toco toco — Season 1, Episode 21: Daijū Ishikawa, Hebocon creator and journalist

Episode synopsis

In today’s episode, Daijū Ishikawa will take us to the Cultural Center Tokyo Culture Culture situated in Odaiba and he will also introduce us the robot competition Hebocon of which he is the creator. Tokyo Culture Culture is a talk live house in Odaiba where are held events centered around a very specific theme. Today's theme is "dams", and it is the tenth times the event is held there. You can listen to guests talking about dams and its particularities while enjoying food and drinks. There is also a special menu created for the occasion such as the chicken curry rice in the shape of a dam or original cocktails like the "Dam Sour". You can always be surprised by the menu as it changes depending on the event theme. In the second part of the episode, Daijū Ishikawa is introducing us the robot competition called Hebocon that he created for people who have no technical skills. At first, he just wanted to make an exhibition of robots created by people with no skills but as it didn't gather much people, he decided to make it a competition, a battle of robots following the sumo rules. In Hebocon, there are all sorts of robots that shows how creative participants can be. The goal is not necessarily to win the competition but to have fun and to create the most poorly done robot that will catch everyone's attention by its somehow touching weakness.

About toco toco

toco toco is a program where Japanese artists and creators introduce places in Japan that inspire them. No scripted text or guidance, guests speak naturally and are free to choose any place they like. “toco toco” is the onomatopoeia to describe the sound of footsteps in Japanese, for the walks we go on together with our guests.

More episodes from Season 1

• E1Yusuke Shigeta, digital artist
• E2Soryo Matsumura, tea ceremony master
• E3Michihito Fujii, film director
• E4Hima://Kawagoe, illustrator
• E5Wagashi Asobi, Japanese traditional confectioners
• E6Professor Sakamoto, 8-bit musician
• E7Kyoka, electronic musician and artist
• E8Arisa Katayama, Walking Bicycle project leader
• E9Riyoo Kim, ceramic artist
• E10Fuyuki Kanai, illustrator and performer
• E11Ayaka Matsuno, cookie artist
• E12Montblancs, comedy duo