Doc Type（書類）: Public Presentation（公開したプレゼン）
Date（日付）: Oct. 4, 2022
Subject（件名）: t.U.N.A. / UNITED NEKO ALLIANCE Origin
Attn（宛先）: Members
Cross Reference : Public Presentation, Origin, Mission
Filing Code : OR104/lk98tt - Post004
（日本語は下記にある。Japanese follows below）
The following contains some important background information about UNITED NEKO ALLIANCE and their relationship to the MANEKI NEKO. It’s a transcript in English of the Japanese presentation by team members of UNITED NEKO ALLIANCE made at the “CAWA Tokyo 2022” event in October 2022:
Of course you all know about MANEKI NEKO.
Even around the world they are quite well-known as Lucky Cats.
However, few people know any details about MANEKI NEKO other than that the right paw raised means beckoning money and the left paw raised means beckoning customers.
But that is really just the pose they take when they are working.
Did you ever stop to think about where the cats learned their art of beckoning?
Some of you have probably heard rumors.
But it’s really rare to meet anyone with direct contact of NYANJUTSU (ニャン術)
More correctly it’s called Shōdō (招道), which comes from SHOU as in MANEKU and DO as in JUDO).
For hundreds of years, maybe longer, the art of beckoning has been passed down often through NEKO families. Until recently, it wasn’t unusual to find a 8th or 9th generation MANEKI NEKO.
But recently the number of MANEKI NEKO is dwindling.
The young cats are no longer willing to go through the intense training, only to spend their days after the training finishes in a shop with their paw raised beckoning good fortune all day long.
They want to move to the big city and go work in a NEKO CAFE where they can lay around all day and get all kinds of attention from customers paying to spend time and fawn over them.
The meaning of SHODO GIJUTSU (Art of beckoning) has been diluted as well.
The art of beckoning has been primarily adopted by businesses, and as such, has become all about money,
The right paw beckons money and the left paw beckons customers who bring money.
But the really meaning is actually about EN (fate) or KIZUNA.
The left paw beckons new encounters with people... EN or KIZUNA...
It’s like that feeling you get when you meet someone new and you know that encounter is important.
And the right paw is the physical manifestation of EN.
Anyway the dwindling numbers of MANEKI NEKO is startling and a real problem.
A small group of NEKO have decided that the arts are in danger and the only way to keep them alive is to open up the arts and teach everyone the art of beckoning. They need to keep their identity secret because the MANEKI NEKO establishment is against this idea and wants to stop them.
So what is a way to reach people around the world while still keeping their identity secret?
Of course, the answer is through NFTs and Web3.
That’s what the UNITED NEKO ALLIANCE really is about.
Everything mentioned earlier about the activities of UNITED NEKO ALLIANCE is a front.
It’s all real, but it’s a front for the secret activities.
We are holding secret meetings... on Twitter Spaces.
Gradually we are recruiting more NEKOs and more humans to help.
Artists are collaborating to help us provide the NFTs that can be used by the NEKOs to keep their identity secret.
As we announce the new NEKO members in the Twitter spaces we’ll drop some NFTs and get humans to join.
The humans who hold these NFTs are like DESHI (apprentices), but we don’t talk about that.
This is the way that we can continue to do both public facing and secret activities.
The “front” activity of telling the world about creators in Japan and NFT projects in Japan, building a community of people who love NFTs/Web3 & Japan.
At the same time we will recruit more NEKOs to keep NYANJUTSU alive,
more collaboration artists to help us provide NFT identities for those NEKOs,
and more humans to hold those NFTs and spread the art of NYANJUTSU.
この投稿は、CAWA Tokyo 2022で行われた日本語のプレゼンテーションの英訳です。日本語版は下に埋め込まれたYouTubeビデオでオリジナルのプレゼンテーションをご覧ください。プレゼンのスタートは49:37からです。