Samelyn Lafuente, a young primary school teacher from Masbate City, in the Philippines, spent the last three years turning a bland classroom into a little girl’s real-life fantasy, decked in pink and full of Hello Kitty-themed decorations.

Walking into Samelyn Lafuente’s classroom, you would be tempted to think that it’s an obsessed Hello Kitty fan’s shrine to the popular Japanese character. The floor is covered with a Hello Kitty-themed carpet, the walls are all pink, as are the school desks, and there are Hello Kitty decorations everywhere, hanging from the ceiling, plastered on the walls and even in the windows. It would be fair to assume that parents of little girls in Ms. Lafuente’s class must be struggling to pull them away from this real-life fantasy in pink every day, which is just what the teacher planned all along – to create a place where her students would be happy and enjoy their time at school.

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Hello Kitty was designed to appeal to young girls, but its biggest fan may just be an adult Japanese man. 67-year-old Masao Gunji has been collecting Hello Kitty memorabilia for the last 30 years, and he was recently acknowledged by Guinness Records as the owner of the largest Hello Kitty collection in the world.

Gunji, a retired police officer from Yotsukaido, in Japan’s Chiba Prefecture, bought his first Hello Kitty item over thee decades ago, at a sightseeing spot. He just thought it looked really cute, and it ended up making his stressful job a bit easier. Whenever he would take a look at the cute character, it put a smile on his face and helped him push through whatever hardships he faced. Masao soon became a Hello Kitty fan and started buying all kinds of items featuring Sanrio’s popular creation. But his obsession really kicked in after he retired from the police force.

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The Japanese creators of Hello Kitty have decided to oblige the character’s massive Hong Kong fan base by giving them the world’s first Hello Kitty-themed Chinese restaurant. Sanrio Co. has teamed up with Chinese restaurateur Man Kwong to create an incredibly cute Hello Kitty dining experience in Hong Kong.

“Hello Kitty is more popular in Hong Kong than in Japan,” said Kwong, who started negotiations with Sanrio in 2013. The official nod came through in April 2014, and since then, he has worked hard experimenting on hundreds of recipes and varieties of dim sum. Each dish was individually inspected, taste-tested, and approved by Sanrio executives. The final menu consists of 37 dishes, ranging from fresh shrimp buns to stir-fried beef and noodles.

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Hello Kitty has millions of fans around the world, but none are more in love with Sanrio’s iconic character than Asako Kanda. The 39-year-old receptionist from Japan has amassed a fantastic collection of over 4,500 Hello Kitty items.

Like many other girls of her generation, Asako’s fascination with Hello Kitty began during her elementary school days. At first, she just bought little things like pencils and erasers featuring the popular kitty, but by the time she turned 11 she was so obsessed with Sanrio’s creation that she made a Hello Kitty mug in her pottery class, and an embroided Hello Kitty apron for her home economics course. But she can’t be the only girl in the world who did this kind of stuff while growing up. But that’s the thing, while most other girls move on to idolizing boy bands or movie actors, Asako Kanda remained faithful to her childhood friend. “Kitty has always been with me, almost subconsciously,” she said in an interview a few years back. Some people call her infantile, other laugh at her bad taste, but none of this has ever affected her long-term love affair with Hello Kitty. She now holds the Guinness World Record for most Hello Kitty items, 4,519, as of August 2011.

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EVA Air has recently announced the transformation of two of its Airbus A330-300 airplanes into airborne tributes to Japanese icon Hello Kitty. I’m pretty sure this proves there is nowhere to hide from the magic of Hello Kitty.

The adorable kitten created by Sanrio, in 1974, has become a powerhouse brand in Asia, worth several billion dollars. Everybody seems to love Hello Kitty so Taiwanese airline EVA Air decided to associate itself with it in an attempt to boost their struggling sector. Analysts say there is no risk in the move, and that despite having to pay Sanrio a sum of money for licensing , the company has a high chance of reaching its goal. After all, this is their third Hello Kitty plane, so they must have had some success with the previous two.

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If there was one field that I thought was safe from Hello Kitty mania, it was painting. But all my hopes were shattered when I stumbled across this $1.25 million artwork of the famous Japanese icon.

That’s right boys and girls, a painting of your favorite kitty is being auctioned off on eBay for the “bargain price” of just $1.25 million. And if you, by chance, think that’s too much, you should know the price has gone down from $1.5 million. I mean come on people, it’s not just any other Hello Kitty painting we’re talking about, this is in fact the world’s largest Hello Kitty painting, measuring 4 feet by 5 feet. The auction page reads “this would make a great gift for that little girl you love so much”, but unless they were referring to Paris Hilton’s dad, I doubt anyone will by this as a Christmas gift.

I don’t know if this matter to you or not, but the painting was done by American artist James Dillon Wright, also known as Dillon Boy.

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As if the world didn’t have enough of their annoying icon, Hello Kitty, the Japanese thought they’d open a new theme park as well.

If you’re a regular visitor of Oddity Central, you probably already know I’m not the world’s biggest Hello Kitty fan. I’ve featured quite a few strange Hello Kitty stuff, from a pink assault rifle to a Hello Kitty-themed Ferrari. Now, it brings me great…honor to present to you Hello Kitty’s Kawaii Paradise, a Hello Kitty theme park that just opened in Tokyo.

I guess the Japanese didn’t want to look bad, after their Chinese neighbors built a Hello Kitty castle, and a nice new pink theme park was just the thing. Located on Odaiba Island, Hello Kitty Kawaii Paradise opened on October 22nd, and hopes to attract as many as 700,000 Hello Kitty fans in its first year. While the despicable icon has tons of fans in Japan’s capital, not many of them bothered to check out the theme park, probably because Odaiba is quite a long way from central Tokyo, and many of them don’t care to make the long trip. Let’s just hope the place stays empty and they’ll be forced to close it down soon, because unless you’re the Pink Lady, human eyesight just can’t handle all that pink.

In case you’re interested, the 10,000 square-foot park features a big Hello Kitty shop, where you can find all kinds of accessories, toys and other pink junk, a Hello Kitty pancake restaurant, a small theater, a big statue of Hello Kitty and a whole bunch of other pink, girly stuff fans go crazy about.

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After the pink assault rifle, and the bedazzled Gundam robot, Hello Kitty has tainted yet another bastion of manliness, the Ferrari Modena.

Some have suggested this kind of auto blasphemy should be illegal, but unfortunately, the person who afforded to buy it can do whatever they want with it. This particular Hello Kitty car was spotted on the streets of Jakarta, in Indonesia, where the Japanese icon apparently has quite a following. Now, the exterior doesn’t look so bad, except for the Hello Kitty exhausts, huge rear window decal, and hideous side-mirrors, but the interior s simply beyond words.

Hello Kitty seat covers, steering wheel cover, mats and all kinds of other memorabilia taint the inside of this Ferrari road monster. There’s really just one thing the owner of this car could do to complete this “massacre” and that’s replace the Ferrari logo with that of Hello Kitty. Can you imagine the horror?

If he can afford to but a Ferrari and turn it into a Hello Kitty shrine on wheels, maybe this person should build himself a Hello Kitty castle to go with the car.

Photos by Detikoto and GT Spirit

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I really don’t get why Hello Kitty is so popular these days, I really don’t, but people keep coming up with various Hello Kitty-themed stuff.

The latest Hello Kitty project comes from designer Jason Mecier, who recreated the popular Japanese character from various Hello Kitty items. Toys, clothes and tons of other accessories come together to form a hideously pink, giant Hello Kitty. Disgusting, but I’m sure there are plenty of girls out there who love it.

via If it’s hip it’s here

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I swear Hello Kitty is trying to take over the whole world. It’s everywhere these days, even on things that used to belong to us manly men, like guns and Gundam robots and it even got its very own Hello Kitty castle.

And if thing weren’t bad enough, I’ve just come across some dreadful photos of a Hello Kitty car, taken in mother Russia. Someone went through an awful lot of trouble converting a perfectly nice Suzuki into a hideous girly-pink ride.

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Finally, the world-famous Japanese character gets a proper home…in China.

Now loyal Hello Kitty fans from around the world can start their pilgrimage to the Hello Kitty Castle that was inaugurated in Shanghai. Not much I can say about this place, it’s very pink and girly-like and, judging by the popularity of Hello Kitty, it might just become the new Mecca.

One thing that would fit perfectly in the Hello Kitty Castle is the Hell-Kitty Rifle, an AR-15 rifle personalized by a Californian weapon enthusiast.

via China.org.cn