What is Hello Kitty / Oh Yeah I'm in Japan?

It is a four-panel exploitable furry webcomic by Reddit artist brunorust in which a corgi greets a black cat, realizes he is in Japan, and switches to a Japanese greeting.

Where did Hello Kitty / Oh Yeah I'm in Japan come from?

brunorust posted it to r/furry on November 27, 2019, under the title "living in Japan in a nutshell", and it went viral after a crosspost to r/furry_irl.

What does the Hello Kitty comic mean?

The joke is a double-take: panel two has the corgi catch himself and redo his greeting to match the local culture, so edits swap in whichever country, state, or city the poster wants to mock or celebrate.

How do you use the Hello Kitty format?

People typically keep the four-panel structure, rewrite panel two to name their own location, and change the bottom panels to show regional slang, visuals, or paraphernalia such as the ones in Australia_irl and michigan_irl.

Is the Hello Kitty meme still popular?

The bulk of its activity was a late-November 2019 run on r/furry_irl, where commenters were already predicting a "deadhorselist" ban within two days of the first edits.

Hello Kitty

2019exploitable four-panel webcomicclassic

Published November 15, 2026

On November 27, 2019, Reddit artist brunorust posted a four-panel furry comic in which a corgi greets a black cat, realizes he is in Japan, and switches to a Japanese good-morning. Within two days, r/furry_irl users were swapping the second panel for their own country, state, or city, turning the gag into one of the subreddit's most-copied templates of late 20191 2.

exploitable templates furry fandom memes webcomic memes subreddit origin memes stereotype memes

Overview

Hello Kitty / Oh Yeah, I'm in Japan is a four-panel exploitable in which an anthropomorphic corgi greets a passing black cat in English, catches himself with "Oh wait… I'm in Japan…" in the second panel, then redoes the greeting in romanized Japanese. The cat answers in the final panel with a sideways V sign, a wink, and a "Nyaaa…" emoticon1.

Edits keep the double-take structure and swap the location text in panel two, along with the slang, visuals, and sometimes props in the bottom half of the comic. Entries for Australia, Michigan, Britain, and Alberta each redrew backgrounds with regional landmarks or paraphernalia so the joke landed on local in-group humor rather than language play3 4 5. The template works because the beat is portable: any culture with a distinctive greeting, dialect, or stereotype fits the second-panel correction.

Gallery

Origin & Background

Platform

Reddit (r/furry origin, r/furry_irl viral spread)

Creator

brunorust

Date

2019

Reddit user brunorust published the original comic, titled "living in Japan in a nutshell," to r/furry on November 27, 2019. It picked up more than 3,500 upvotes at 91% approval and about 70 comments inside a week1. A crosspost to the furry meme subreddit r/furry_irl appeared the same week and pulled over 1,100 upvotes at 99% approval, which is where the exploitable chain actually started2 10.

How It Spread

One of the first regional edits, Australia_irl, landed in r/furry_irl shortly after the crosspost and drew over 3,600 upvotes at 95% approval with 100 comments in its first week3. michigan_irl, britian_irl, and an Alberta🍁irl entry followed within days, each pulling hundreds of karma and mixing the second-panel correction with state or province references instead of a country4 5 6.

By November 29, 2019, the format was saturated enough that r/furry_irl users were making meta edits. A "furry_irl" version set the location of panel two as the subreddit itself and used the bottom half to point out how everywhere the comic suddenly was; commenters openly wondered whether mods would add it to the subreddit's "deadhorselist" to block future posts7. Others riffed on the exploitable idea through adjacent formats, including a "memes_irl" screenshot of the front page and a loss_irl entry that tied the comic back to an older Reddit joke8 9. The same day, brunorust posted to r/furry_irl to thank the subreddit for the reception10.

Timeline

2019-11-27

Brunorust posts "living in Japan in a nutshell" to r/furry; the four-panel comic hits 3,500+ upvotes in under a week.

2019-11-27

The comic is crossposted to r/furry_irl as Japan_irl and clears 1,100 upvotes at 99% approval.

2019-11-28

Australia_irl, among the earliest regional edits, reaches 3,600+ upvotes with 100 comments.

2019-11-28

Michigan_irl, britian_irl, and Alberta🍁irl appear, moving the format from countries to states and provinces.

2019-11-29

A self-referential "furry_irl" edit calls out how saturated the subreddit is with the format; brunorust posts a public thank-you the same day.