Interest
Lucky Star Shrine's Otaku Matchmaking Events Lead to 1st Wedding
posted on by Egan Loo
After three years of hosting otaku matchmaking events, the "Lucky Star shrine" celebrated the first wedding of a couple who found each other through those events. 31-year-old Nari and 31-year-old Seira tied the knot at the shrine on Saturday.
The shrine appeared in Kyoto Animation's 2007 television adaptation of Kagami Yoshimizu's manga Lucky Star. It has since become a popular destination for anime fans, who make "pilgrimages" to the shrine.
After many visiting fans told the shrine staff in surveys that they were interested in marriage, the local neighborhood held its first "Ota-Konkatsu" matchmaking event in 2010. 386 males applied for 20 spots, and 115 females applied for 20 spots.
Nari and Seira met each other through the third matchmaking event in 2012, which featured cosplaying. When the matchmaking event organizers heard about their marriage registration last September, they offered to arrange a wedding ceremony at the shrine. The couple refused the generous offer several times at first, but eventually agreed.
Kaori Fukuhara, the voice of the character Tsukasa Hiiragi who works at the shrine, gave a personal message of blessing to the couple. Yoshimizu gave them a sketch as a surprise present.
The Mainichi Shimbun newspaper's Mantan Web site posted more photographs from the event.
Source: Mainichi Shimbun's Mantan Web
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