Twitter might often seem like the toilet of the internet, but ask any anthropologist and they’ll tell you that toilets can be treasure troves of information and insights into a given culture. So this week, we’ll be lifting the lid and taking a look at a bunch of viral tweets from the last seven days to see what’s been happening in Tokyo pop culture.

What Lurks Beneath

It wouldn’t be the internet if it didn’t take something cute, innocent and intended for children, and turned it into high-octane nightmare fuel. On Japanese Twitter, that honor went to user @mosi_usa_ who noticed something… strange lurking beneath a train platform. Now, Japanese train platforms always have something hiding under them: lost umbrellas, empty bottles, the occasional dropped cell phone, etc. This time, though, in the posted video, there seemed to be a face lurking in the darkness. As the camera slowly zoomed in on it and you sort of started to expect that this is some weird viral marketing campaign for It Chapter Two, the face is revealed to be a Curious George toy or book.

But good luck trying to explain that to your bladder if it was you on that cursed train.

Just Because You Can…

How much time and energy would you devote to something silly just to make people laugh? For user @yoshiyukidaikon, the answer is “three days,” which is how long it took them to design a buridaikon, a hilariously horrifying crossbreed of a yellowtail fish and a daikon radish in blender, the 3D modeling software. Why? Science still hasn’t progressed enough to answer that question, but taking buridaikon, a normal fish and vegetable dish, and engineering it into something so literally disturbing AND getting nearly 60,000 likes for it is the epitome of Japanese Twitter so… congratulations, maybe?

Reach Out and Touch Someone

https://twitter.com/tamayan22/status/1198640234273001472?s=20

In more Frankenstein news, on November 25, @tamayan22 posted a video to Twitter showing a… something put together from plastic and some random clothes in the vague shape of a woman. The twist came when the user put on VR goggles, revealing an image of a blushing anime girl that was projected onto the “sculpture.” This allowed them to “touch” a computer-generated person, which at least one of the tweet’s 44,000 fans will definitely use to do very “weird” “things” to what looks like plastic cola bottles in pantyhose.

Would You Call It a S’mocky?

Food hacks are as synonymous with the internet as unwanted political opinions from people you don’t know, and both of them are usually pure garbage. But leave it to Japanese Twitter user @sasara_miyako to find the one food hack that’s actually kind of genius: roasting marshmallows skewed on a chocolate Pocky stick. With the marshmallow, the melted chocolate and the crunchy biscuit, the entire thing essentially becomes an edible s’more skewer, which more than earns it the 135,000+ likes the tweet has already accumulated.

The Dragon Fruit Pee Challenge

If, however, you’re more in need of a food hack crossed with a bizarre internet challenge, then @ARuFa_FARu has got you covered. In a tweet from November 24, which currently has been liked 81,000 times, @ARuFa_FARu invented the Dragon Fruit Pee challenge. The rules are simple: you eat a bunch of Dragon Fruit (also known as Pitaya) until your urine changes color to slightly pinkish. Although, @ARuFa_FARu described it as more of a “Kirby color” because the entire experiment wasn’t weird enough as it was. Interestingly, if you desperately need to color your urine for reasons that we will not get into but are not a big fan of eating what looks like compacted watermelon, you can achieve the same urine-coloring effect by eating beetroot. Try it out, scare your doctor!*

* Please don’t.

What If The Pope Is Allergic to Cats?

During the past few days, Japanese Twitter was abuzz with news of the Pope’s visit to Japan. Well that and cats, but that’s always the case when it comes to the internet. So when @r2d2c3poacco managed to find a way to combine the two topics, it was obvious they had a viral hit on their hands. See, they discovered that, and this might get a bit technical, when you put a slipper on a cat’s head, it sort of looks like the Pope’s hat. Breakthrough stuff right there and a very worthy recipient of over 80,000 likes.