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Comment by lynguist | Hacker News Reader

If I can also make suggestions:

Osaka: Magical Shopping Arcade Abenobashi. You can see such shotengai in real life Osaka as well. Also uses exclusively Kansai-ben.

Hiroshima: In This Corner of the World. It made me cry 3 times!

Fukuoka: Manga Bambino! An Italian food manga with a ca. 22 year old protagonist. I dearly dearly loved this manga when I was around the same age. The protagonist is from Fukuoka. This manga was one of the reasons that inspired or motivated me to learn how to cook properly. I liked everything about it: the drawings, the story, the content, the characters, how to navigate the world as a young adult.

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Magical Shopping Arcade Abenobashi is probably under-appreciated, as it's overshadowed by some of the studio's more popular titles (including, of course, the juggernaut franchise of Evangelion). It's one of those works that feels inextricably linked to its setting; despite being another wildly imaginative Gainax series, the richness it draws from Kansai history and tradition is impressive.

A suggestion for Kyoto along similar lines: The Eccentric Family (both the original and sequel seasons).

Both the eccentric family and the night is long… are based on novels by Tomihiko Morimi, and have a similar flavor. He’s sort of a champion of an ideal of a magical Kyoto, centering around nightlife and private clubs. And I believe there is talk of a third novel of the Eccentric Family. I love the anime adaptations of his work, the novels themselves in translation I do not care for.

I loved In This Corner of the World! It's a really good take on WWII in Japan told from the eyes of an ordinary housewife in Hiroshima.

For Fukuoka, I also remembered that the recently aired Buddy Daddies is also set in Fukuoka. Two assassins end up taking custody of a little girl who is the kid of one of their targets. The kid is super innocent and cute, and from what I've seen, it's more about bringing up a kid (the checklist for things to prepare on day 1 of kindergarten seems very real) in Japan. Can recommend!

Seconding Magical Shopping Arcade Abenobashi, it's a great anime and as someone who lived in Kansai for a few years a while ago feels nostalgic.

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