It is never easy to remember the names of all the people you meet at a party, except in Tokyo where, on Saturday, the 178 guests were all called Hirokazu Tanaka, gathered to beat the record held until then by 164 Martha Stewart.
From 3-year-old Hirokazu Tanaka to 80-year-old Hirokazu Tanaka to Hirokazu Tanaka from Hanoi, they all wore the same name t-shirt and sat in a crowded theater for 5 minutes, according to the rules of the Guiness, before an official of the organization formalizes the new record.
“I would never have expected us to break such a ridiculous record,” said Hirokazu Tanaka, 53, the man behind the rally, after years of effort and two failures.
To distinguish the 178 Hirokazu Tanaka, each of them had been assigned a pseudonym inspired by their hobbies, profession or favorite dish. Also, the crowd was able to greet, as soon as they arrived, Hirokazu Tanaka “sunglasses”, Hirokazu Tanaka “chewing gum” and Hirokazu Tanaka “triathlon”. The founder of Tanaka was baptized “semi-leader”.
The world record for the “largest gathering of people with the same first and last name” was previously held by 164 Martha Stewart who met on the set of a television show in New York in 2005.
The calling of the new record-breaker dates back to 1994, when he heard on the news from baseball prodigy, Hirokazu Tanaka, and felt the “tremendous joy” of sharing the name he had previously considered commonplace. .
Twice, the record attempt failed, notably in 2017 when only 87 of them met.
But a silver lining appeared when Guinness clarified that the gist of the name is pronounced “Hirokazu Tanaka”, regardless of whether the Japanese characters used to write it differ somewhat.
A 179th namesake, Hirokazu Tanaka “mini-van” should have been on the record, but he died of Covid-19 last year, his father Suzuko Tanaka told AFP. “He was always up for the events organized by this group”, he says, “he would have been very happy today”.
