A white Japanese man, do you think this guy is for real?

[The Frankensteiner]

Apparently this man was adopted from the states into Japan when he was a baby. So he is Caucasian but sounds like a Japanese person, either he's for real or he does really great impersonations.

Anyways, he's trying to find his real parents who live in Los Angeles.
Here's his first video.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=awiW8UC3CWY

Now here is a video of him calling up some people in the search to find his parents. I find it really heart wrenching to watch this if he's for real, but if he's some guy just doing this for publicity then I'll be really pissed.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=fcGC-HpjnyE

What do you think?
Is he for real?

[Ulver_684]

how can you believe this? It seems pretty fake! This guy just want publicity and fame!

I want publicity and fame too but in another way I would make a video for youtube too! I am planning to cut my hair live like Britney Spears did live and post the video so the whole world knows me! So what you say ehhh? sounds crazy but at the end it would be good!

[NickT]

There are real white people raised in Japan, who speak Japanese like a native and speak English like this guy (with a horrible accent). But I don't beleive this guy is one of them. He sounds too fake. He speaks English pretty fluently really once he gets going, besides the accent, and he doesn't speak enough Japanese to convince me he actually speaks Japanese.

[Joey]

sounds pretty fake to me, especially his Japanese at the end of the first clip.
I guess his fake japanese accent when he is talking in english is somewhat believable but to me at least his japanese sounds pretty foreignish, esp around 2:18 with "kore kara, ganbarimasu"

I think this one gives him away also:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=J1o7tDCSr70

[Ulver_684]

sounds pretty fake to me, especially his Japanese at the end of the first clip.
I guess his fake japanese accent when he is talking in english is somewhat believable but to me at least his japanese sounds pretty foreignish, esp around 2:18 with "kore kara, ganbarimasu"

I think this one gives him away also:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=J1o7tDCSr70

He spoke better Chinese that Japanese and the coat fell on him about the critic of Rosie O'Donnell to the Chinese language!

Maybe he is a Chinese deccent not a Japanese deccent

[dmr214]

So not real...the first couple of sentences out of his mouth are ..."You are Thinking, WHAT!!! SHUT UP!!!"

Japanese folk would never say it like that!

[Ulver_684]

So not real...the first couple of sentences out of his mouth are ..."You are Thinking, WHAT!!! SHUT UP!!!"

Japanese folk would never say it like that!

Yes you're right! I definitive agree!

[Ryan_Maguire]

He's fake. His real name is DAVID URY, NOT Ken Tenaka. Here is his IMDB profile --> http://www.imdb.com/name/nm1352845/

[metablue]

Re his English - he sounds a bit French to me. Other than that, he doesn't sound like a native Japanese, but it's not a terrible fake accent.

Recently I watched a couple of old tv shows with white actors made up to be asian (one was a WWII propaganda film about the Japanese, and the other was a Doctor Who episode from the 70s(!) with some Chinese characters), and they sounded awful. I couldn't put my finger on what sounded so wrong, but there was something very off. By comparison, this guy is actually quite good.

[foxyshez]

Apparently this man was adopted from the states into Japan when he was a baby. So he is Caucasian but sounds like a Japanese person, either he's for real or he does really great impersonations.

Anyways, he's trying to find his real parents who live in Los Angeles.
Here's his first video.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=awiW8UC3CWY

Now here is a video of him calling up some people in the search to find his parents. I find it really heart wrenching to watch this if he's for real, but if he's some guy just doing this for publicity then I'll be really pissed.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=fcGC-HpjnyE

What do you think?
Is he for real?

NAH TOTALLY FAKE

but there are people like that. Mixed race Japanese sometimes hardly look Japanese-but they are/were raised in japan.

[maxiewawa]

I've listened to enough Japanese people speaking to know this guy is lying. Japanese don't gesture so much, point so much... the phrase "you are probably thinking" (when he said "you're probably thinking, rolled off his tongue too easily for it to be real... I'm picking on just four words, but such things are all through this video, and the others. I just picked on what he's saying as I type this.

He just can't keep up his accent enough for me to be convinced.

Funny though! I'm laughing at him more than with him though.

[Psy]

Hah, I had thought this topic was dead. He's a complete fake, though as a language learner I'd be glad to have that much control of my voice in emulating accents. I did like how he spoke proper Mandarin when doing his "impression." Somehow he annoys me less than some of those bloggers claiming "fluent" Japanese-- sure, they talk fluidly, but their actual output is... lacking.

At any rate, fully-caucasian Japanese is rare but it does happen, there are those I've met whom you'd never guess spent their entire childhoods in Japan.

[the_haunted_boy]

His voice makes him sound like an anime stereotype.

[untmdsprt]

NAH TOTALLY FAKE

but there are people like that. Mixed race Japanese sometimes hardly look Japanese-but they are/were raised in japan.

I teach a lot of students who are mixed and they look non-Japanese, but are totally Japanese from being raised here. All of the students I teach have poor English skills which tells me one parent certainly doesn't know English at a native level. Most know Spanish along with Japanese.

On the other hand, a cousin looks more Japanese but has a very high level of English because his dad is American, and everyone speaks English to the boy.