Randoseru / Nur Ilianis Adrian

Recently, when the school term started, the story of ‘Smiggle school bag’ went viral. Some kids were unhappy when some friends at school were talking about ‘Smiggle’, and this created tension among those who do not possess the fancy bags. For those who are unfamiliar, ‘Smiggle’ is a brand for school, lifestyle, and stationery product categories such as bags, lunchboxes, drink bottles, pencil cases, books, writing tools and a lot more! The prices of the ‘Smiggle’ school bags range between RM100 to RM300. This issue reminds me of the Japanese school bags. I still remember my trip to Japan in 2019. Before going to Japan, I tried googling on nice souvenirs to buy from Japan and I found ‘Randoseru’. I was so into this cool school backpack which I planned to use as my laptop bag and was determined to get one from there. Oh well, confidence is everything. The innocence me went to a few shops in Tokyo to find this ‘souvenir’ without knowing the price of it. It was not easy to find because I was there during the school holiday season and not many shops selling it at that time. Finally, I found it at one of the shops in Odaiba, my eyes were glued to the so called 'fictitious' price tags which eradicated me from having this cute boxy bag. The cheapest on the shelves was RM2000!!! I can buy a designer handbag with that price!! I was flabbergasted. Who on earth would spend that much money just for a school bag?? It was truly mind-boggling!! Do you think a kedekutist like me would spend a plethora of cash on that? Not in a million years! and so, I left the shop and kissed the ‘Randoseru ’ goodbye. Later that day, I talked to my Japanese friend and told him about this incident. He said, in Japan, usually, most kids are gifted that bag (often by grandparents) as a rite-of-passage when beginning elementary school. Gosh, 1 wish my grandparents would have done the same. Here is the Randoseru ’ that caught my attention. Now, tell me, how can I not fall in love with it?