The Namahage: UN honours Japan's scariest tradition

In your first few hours in Japan, you are comforted by the thought that things are only slightly different.

There are signs in English at the train stations. A vending machine featuring Tommy Lee Jones' face is on every street corner. And you can buy far more Kit Kats than you ever thought necessary.

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But somewhere between a sumo tournament and a robot toilet that doesn't stop spraying you on its own accord, you realise that Japan and Australia are very different places.

Case in point is the Namahage, a folklore demon that has been placed on the United Nations' Intangible Cultural Heritage list.

Australian children get visits from the tooth fairy or the Easter Bunny. Japanese children get visits from this demon, who bangs on your door with a knife and declares: "Are there any crybabies around?!"

Only in Japan, they actually do this.

Grown men on New Year's in Akita Prefecture will dress up in terrifying masks and come to your house to terrify your children.

And if your Mum and Dad are typical Japanese parents, they will let the Namahage in to scare you senseless.

There's a Namahage emoji as well, which you may have noticed while searching for that smiling poop you send your sister every now and again.

Inclusion of the Intangible Cultural Heritage list puts the Namahage in the same standing as Irish Uilleann piping, Croatian gingerbread craft and Peru's scissor dance.

And if you've never heard of those things, you obviously aren't intangibly cultured enough.