Japan’s sumo and soap star rolls into Ireland to be oyster opening king

A FORMER sumo wrestler who is a major television soap star in Japan will bid to become the World Oyster Opening champion in Galway this weekend.

Yujiro Shirakawa, aged 27, regularly attracts a television audience in excess of 15 million in Japan and is in Galway this week filming a reality television programme.

Yujiro has been working with oysters all week in Galway and is going to be one of the 18 competitors from all over the globe who will be competing at the 50th Galway International Oyster Festival.

Among the countries represented will be entrants from Australia, Canada, Norway, Finland, USA and Switzerland, while the Irish Oyster Opening Champion will be decided this evening in the Quays Bar.

A spokesperson for TVS, the Japanese company making the reality show, said Yujiro knew he would face some unusual task this week, but had no idea what it was.

“He now has two days to perfect the art and get 30 oysters cleanly opened in less than three minutes,” the spokesperson said.

Yujiro said: “Oysters are popular in Japan but I had a bad experience with them once and did not know how I would react when I ate them here.

“There is no doubt, the oysters here are tastier and I have enjoyed them.”