idea people had with Miku was to make her sing…loituma of course.
November 14th, 2007 at 8:41 am
Technically, it’s not a leek. The 5,000 yen replica is a “negi,” (scallion). ME-tan was the first mascot character to be associated with a “negi” because it’s a pun on the Japanese pronunciation of the name of the Windows firewall software “NEGiES.”
November 14th, 2007 at 9:07 am
One of the first popular vids with Miku on nico douga had her swinging the leek so it stuck with her image basically.
Is the scallion term usually used in normal speech in the US though? I’ve always wondered why it was called leek in English when the leek seemed to look so different from the asian negi.
Leeks are usually called the western negi, so I’ve thought the local leeks produced in the US probably looked very different and were closer to what the asian negi looks like.
November 14th, 2007 at 9:07 am
Yeah, when Miku came out, one of the first things people did was to make a Miku version of that Leek-spinning Orihime flash, then I guess it stuck.
November 14th, 2007 at 12:24 pm
And I failed with my prediction of Rin singing “Ievan Polkka” (correctly written this time). This this the leek is now to attached to Miku, so they don’t want Rin to be a clone.