"Do sumo wrestlers have groupies?"

[Taro Toporific]

Musashimaru, Sumo's Ambassador-at-Large
Washington Post / Saturday, April 3, 2004; Page C01
... Do sumo wrestlers have groupies?
Musashimaru laughs.
"Yes -- many," says Suetsugu [Japan-America Society interpreter in Washington DC]. "Sumo wrestlers are like rock stars over there."
Musashimaru says something in Japanese..."He's telling a story about a fan or a groupie who came to the stable to get his signature," Suetsugu says.
Sumo wrestlers don't sign autographs, he explains, they make their signature with their own personal rubber stamp.
"This girl came to the stable to ask for his stamp," Hino says, translating Musashimaru's story. "And the piece of paper she had was a marriage certificate already filled out with her name and his name."
"He didn't even know this lady," Suetsugu adds, laughing. "She got crazy when he told her to go home. And she grabbed a golf club that was there and started swinging it. They had to call the police."

[kurohinge1]

Do Sumo have groupies?
Sumo Do Sumo Don't.


Certainly, since they stopped the sumos stage diving I think that the groupies are starting to recover in numbers.

[kamome]

Yukiko Hino, a tiny woman from the Japan-America Society, announces that Musashimaru prefers to conduct this interview in Japanese, so she will translate.

This is odd. Musashimaru, whose real name is Fiamalu Penitani, grew up in Hawaii. He played nose guard for his high school football team before he was recruited by Japanese sumo scouts impressed with his size, which was then a mere 290 pounds. Surely, he can speak English. Why use a translator?

"My English," he says, "is kinda rusty."

Musashimaru, 32, looks very serious. And he's not the kind of man you want to argue with, so the issue is settled: He'll answer the questions in Japanese.

This is bizarre. No matter how long you live in Japan, I don't think your English will get rusty. Can anybody explain this bit of weirdness to me?

[AssKissinger]

Yukiko Hino, a tiny woman from the Japan-America Society, announces that Musashimaru prefers to conduct this interview in Japanese, so she will translate.

This is bizarre. No matter how long you live in Japan, I don't think your English will get rusty. Can anybody explain this bit of weirdness to me?

He likes having this 'tiny woman' translator around (she probably blows the big man) so he sets her up with a pointless job where she gets paid to hang around him instead of him having to pick up the costs pf having her around. He doesn't wanna get broke and have to take ass-whippings on Pride or K-1 or whatever that shit Akebono's doing.

"Do sumo wrestlers have groupies?"

The smart ones do.