Speaker 1: I guess what will What's that? So I was thinking
Speaker 1: about this old story. I read an esquire where this
Speaker 1: NBA player was talking about how he talked trash and
Speaker 1: to make the experience even worse for his opponents, he
Speaker 1: would eat raw onions before a game. Not only was
Speaker 1: his like mouth smelly, but his entire body which is
Speaker 1: reek of onions. And obviously people wouldn't want to get
Speaker 1: as close to him. I mean, as if the trash
Speaker 1: talking wasn't bad enough to have to deal with that smell.
Speaker 1: And actually, I feel like it would almost be even
Speaker 1: worse if instead of talking, he just kind of went
Speaker 1: near them and just was like breathing like my glass
Speaker 1: to them. Anyway, that's so weird, It is gross and ridiculous.
Speaker 1: But you know, I was reading up on Ninja's and
Speaker 1: ninja diets on Atlas Obscura, and this is the total
Speaker 1: opposite of that. So Ninjas would actually avoid eating any
Speaker 1: smelly foods because they were supposed to be completely undetectable
Speaker 1: even by smell. So think about things like garlic, leeks, onions.
Speaker 1: Those were all off the table also since they had
Speaker 1: to be super agile. You know, Ninja's had this ironclad
Speaker 1: ruled that they couldn't weigh more than a hundred thirty pounds.
Speaker 1: And because they'd be lurking in shadows, you know, just
Speaker 1: waiting for the right opportunity, they'd take these homemade hunger
Speaker 1: pills with them, that's what they'd call them, so that
Speaker 1: they're you know, stomachs wouldn't start growling and give them away.
Speaker 1: And one of these pills was made from yams um,
Speaker 1: also a bit of cinnamon rice lotus pips, and and
Speaker 1: there was another snack ball made of pine bark gin
Speaker 1: seng in white rice. And well, I don't think anyone's
Speaker 1: gonna go on the ninja diet anytime soon exactly. You know.
Speaker 1: Reading about this did make me wonder, like what else
Speaker 1: don't we know about ninja's Why did so many of
Speaker 1: them keep crickets as pets, Like why were they staring
Speaker 1: into cat's eyes? Why did they keep pocket change on them?
Speaker 1: You know? And and also does the ninja shark live
Speaker 1: up to its reputations? So let's tag in a their podcast. Listeners,
Speaker 1: Welcome to Part Time Genius. I'm Will Pearson, and as
Speaker 1: always I'm joined by my good friend Manges Ticketer. And
Speaker 1: on the other side, of the soundproof glass Mango. All week,
Speaker 1: I've been excited to see what Tristan would be doing.
Speaker 1: I thought maybe he would be hidden and we wouldn't
Speaker 1: see him the entire episode pulling off the Ninja thing.
Speaker 1: But instead he's showing off his pirate costume again for
Speaker 1: some reason. Anyway, that's our friend and producer Tristan McNeil.
Speaker 1: I'm not really sure what's going on here because today's
Speaker 1: show is all about Ninja's. Do you think he just
Speaker 1: missed the memo or what? You know? I asked him
Speaker 1: earlier and he said he's just showing his love for
Speaker 1: the team. You know, I guess when it comes to
Speaker 1: this eternal debate over who's cooler pirates are Ninja's, Tristan
Speaker 1: is a friendly team Pirate all the way. Wow. Well,
Speaker 1: we'll have to see if today's show brings him around
Speaker 1: at all, because I'm just gonna come out and say
Speaker 1: that I am team Ninja all the way here. Yeah,
Speaker 1: I mean too. You know, pirates are cool, but to me,
Speaker 1: they feel like loudmouths. You know, they're like brash and
Speaker 1: and you know, like Ninja's are so calm and collected
Speaker 1: and stealthy, and they use like smart tricks, like misdirection.
Speaker 1: You know, it feels like the two camps couldn't be
Speaker 1: anymore different. No, I agree completely, But you know, if
Speaker 1: pirates and ninjas do have one thing in common is
Speaker 1: that both groups are pretty misunderstood. You know, in our
Speaker 1: Pirate episode, we talked about how most of what we
Speaker 1: know about pirates really comes from popular fiction instead of
Speaker 1: things like historical accounts, And it's actually the same story
Speaker 1: when it comes to ninja's, Like, we know them mostly
Speaker 1: as these masked characters that Chuck Narris fights off in
Speaker 1: his movies, or I don't know, as these pizza loving
Speaker 1: mutant turtles. But you know, I hate to disappoint you,
Speaker 1: those portrayals are not actually rooted in reality. So for
Speaker 1: today's episode, we thought it'd be fun to peer into
Speaker 1: the shadows surrounding ninja history and and really kind of
Speaker 1: see if we can get a better idea of what
Speaker 1: these legendary warriors were really like. So we'll talk about
Speaker 1: where ninjas came from, what kinds of missions they carried out,
Speaker 1: as well as some of the coolest ninja skills, and
Speaker 1: you know, the equipment you've probably never heard about. So
Speaker 1: why don't we start with wine ninjas are so mysterious
Speaker 1: in the first place, and why it's likely that they
Speaker 1: always will be. One thing I noticed while researching is
Speaker 1: that even when ninja's were at their peak in Japan,
Speaker 1: and this was in the early sixteenth century, nobody really
Speaker 1: knew that much about them. And it makes sense because
Speaker 1: ninja's were spies for the most part, so of course,
Speaker 1: you know, they had to keep a low profile. They
Speaker 1: didn't talk about their work, you know, especially with anyone
Speaker 1: outside their clan. But rumors still swirled about these secretive warriors,
Speaker 1: and as a result, ninja's became steeped in superstition pretty
Speaker 1: much from the start. For instance, some Japanese folklore claims
Speaker 1: that ninjas descended from a demon that was half man
Speaker 1: and half crow, and most villagers during the Ninja Age
Speaker 1: belief that ninja's possessed all sorts of supernatural powers, like
Speaker 1: everything from shape shifting to invisibility to the power to
Speaker 1: walk through walls. And if you think about it, those
Speaker 1: kinds of superpowers are pretty easy to arrive at when
Speaker 1: you look at some of the methods ninjas used, like
Speaker 1: they'd often disguise themselves on missions they were masters of concealment.
Speaker 1: They could break into an enemy's house or infiltrate a
Speaker 1: fortress with the ease, and with a little bit of imagination,
Speaker 1: you've got a ninja that can shape shift or walk
Speaker 1: through walls. It makes sense. Yeah, and it actually sounds
Speaker 1: a lot like what happened with pirates, like the way
Speaker 1: all these embellished stories and tall tales kind of sprang
Speaker 1: up right alongside them and and then later became just
Speaker 1: the accepted truth. Yeah, it's interesting because Ninja's capitalized on
Speaker 1: their own legends the same way pirates did. Like Ninja's
Speaker 1: actually encouraged all these rumors because they knew the inaccurate
Speaker 1: reports would make them seem more dangerous to enemies, and
Speaker 1: it was also a great way to muddy the waters
Speaker 1: and further conceal who they were and how they functioned.
Speaker 1: Of course, there's a downside to that, and that's that
Speaker 1: no one actually corrected the falsehoods, and as a result,
Speaker 1: even written accounts from the era tend to be exaggerated,
Speaker 1: which makes it tough to distinguish between fact and fiction.
Speaker 1: You know, we only have three or four manuals supposedly
Speaker 1: written by Ninja masters, and this was shortly after their
Speaker 1: fall from power in the late sixteenth century, and because
Speaker 1: they were written after the fact, it's possible those are
Speaker 1: inaccurate as well. Yeah, that's true. But just like with pirates,
Speaker 1: there are at least a few things we know that
Speaker 1: you know, we're true about ninja history. For instance, we
Speaker 1: actually know a good bit about where ninja practices first
Speaker 1: came from, and surprisingly much of that philosophy comes from China,
Speaker 1: not not from Japan. And in the fourth or fifth
Speaker 1: century BC suns who wrote his famous Battle Guy The
Speaker 1: Art of War, which includes this section extolling the virtue
Speaker 1: of stealth and surprise, which are of course the backbone
Speaker 1: of ninja training. So just to make sure I have
Speaker 1: what you're saying is right. You know, you're saying that
Speaker 1: a lot of the ideas of what it is to
Speaker 1: be a ninja actually come from Chinese philosophy, but the
Speaker 1: Japanese were the ones who actually put them into practice. Yeah,
Speaker 1: that seems to be the case. And you know, most
Speaker 1: historians now agree that ninja practices originated in central Japan
Speaker 1: during the early Middle Ages, and that was a period
Speaker 1: when the country was really being picked apart by war lords.
Speaker 1: Now luckily for would be ninjas. The warlords were mostly
Speaker 1: interested in the more developed areas of Japan, and that
Speaker 1: meant that the rural regions often went overlooked and were
Speaker 1: typically warlord free. And so those two factors combined to
Speaker 1: create these prime conditions for the birth of ninja's. Is
Speaker 1: that another reason why ninjas are still such a mystery, Like,
Speaker 1: not only did they keep their practices secret, but they
Speaker 1: kind of developed in isolation. Yeah, that's right. And you know,
Speaker 1: to be specific on this, they developed in two such regions.
Speaker 1: There was Ega and Coca. Now, both of these were
Speaker 1: especially remote and almost completely undeveloped, so there were no
Speaker 1: warlords there, and that's exactly how the people liked it,
Speaker 1: so much so that the villages began to organize themselves,
Speaker 1: like these self defense communes. And because they had neither
Speaker 1: the numbers nor the weapon read award off invaders with
Speaker 1: any sort of real force, the residents focused instead on
Speaker 1: these survival techniques, things like stealth, disguise, evasion, misdirection, you know,
Speaker 1: all the basic ninjas stuff. Yeah, And so as their
Speaker 1: skills developed, these travelers started telling stories and pretty soon
Speaker 1: these early ninja's were being hired as mercenaries all over
Speaker 1: the country. Yeah, and I think the mercenary role is
Speaker 1: really worth lingering on for a second, because one of
Speaker 1: the biggest misconceptions, at least I had about ninja's is
Speaker 1: that there were some kind of elite fighting force, And
Speaker 1: the truth is that ninja's mostly acted as medieval secret agents.
Speaker 1: They were like hired by lords to spy on their
Speaker 1: enemies and report back with intel or sometimes assassinated target.
Speaker 1: But they occasionally acted as bodyguards. Still, they're they were
Speaker 1: mostly providing spy work for the battlefield, but you know,
Speaker 1: they were never traditional soldiers or warriors. And in fact,
Speaker 1: ninjas didn't even receive formal martial arts raining. All right,
Speaker 1: So what about those classes that people take where you
Speaker 1: learn to defend yourselves, you know, supposedly like a ninja ninjatsu.
Speaker 1: I think it's called isn't that a martial art? It's
Speaker 1: not really a traditional martial art. You know. All that
Speaker 1: came well after the ninja's fell from power, and it
Speaker 1: was never part of their real training. In fact, most
Speaker 1: ninja's learned self defense during childhood from their family members,
Speaker 1: but from their adult training would really focus more on
Speaker 1: infiltration techniques. Gymnastics, as well as these more esoteric topics
Speaker 1: things like chemistry, weather, psychology. You've got to remember, ninjas
Speaker 1: were mostly hired to gather information and survive long enough
Speaker 1: to report back, and the whole point was not to
Speaker 1: be seen and not to get caught. So fighting wasn't
Speaker 1: actually a big part of the playbook, like most of
Speaker 1: that was kind of a last resort in case things
Speaker 1: went wrong. Well that makes sense, you know, since we're
Speaker 1: talking about the importance of not being seen. I do
Speaker 1: want to mention another common misconception that most of us have,
Speaker 1: which is what ninja's wore on their mission. So you
Speaker 1: know how ninjas are always depicted, you know, in these
Speaker 1: all black, skin tight uniforms and the ones with hooded
Speaker 1: mask where you can really just see their eyes. Well,
Speaker 1: it turns out that the ninjas didn't have standard uniforms
Speaker 1: like that at all, So most of the time they
Speaker 1: were just in normal civilian clothing like anybody else. And
Speaker 1: that's because ninjas often had to go deep undercover for
Speaker 1: their missions. So as an example, warlords would frequently hire
Speaker 1: ninjas to infiltrate another organization, and to do so, the
Speaker 1: ninjas would disguise themselves, as you know, people like gardeners
Speaker 1: or construction workers, you know, just anybody who might blend
Speaker 1: in around a palace and not draw attention to themselves,
Speaker 1: which you know makes sense. But how did those ninjas
Speaker 1: sneak back to their warlords without blowing their covers? I
Speaker 1: found this interesting because they would actually do this by
Speaker 1: adopting a different cover, and the most popular choice was
Speaker 1: to dress up like a monk, because monks were actually
Speaker 1: one of the few groups who were allowed to pass
Speaker 1: freely between these various warring states in Japan at the time,
Speaker 1: So anytime a ninja needed to report back to a
Speaker 1: different province, they just slip on their monk disguise and
Speaker 1: cross over the border. That's fascinating. You know, when I
Speaker 1: was in Tibet and studying about Tibetan culture and stuff,
Speaker 1: Tibet was also one of these very secretive regions, and
Speaker 1: the only way spies would come through and sort of
Speaker 1: catalog what was there was dressed as monks, and they
Speaker 1: would use their rosaries to count steps, so they knew
Speaker 1: like the steps to various places, you know, and and
Speaker 1: that's how they count distances and stuff. And it's pretty fascinating.
Speaker 1: That the monk disguises such a great disguise. But you know,
Speaker 1: it is a shame to me that these ninja's didn't
Speaker 1: put on like their black cloaks and just sneak back
Speaker 1: in the middle of the night. You know, if Tristan
Speaker 1: had done his homework, he probably would be dressed up
Speaker 1: as a monk today instead. And I will say, I mean,
Speaker 1: I want the ninja uniform to be true as much
Speaker 1: as you do, but it does seem like history is
Speaker 1: not on our side with this one. But that being said,
Speaker 1: ninjas did go on plenty of these one night missions,
Speaker 1: and when they did, what they were was not all
Speaker 1: that dissimilar from what we like to imagine. I mean,
Speaker 1: there are a couple of key differences. First was that
Speaker 1: those real stealth ninja outfits were not skin tight. I mean,
Speaker 1: the ninjas had to perform all these acrobatics to get
Speaker 1: in and out of these buildings without being seen, so
Speaker 1: it was better to have clothing that breathed a little
Speaker 1: bit and would allow for a good degree of movement.
Speaker 1: And then second, black wouldn't have been their color of choice,
Speaker 1: not only because it would have been difficult to achieve
Speaker 1: because of the dyes that were available at the time,
Speaker 1: but black also tends to reflect moonlight, which would definitely
Speaker 1: be a no no on these night missions. So instead,
Speaker 1: historians believe Ninja's were dark brown or navy blue clothes
Speaker 1: when they were doing these late night scouting missions. I
Speaker 1: like that they were both fashionable and practical too. You Know,
Speaker 1: one thing I've been thinking about is that people usually
Speaker 1: think of Ninja's and samurai as polar opposites, and to
Speaker 1: a certain extent, that makes sense. Like Samurai had really
Speaker 1: bold personalities, they were pretty renowned for their toughness and
Speaker 1: their bravado. Plus they dressed really, really colorfully. And meanwhile,
Speaker 1: Ninjas were secretive and mostly out for themselves. They practiced
Speaker 1: deception and stealth, then avoided combat whenever possible. You know,
Speaker 1: the demeanor and tactics of the two groups couldn't have
Speaker 1: been more far apart. But at the same time, that
Speaker 1: disparity actually turned off a lot of Japanese citizens. They
Speaker 1: were used to the explicit bravery and the undying loyalty
Speaker 1: of the samurai. I mean, that was their measure of
Speaker 1: a warrior, not this like stealthy, underhanded stuff that Ninja's
Speaker 1: were doing. So did people not think much of ninjas
Speaker 1: at the time, not at first, apparently, like they eventually
Speaker 1: came around over time, samurais and warlords both kind of
Speaker 1: realized the value of these covert operations and that it
Speaker 1: was useful for winning battles or whatever. But you know,
Speaker 1: it wasn't uncommon to see ninjas and samurai on the
Speaker 1: same side of the battlefield, and some people can practice
Speaker 1: both professions, like you have a samurai by day and
Speaker 1: ninja by night, which just feels like a great business card. Well,
Speaker 1: and even though what they wore was drastically different, Samurai
Speaker 1: ninjas did use some of the same equipment, didn't they.
Speaker 1: Like I read somewhere that they both used that same
Speaker 1: kind of sword, like the katana, I think, right, that's right.
Speaker 1: So the main difference was that samurai wore the swords
Speaker 1: on the hips, while ninja's carried them on their backs,
Speaker 1: which obviously seems like the way to go for someone
Speaker 1: who's always like climbing on walls and jumping across rooftops.
Speaker 1: And you know, the katana was a part of some
Speaker 1: ninja missions, but mostly they preferred to carry shorter and
Speaker 1: less conspicuous blades. Actually, I kind of want to stick
Speaker 1: with this subject and talk a little bit more about
Speaker 1: some of the lesser known gear that Ninja carried around
Speaker 1: with them. But before we do that, let's take a
Speaker 1: quick break. You're listening to Part Time Genius and we're
Speaker 1: talking about the surprising truths behind the Ninja legend. Alright, Mango, So,
Speaker 1: I know one thing we were both scared to find
Speaker 1: out this week, I mean really scared to find out
Speaker 1: is whether or not Ninja's actually used throwing stars. I
Speaker 1: know we talked about this as we were prepping for
Speaker 1: the episode, and I feel like I've been mentally preparing
Speaker 1: all week in case you decided to ruin my life
Speaker 1: by telling me that Ninja's didn't use throwing stars. Well
Speaker 1: I've got good news, because yes, Ninja's absolutely used throwing stars.
Speaker 1: They you know, those pointed stars were used to seeing
Speaker 1: We're part of a broader class of weapon called shuriken,
Speaker 1: and it's a term that covers any kind of throwing weapon,
Speaker 1: including stars, or flat knives, darts, wooden sticks, or actually
Speaker 1: even coins. Wait, did you say coins, like like people
Speaker 1: could just take coins out and throw them at their enemies. Well,
Speaker 1: I mean it sounds like they did this and you know,
Speaker 1: this is actually where reality maybe differs a little bit
Speaker 1: from the fictional ninjas, because real ninjas didn't really use
Speaker 1: these like an offensive weapon all that often, so instead
Speaker 1: they would take these shur akens. Is kind of a
Speaker 1: distraction or delaying tactics. So let's say you've got a
Speaker 1: ninja that's hiding in the shadows and a nearby guard
Speaker 1: was getting a little too close, so he might be
Speaker 1: able to throw a coin or a knife in the
Speaker 1: opposite direction and get the guard to follow that sound.
Speaker 1: So yeah, of course, if a ninja was discovered, then
Speaker 1: these could also be used more defensively. You know. For example,
Speaker 1: if a guard charged toward them, ninjas could buy some
Speaker 1: time by forcing their enemies to dodge or block a
Speaker 1: bunch of projectiles, and those few seconds could be just
Speaker 1: what the ninja needed to either amount a stronger attack,
Speaker 1: or in most cases, you know, plot an escape route.
Speaker 1: That's interesting and I think I like that explanation even
Speaker 1: better than just throwing fistful of coins at someone. But yeah,
Speaker 1: I am curious, like why would they bother with something
Speaker 1: as unwieldy as a throwing star if the intention is
Speaker 1: just distraction? Right, Like, like I mean the other stuff
Speaker 1: you mentioned makes sense, But throwing stars have a ton
Speaker 1: of sharp points. They kind of feel like a liability,
Speaker 1: Like if I was reaching into my pocket, I'd be
Speaker 1: worried I'd be cutting my finger every time I reached
Speaker 1: for one. And that's why you're not an engine. But
Speaker 1: I mean, you know, I can tell you that these
Speaker 1: throwing stars were considered actually a little bit easier to
Speaker 1: throw than some of the other shure it can like,
Speaker 1: you know, the flat throwing knives, And that's because the
Speaker 1: stars have these multiple points that spin when they're in flight,
Speaker 1: and it actually makes it a little bit easier to
Speaker 1: aim these things and throw these things. And plus it
Speaker 1: likely didn't hurt that a bunch of spinning blades makes
Speaker 1: for a pretty menacing site when it's coming right at you. Yeah,
Speaker 1: that makes sense, you know. I I know, we wanted
Speaker 1: to talk about some of the weirder skills and gadgets
Speaker 1: that Ninja's had at the disposal, but really quickly I
Speaker 1: did want to mention a few other blades that Ninja's
Speaker 1: put to good use. So first up, there's the Kusara gama,
Speaker 1: which was the small sickle with the chain on the
Speaker 1: end of the handle. And this was especially helpful for
Speaker 1: ninja's who were undercover because this is actually a farming tool,
Speaker 1: so if a ninja was caught with one, he could
Speaker 1: just claim to be a gardener. And then the other blades,
Speaker 1: like I wanted to talk about, where the kunai, and
Speaker 1: these are little daggers which were borrowed from another sort
Speaker 1: of harmless trade masonry in this case, and they were
Speaker 1: shaped like trowels, only a little bit sharper, and the
Speaker 1: ninja used this for scaling walls rather than fighting, like
Speaker 1: they would infiltrate a castle by pulling out their kunai
Speaker 1: and then climbing way up the wall by digging holes
Speaker 1: into the plaster as they went. That's pretty neat, And
Speaker 1: you know, it was really surprising when we found out
Speaker 1: just like all of the unusual or unique things that
Speaker 1: they would find to be able to use as tools
Speaker 1: and their utility bill But I know we both found
Speaker 1: a lot of stuff that ninja's relied on that that
Speaker 1: honestly feels even stranger than that. And there's one I
Speaker 1: definitely want to talk about, and it's a particularly helpful
Speaker 1: ninja skill, and it's the ability to tell time from
Speaker 1: looking to a cat's eyes. Now something I would never do,
Speaker 1: but I respect this skill and this is a real thing.
Speaker 1: I'm not making this up. It's called nikom jutsu, and
Speaker 1: it's based on the fact that cats have these especially
Speaker 1: sensitive eyes, including these pupils that can drastically change in
Speaker 1: size throughout the day and response to changing light. And
Speaker 1: so Ninja's would spend a lot of time apparently staring
Speaker 1: into cat's eyes because they were able to determine the
Speaker 1: time of day down to the exact hour just by
Speaker 1: looking at these cats pupils. So weird, Yeah, I know,
Speaker 1: it really is. It is. And you know, for all
Speaker 1: of our more cat inclined listeners out there that want
Speaker 1: to give this a shot and report back, you should
Speaker 1: know that a cat's pupils start out super round in
Speaker 1: the early morning, and then they begin to narrow to
Speaker 1: like more of an oval shape as the sun climbs
Speaker 1: higher in the sky. And then the pupils reach their
Speaker 1: narrowest at noon, when they basically look like those thin
Speaker 1: straight lines we sometimes picture as cat eyes, and they
Speaker 1: gradually start to widen as the afternoon goes on. And
Speaker 1: so if you really want to get precise about this,
Speaker 1: you can search online for cat's eyes sun dial and
Speaker 1: become a nakoma jutsu master yourself. That's funny. So you
Speaker 1: can actually like look at a cat print advertisement until
Speaker 1: exactly when it was shot by looking at the That's crazy.
Speaker 1: You know. I feel like telling the time by your
Speaker 1: cat's eyes is somehow both the dorky ist and kind
Speaker 1: of the most impressive thing I've heard about ninjas today,
Speaker 1: I think so. So this next skill doesn't involve seeing
Speaker 1: like a cat. It is more about moving like one.
Speaker 1: It's called taihn jitsu, and it's basically the art of
Speaker 1: quieting your movements because obviously ninjas have to sneak around
Speaker 1: a lot, and that's kind of a big part of
Speaker 1: the job. So they grew adept at all kinds of
Speaker 1: noise canceling practices, like absorbing their falls or rebounding off
Speaker 1: something quietly, or just softening their footsteps by walking on
Speaker 1: the out soles of the feet and keeping their knees
Speaker 1: bent as they did. You know, ninja's had become such
Speaker 1: masters a quiet movement that it really freaked out war lords,
Speaker 1: and warlords started building houses with these floors that were
Speaker 1: prone to squeaking, just so a ninja couldn't sneak up
Speaker 1: on them. And that wasn't all either, Like some warlords
Speaker 1: hired these bodyguards to watch them sleep every night and
Speaker 1: even demanded that all members of the household where baggy
Speaker 1: clothes so that they would drag along the floor and
Speaker 1: just make noise wherever they went. Yeah, you know, these
Speaker 1: guys sound pretty paranoid for a bunch of warlords. It's
Speaker 1: it's a little strange, but you know, I actually came
Speaker 1: across another technique that Ninja's used to mask their movements,
Speaker 1: and this one's pretty ingenious if you ask me so. Apparently,
Speaker 1: when Ninja's needed to travel silently through a forest or
Speaker 1: make their way through an enemy camp, they would actually
Speaker 1: bring along with them a small box or jar of
Speaker 1: live crickets, and so the noise from the chirping crickets
Speaker 1: would help cover the sound of the ninja's footsteps and
Speaker 1: prevent their location from being given away by any stray
Speaker 1: sounds like snapping twigs or crunchy snow. But ninjas couldn't
Speaker 1: afford the deal with uncooperative crickets, so they actually used
Speaker 1: these special chemical mixtures that would either entice the crickets
Speaker 1: to chirp or compel them to stay silent, depending on
Speaker 1: what the situation called for. That's pretty amazing, you know.
Speaker 1: I was gonna say insects and birds usually go quiet
Speaker 1: when they sense the predator is near, So I'd imagine
Speaker 1: crickets wouldn't always feel like chirping when they're strapped to
Speaker 1: a ninja. So it is interesting that they've got a
Speaker 1: way to make them churp. Yeah, it's true, and it's
Speaker 1: actually another good reason why ninja's carried these crickets, because
Speaker 1: if you think about if all the animals in an
Speaker 1: area suddenly went quiet, that might tip off the guards
Speaker 1: that there would be a ninja nearby. And so if
Speaker 1: the ninja has a bunch of these drug induced chirping
Speaker 1: crickets at his side, the noise could actually keep the
Speaker 1: other animals from blowing his cover drugged up crickets. It's crazy.
Speaker 1: It is amazing how resourceful these ninjas were, like that
Speaker 1: they just saw these cricket and realized they could make
Speaker 1: use of them. That's amazing. Yeah, yeah, it really is.
Speaker 1: And you know, speaking of being resourceful, you know, ninjas
Speaker 1: use different powders to to blind their opponents. I feel
Speaker 1: like you've seen a little bit of this and things
Speaker 1: like movies. But I read their containers of choice for
Speaker 1: this were hollowed out eggshells, which was something I had
Speaker 1: not seen before. So apparently they would poke a needle
Speaker 1: in a chicken egg and then drain out the contents
Speaker 1: of that egg through the hole, and then they would
Speaker 1: refill it with some sort of blinding agent. And this
Speaker 1: could be anything from sand or salt to iron filings
Speaker 1: or pepper powder, I mean pretty much anything guaranteed to
Speaker 1: bring some tears and irritate the respiratory system. So in
Speaker 1: a fight, ninjas would smash the trick eggs into their
Speaker 1: opponent's eyes, incapacitating them and giving the ninja a chance
Speaker 1: to plan his next move. That is so weird. So
Speaker 1: my cousins and I used to fill eggs with sand
Speaker 1: like that as a kid and then just drop them
Speaker 1: off the first story of my grandma's house as kind
Speaker 1: of spy bombs, and I had no idea that it
Speaker 1: was actually a ninja technique we were using. Also, take
Speaker 1: that back what I said earlier, Maybe you were actually
Speaker 1: a ninja. You know what you're doing? You know this
Speaker 1: sounds so much weirder, but can you imagine how thrown
Speaker 1: off you'd be if like you were in the middle
Speaker 1: of a fight and the ninja just pulled out a
Speaker 1: chicken egg and then try to jam in your face
Speaker 1: like confused. You know, I didn't come across any examples
Speaker 1: of odd ninja food fights, unfortunately, but I did find
Speaker 1: a few cases where they used food is a way
Speaker 1: to pass along secret information. So one example of this
Speaker 1: is something called goshiki my and it roughly translates to
Speaker 1: five colored rice. The ninjas would take a bunch of
Speaker 1: grains of rice and they'd paint them five different colors
Speaker 1: like red, blue, yellow, black, and purple. And then whenever
Speaker 1: ninja had something to report while undercover, he could just
Speaker 1: like go to the side of the road or some
Speaker 1: out of the way place and scatter a bunch of
Speaker 1: grains for other ninja's from the same clan to find.
Speaker 1: So I guess this was based on some sort of
Speaker 1: code system that they all knew or what was this?
Speaker 1: Definitely so, the number of grains they dropped and the
Speaker 1: different color combinations all had their own specific meanings, and
Speaker 1: none of it would mean much to an enemy or
Speaker 1: even a random passers by, But a ninja with the
Speaker 1: no how would be able to you know, read over
Speaker 1: a hundred different codes using this method. Also, just as
Speaker 1: a side note, it was safe for birds. Uh. Supposedly
Speaker 1: the paint would tip them off that the rice wasn't
Speaker 1: grain or seeds, and they'd steer clear of it on
Speaker 1: their own. But what's really wild is that goshiki may
Speaker 1: wasn't even the only kind of food code that ninja's used.
Speaker 1: According to a text from this eighteenth century Japanese writer,
Speaker 1: ninjas also sent pieces of fish to communicate an important date,
Speaker 1: like if an undercover ninja hit upon like the perfect
Speaker 1: day for reinforcements to storm a castle, for example, he
Speaker 1: could send his clan some fish, and the size of
Speaker 1: the fish and the number of pieces indicated the month
Speaker 1: and the day he had in mind. Yeah, it's stunning,
Speaker 1: you know. The way the fish was prepared it also mattered.
Speaker 1: So if it was dried fish, that meant you were
Speaker 1: planning to commit arson. Salted fish meant that you had
Speaker 1: some sort of treachery in the works. But it wasn't
Speaker 1: just rice and fish. According to Apples Obscure, ninjas also
Speaker 1: used sweet cakes to call for reinforcements and bread rules
Speaker 1: to call for forces to attack the enemy from the rear.
Speaker 1: They also had a rice cake code, which meant, I guess,
Speaker 1: a request for provisions. I kind of want to do
Speaker 1: something like this, but like just indicating what time a
Speaker 1: meeting will start, like rather than sending around, you know, electronically,
Speaker 1: we're gonna send each other like some fish or maybe
Speaker 1: some of those like granola bars and depending on you know,
Speaker 1: whether they're unwrapped. I don't know, I need to code.
Speaker 1: I'll keep you guys posted, And that's going to be
Speaker 1: how we indicate what time meetings start. But one of
Speaker 1: the things I'm curious about is how ninja's went mainstream
Speaker 1: and and really take a look at how their legacy
Speaker 1: is holding up today. But before we get to that,
Speaker 1: let's take one more quick break. Okay, Well, so today
Speaker 1: we know that ninjas have become pretty iconic figures of
Speaker 1: pop culture. They show up in video games, comics, cartoons,
Speaker 1: this pretty much an entire genre of action films devoted
Speaker 1: to them. But of course it wasn't always like this,
Speaker 1: And actually it wasn't until the nineteen sixties that ninja's
Speaker 1: really made their splash in the Western world. Roughly three
Speaker 1: d years after the heyday of real life ninja's So
Speaker 1: what happened in the sixties, Well, as weird as it sounds,
Speaker 1: James Bond happened. So more specifically, the movie You Only
Speaker 1: Lived Twice happened. And when the movie version debuted in
Speaker 1: nineteen six seven, it featured Bond on a mission in
Speaker 1: Japan where he was supposed to be trained as a
Speaker 1: ninja by this Japanese secret agent named Tiger Tanaka. And
Speaker 1: for many in the West, this was the first exposure
Speaker 1: to ninja culture, or at least what passed for it
Speaker 1: in the movies. And I'm guessing probably not the most
Speaker 1: accurate portrayal though, right No. In fact, just listened to
Speaker 1: his quote from the British travel writer and historian named
Speaker 1: John Man, this is what he wrote. Quote. The Bond
Speaker 1: movie popularized the idea of ninja among people who are
Speaker 1: not interested in martial arts. It's quite strange, really, the
Speaker 1: idea of the ninja spread, but in the film they're
Speaker 1: not represented as ninja at all, more as commandos. Nevertheless,
Speaker 1: that's what made the term popular in the West. I
Speaker 1: blame James Bond, you know, actually I just pulled up
Speaker 1: the IMDb page for You Only Live twice and this
Speaker 1: is super interesting. But it actually looks like we can
Speaker 1: also blame Roll Doll because he apparently wrote the screenplay
Speaker 1: for this movie. That is really weird. I feel like
Speaker 1: I've read Roll Doll's entire catalog and I had no
Speaker 1: idea that he worked on a James Bond movie. Yeah,
Speaker 1: like this, this is what it says, and he's strayed
Speaker 1: pretty far from the source material with the whole ninja plot.
Speaker 1: But that's not even the strangest thing on IMDb. Apparently,
Speaker 1: while scouting locations in Japan, the movie's entire chief production
Speaker 1: team actually narrowly escaped death and this was all thanks
Speaker 1: to a bunch of ninja's. So apparently the team was
Speaker 1: invited to this last minute Ninja demonstration and they missed
Speaker 1: their flight as a result, but the plane that they
Speaker 1: would have been on it actually wound up crashing and
Speaker 1: killing everybody on board. That is really horrible. It also
Speaker 1: feels like I got miss Lender. I thought the Ninjas
Speaker 1: like swooped into Save Today and said they just had
Speaker 1: the performance that everybody happen. That's what they did. They
Speaker 1: just had to put on a show. But you know,
Speaker 1: in terms of accuracy. The portrayals only got less connected
Speaker 1: to reality as ninjas became more and more popular. So
Speaker 1: by the time the nineteen eighties rolled around, ninjas really
Speaker 1: had some ented themselves as these characters and children's programming, yeah,
Speaker 1: right up there with like cowboys and spacemen and of
Speaker 1: course pirates. So ninja characters started popping up in G I.
Speaker 1: Joe like in their Toil one. I actually vividly remember this,
Speaker 1: and Batman's Origin even got a rewrite to include a
Speaker 1: stint where he underwent ninja training before he you know,
Speaker 1: pulled it all together. And there was actually this full
Speaker 1: blown ninja craze all through the eighties and well into
Speaker 1: the nineties, right in the prime of our childhood. And
Speaker 1: that's only in the last decade or so that that
Speaker 1: ninja fever has cooled a bit, and now they mostly
Speaker 1: show up in places like anime series and internet culture,
Speaker 1: and they're really usually more portrayed in a playful light,
Speaker 1: I guess, But it feels like they don't get as
Speaker 1: much respect as you would think they had, given how
Speaker 1: impressive their history is. And I guess that's probably the
Speaker 1: cost of ninja's having kept so much of their practice
Speaker 1: a secret. Yeah, I mean, that sounds right to me.
Speaker 1: But the good news is that the Ninja's in the
Speaker 1: past probably wouldn't be too bothered by that. I mean,
Speaker 1: I'm not saying they'd appreciate the implication that a bunch
Speaker 1: of teenage mutant turtles could do their job, but Ninja's
Speaker 1: did go along with plenty of far fetched legends in
Speaker 1: their day, and they'd probably consider it a far worse
Speaker 1: tragedy if we'd figured out everything about them and sort
Speaker 1: of ruined their mystery. That's a good point. I'm curious, though,
Speaker 1: are there any real Ninja's left in the world. Like,
Speaker 1: I know, there's the whole Ninjatsu martial arts community, but
Speaker 1: it sounds like that's kind of its own thing, doesn't
Speaker 1: really have much basis in tradition. But are there, you know,
Speaker 1: any of the old clans still around? Yes? And no.
Speaker 1: So there are actually two men who could reasonably claim
Speaker 1: the title of Japan's last ninja because they're both leaders
Speaker 1: of surviving ninja clans, uh the Bond Clan and the
Speaker 1: Toga Kura Clan. The head of the Bond Clan is
Speaker 1: this guy named Junichi Kawa Kami, and he's pushing seventy
Speaker 1: but still teaches ninjasu classes and also runs a ninja museum.
Speaker 1: And the other Ninja master is Masaki Hasumi, and he's
Speaker 1: about a decade older than the other guy, and he
Speaker 1: was actually the martial arts advisor on that Bond film.
Speaker 1: Today's semi retired, but he still teaches ninja history part
Speaker 1: time at the Japanese University. Alright, so these guys are
Speaker 1: like the real deal, like they actually know the techniques
Speaker 1: handed down from that golden age of ninja's way back
Speaker 1: in the sixteenth century. I mean, that's definitely the claim.
Speaker 1: But both men come from families with strong ninja heritage,
Speaker 1: They have a lot of history, and once they became masters,
Speaker 1: they were supposedly granted access to these secret scrolls and
Speaker 1: tools of their respective clans dating back as far as
Speaker 1: five years. Of course, no one else has seen or
Speaker 1: likely will see those artifacts, so it is hard to
Speaker 1: verify their authenticity or even their contents. I mean, it
Speaker 1: feels like someone will eventually see this stuff, right, Like,
Speaker 1: I assume these guys have been busy training successors so
Speaker 1: the clans, you know, they won't die out completely once
Speaker 1: they're gone, at least you'd hope not. That's what I
Speaker 1: thought as well, But it turns out that both men
Speaker 1: are in agreement that neither will appoint anyone to take
Speaker 1: over for them as Ninja grand masters. This is what
Speaker 1: Mr Kawakami explained in an interview a few years back. Quote.
Speaker 1: In the age of civil wars, ninja's abilities to spine
Speaker 1: and kill or mixed medicine may have been useful, but
Speaker 1: we now have guns, the internet, and much better medicines,
Speaker 1: so the art of ninjatsu has no place in the
Speaker 1: modern age. We can't try out murder or poisons. Even
Speaker 1: if we can follow the instructions to make a poison,
Speaker 1: we can't try it out. You know, I was really
Speaker 1: feeling for the guy who rides until the part where
Speaker 1: he limited not being able to try out murder. I
Speaker 1: think that's I think that's where I lost it. It
Speaker 1: is frustrating for true ninjas. But you know, this is
Speaker 1: the quote from Mr Hutsumi when he was asked about
Speaker 1: his decision to not select an air. This is what
Speaker 1: he told reporters. Quote, my students will continue to practice
Speaker 1: some of the techniques that were used by ninja's, but
Speaker 1: a person must be destined to succeed the Klan and
Speaker 1: there is no such person. Well, that is a definitive answer,
Speaker 1: if nothing else, I guess, but it's still still kind
Speaker 1: of a sad one. I think. Yeah, I think you're
Speaker 1: ultimately right that ninjas would appreciate that their mystique is
Speaker 1: still intact after all these years. But I just hope that,
Speaker 1: along with all the cartoon ninja's and the cheesy Chuck
Speaker 1: Nars films, that we still find ways to remember the
Speaker 1: real thing. I mean, there was a time when ninja's
Speaker 1: were a very bizarre but very real force in the world,
Speaker 1: and it'd be ashamed to forget that completely. Well, I
Speaker 1: think between the two of us, we've probably got some
Speaker 1: unforgettable ninja facts for the fact off, so let's just
Speaker 1: dive in. And two thousand, Tim Bloomberg News reported that
Speaker 1: security agents at a Japanese airport made Steve Jobs throw
Speaker 1: away his ninja stars before he boarded his private plane.
Speaker 1: I guess he had picked up these objects and wanted
Speaker 1: to bring them home with them. They're really beautiful things,
Speaker 1: and of course he was doubly irritated when he had
Speaker 1: to leave them, because the logic was that he might
Speaker 1: use the throwing stars to hijack his own plane, and
Speaker 1: so Apple later downplay it and even refuted the incident,
Speaker 1: but Bloomberg stuck with their story. I like this idea
Speaker 1: of like Steve John's being uh ninja fanboy amazing. You know,
Speaker 1: apparently ninja's aren't just land based creatures. There's also a
Speaker 1: ninja of the sea, the ninja lantern shark, and apparently
Speaker 1: most lantern sharks who dwell deep in the sea glow
Speaker 1: from their bellies, but this newly discovered ninja shark doesn't.
Speaker 1: They're totally black, and they do have this a faint
Speaker 1: blue glow that emerges from their heads. But you don't
Speaker 1: have to be too scared of them. Mental Flaws says,
Speaker 1: they're only really the size of a ferret. But the
Speaker 1: best part in the Ninja shark to me is how
Speaker 1: it got its name. So the lead scientists on the study,
Speaker 1: Vicky Vasquez, let her four kids, who were aged eight
Speaker 1: to fourteen, decide on the name, and what they lobbied
Speaker 1: for was the super ninja, but she dialed it back
Speaker 1: to just plane ninja. Also, I know it's so cute,
Speaker 1: but the sharks Latin name is e bench Lady, which
Speaker 1: is a tribute to Peter Benchley, the author of John's
Speaker 1: that's pretty cool. And even if they are the size
Speaker 1: of ferrets, I'm pretty sure I'd still be scared if
Speaker 1: I saw something that was called a ninja shark. I mean,
Speaker 1: I'm scared of ferrets, right, That's that's a good point too.
Speaker 1: I didn't think about that all right. Well, if you're
Speaker 1: headed to Tokyo this year, you can visit the newly
Speaker 1: open Ninja Museum, which is the brainchild of the Japan
Speaker 1: Ninja Council. So this is this group of scholars and
Speaker 1: townships that have banded together to increase enthusiasm for ninja's
Speaker 1: around the world. But here's what's fascinating to me. It's
Speaker 1: that the Ninja Council is very focused on shedding light
Speaker 1: on how well rounded these ninjas were. So according to Smithsonian,
Speaker 1: the Ninja Council notes that quote ninja's often did their
Speaker 1: work not by executing insane flips and perching on rooftops,
Speaker 1: but by making friends and working their social connections. The
Speaker 1: art of the ninja includes things like social skills, conversation techniques, mnemonics, food, astronomy,
Speaker 1: and weather or so I mean Honestly, it kind of
Speaker 1: feels like they're trying to make ninjas so much less interesting.
Speaker 1: It also feels like they're opening up the definition of
Speaker 1: ninja to anyone. Like like like food, you could be
Speaker 1: a ninja. Exacting about the weather, you could be a ninja.
Speaker 1: You're a ninja. So, speaking of ninja, did you know
Speaker 1: that four thousand women have been actively training to become
Speaker 1: ninja in Iran for over twenty years now. There's this
Speaker 1: club that has over twenty four thousand members supposedly, and
Speaker 1: the women practice everything from backflips, two weapons training to
Speaker 1: trying to blend into the landscape. Of course, as the
Speaker 1: group's leaders stay it's vetting the women who are interested
Speaker 1: in the program is a top priority. This is what
Speaker 1: he says, quote, I must be very sure that my
Speaker 1: students will not use the techniques of ninja su to
Speaker 1: hurt anyone or sneak into someone else's house. All right, Well,
Speaker 1: here's one that I honestly think it's going to be
Speaker 1: hard to top. I've been saving this one for very
Speaker 1: last According to the site Consequence of Sound in Axl,
Speaker 1: Rose was late to a Guns and Roses concert and
Speaker 1: Ampa because he was watching the movie Teenage Mutant Ninja
Speaker 1: Turtles too secret of the ooze, so he refused to
Speaker 1: go on stage until the movie was finished. And when
Speaker 1: the management at the venue kept pleading why he wouldn't
Speaker 1: go on here's what his manager said, Axel's attention is
Speaker 1: on the movie right now and he should not be bothered.
Speaker 1: That is incredible. You know, I had been trying to
Speaker 1: find a good mutant Ninja turtle fact, but I I didn't.
Speaker 1: But the fact that you brought Axel roses in the
Speaker 1: next two and I feel like you earned the trophy.
Speaker 1: That's it for today's Part Time Genius. If you've got
Speaker 1: a great ninja factory missed, be sure to share it
Speaker 1: to our Facebook or Twitter. And from gave Tristan Willie
Speaker 1: me thank you so much for listening. Hey Mango, look
Speaker 1: Tristan's gone. Thanks again for listening. Part Time Genius is
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Speaker 1: Do we do we forget Jason? Jason who