In Uchiko Town, Ehime Prefecture, there is an effort to decorate the audience seats with people drawn on cardboard in order to make the local cultural hall, which has a limited number of people to prevent infection with the new coronavirus, as lively as possible. It is done.
The Kyoseikan Hall in Uchiko Town has more than 530 seats, but to prevent infection, only half of the seats can be accommodated now.
Therefore, the town officials planned to draw a figure of a person on paper and decorate the seat instead of the audience to make it lively so that the people on the stage would not feel lonely.
This is called a "customer chama" doll, and is handmade one by one by children and the elderly in the town using cardboard discarded by the company.
At the children's house in the town, children used crayons and paints to imagine the smiling audience.
An elementary school girl said, "I drew a picture of my mom. It was fun."
The goal of 250 "Customer Chama" dolls is currently under construction and will be installed in the hall from the end of this month.
Michitaka Inazuki, the director of the Iwasaki Autonomous Center, said, "I started thinking that I wanted to make the number of people positive. I want people to enjoy it because each one has a different facial expression."