A 35-year-old Japanese man who shunned romantic relationships with real women after being humiliated and bullied by them recently married a popular virtual pop-star named Hatsune Miku.

Akihiko Kondo had been planning his dream wedding to the love of his life since March, and on November 4 the two finally tied the knot during a ceremony in Tokyo attended by around 40 guests, including a member of the Japanese Parliament. Unfortunately, his mother, refused to attend the event and so did all of his other relatives. Not being there on her son’s big day may sound cruel, but Kondo’s mother apparently couldn’t accept the fact that he would rather marry a two-dimensional virtual idol rather than look for love in real life. Akihiko Kondo married Hatsune Miku, an animated 16-year-old hologram with huge anime eyes and aquamarine pigtails, because he simply wasn’t interested in real women.

Photo: amerei/Pixabay

Even in a country obsessed with anime and technology, and where romantic relationships and marriage have become worryingly rare, Akihiko Kondo’s wedding was seen by most as shocking. However, the 35-year-old has urged everyone to keep an open mind, “consider all kinds of love and all kinds of happiness”, and accept the fact that not everyone is bound to the template of a happy life in which men and women get married and have children. He also expressed his desire to be recognized as a sexual minority who simply cannot even imagine dating real women.

“I’m not seeking these in real women. It’s impossible,” Akihiko said about the qualities he looked for in a life partner. “It’s simply not right, it’s as if you were trying to talk a gay man into dating a woman, or a lesbian into a relationship with a man.”

Kondo’s decision to marry an anime-like hologram is admittedly hard to understand for most people, but according to an article in the Japan Times, it may have a lot to do with the man’s past experiences with real women. As a teenager, girls would humiliate him by shouting things like “Drop dead, creepy otaku!”, the Japanese word used to describe those obsessed with anime and manga. His bad experiences with the opposite sex continued during his adulthood, when a woman at a previous workplace bullied him into a nervous breakdown. Kondo claims it was Hatsune Miku who “healed” him, and he swore that he would never get married to a real woman.

Virtual characters like Hatsune have several advantages over human females, Akihiko Kondo says, including that they don’t cheat, age or die, so regardless of his mother’s disappointment with his decision, he is convinced that he made the right choice.

“I never cheated on her, I’ve always been in love with Miku-san,” Kondo said. “I’ve been thinking about her every day.”

The 35-year-old spent around 2 million yen ($17,500) on the wedding ceremony held at a Tokyo mall. He wore an all white suit, and the bride – present in the form of a small doll – wore a small wedding dress. Photos taken at the event and later posted on Twitter show that the two “exchanged” wedding vows, rings and even signed official marriage certificates issued by Gatebox, the same company that created the home device that allows fans of the virtual pop-star to live with a holographic version of her.

“Today, I held a wedding ceremony with Miku,” Kondo recently announced on Twitter. “We invited 39 people and held the ceremony seriously. Many blessings through words, messages of support and cooperation were realized. We would like to express our deepest gratitude to those who supported us.”

Kondo considers himself an ordinary married man, but most would probably disagree. The holographic version of his wife wakes him up every morning and sees him off to his job as administrator at a school. When he calls home to tell her that he is on his way, she turns on the lights for him. He sleeps with the doll version of Hatsune that attended their wedding.

Judging by the support that Akihiko Kondo has been receiving online from like-minded fans of two-dimensional characters, and by the fact that Gatebox reportedly had around 3,000 registrations for official marriage documents between humans and virtual characters, this kind of relationship is not really that rare in Japan. Kondo is just one of the few who decided to make his union to his beloved idol public.