Redditgifts is an international Secret Santa gift exchange with different themes throughout the year. Recently, I participated in their “Rilakkuma and Friends” exchange, which was San-X themed!
My Secret Santa (G-Honey) sent me a shiny new Rilakkuma phone charm, and an adorably soft Tonkatsu plush coin purse!
His bottom swings around when you move him!
Look at this fluffy Tonkatsu plush coin purse with a Hokori zipper pull!
What a lovely gift – I’m so grateful!
Oooh the Rilakkuma is really so cute and shiny – anyone know exactly what he’s holding in his paw? Looks a little like a jug of milk to me haha.
Also the Tonkatsu coin purse is so soft, dirty old coins don’t deserve him! Haha maybe I’ll put little Starbursts inside of him or something ;)
This is my first time participating in Redditgifts, so thank you so much, Santa! Check out the other San-X gifts people received at the Redditgifts “Rilakkuma and Friends” gallery!
In international Rilakkuma news, the San-X Net Shop server crashed during the Dr. Yellow / JAXA release – yikes!
I anticipated the server being slow because it’s a big and exciting release, but I’ve never seen the site quite like this before! I bookmarked the products I wanted ahead of time, and I refreshed my page exactly at 10:00AM JST (9:00PM EST on Friday for me)… the loading time was super slow which was expected, but what was the strangest was that I couldn’t get to the payment page.
The first time around, I was online waiting for pages to load for about an hour when I finally got to check out, logged in, and confirmed my address – when my cart would be mysteriously cleared! This happened about 5 more times over the course of several hours (I was adamant to get these bears haha) until 3AM my time, when San-X released an official statement that their site was unable to handle any orders.
The San-X Net Shop has informed the public and apologized via Facebook, email, Twitter, and their website:
Screenshot of current San-X Net Shop webpage
7月19日10時頃からサンエックスネットショップが非常につながりづらい状況となっておりました。 サーバーメンテナンスでの復旧作業を行いましたが、7月19日16:00現在、抜本的な解決には至っておらず… http://t.co/4us481yIOB
— リラックマごゆるりサイト (@rilakkuma_gyr) July 19, 2014
Wow, the server must have been really overloaded from all the kuma fans!
I really appreciate their transparency, and I wish them luck to get their site back up and running soon – get well soon, San-X Net Shop!
Anyway, here were the three plushies I was planning on ordering:
JAXA Rilakkuma, Dr. Yellow Rilakkuma hugging pillow, and Dr. Yellow Rilakkuma plushie.
Hopefully I’ll get my hands on them soon! Another attempt will be made next week :)
The San-X Facebook page has been posting really cool photos of the JAXA / Dr. Yellow collaboration, which makes me extra excited! Can’t wait to finally place an order next week because they look great!
Wow, look at that mountain of JAXA kumas!
I always love these Rilakkuma statues!
Also, be sure to check out Reddit Rilakkuma fan angelacarpediem’s personal photo album of the Rilakkuma Factory Tower Records Cafe in Shibuya! Wow!
According to angelacarpediem, each table there has a Rilakkuma plush – they are really lovely and high quality photos, so definitely check them out! I really want to go someday!
Sneak peek! Lots more incredible photos from the cafe in angelacarpediem’s photo album!
I hope one day my kuma photography skills will be that good, too! Thanks so much for sharing these great photos with the Rilakkuma community, angelacarpediem!
In other news, I’m heading off to the Dominican Republic next Friday for medical service work, so might get a little quiet on this end. I might try to squeeze in another post before I go, but if not, see you in August!
RilakkumaLifestyle 
What a nice global bear community! How nice to see the internet share company with rilakkuma.
yes, the generosity of the Rilakkuma-unity is always such a pleasant surprise!
What lovely gifts you got there! Haha I guess everybody wants to get their hands on the Dr yellow series haha. Hope they get their net shop back up soon!
Me too! I’ve never seen the Net Shop go down quite like this before; I’ve only seen it get slow/backed up – must be a lot of kuma fans nowadays!
Oh I totally wanted to participate in that gift exchange but I forgot to sign up! Grrrr…so sad that I missed it and now I’ll have to wait who knows how long until the next one. They had a Sanrio one too that I would’ve loved to join.
Those gifts are adorable! I’m a huge fan of Sumikko Gurashi so that little pouch would’ve made my day. I’ve also never seen those types of keychains before, how neat!
I can’t believe the website crashed (although I shouldn’t be surprised since they go crazy for all kawaii and Rilakkuma is definitely one of the nation’s favourites). But I agree that it was awesome how transparent the company is, more companies should follow San-x’s example.
I’ve never participated in a gift exchange before so it was super fun! Since it was all online with strangers, I was kinda worried I would be matched with a dud, but my secret santa delivered so quickly!
Yep, good on San-X for being so transparent and apologetic with this issue – I’ve definitely had other sites crash on me before in similar situations and just get an “oops deal with it” if anything at all.
Oh wow!! All the best in the Dominican Republic !! Have fun and so nice of you to be there to help. Have a safe trip!😉
Shall keep my fingers and toes crossed for you that you would be able to get your plushies from San-X Net Shop.😊
How I wish I can just take home with me the Rilakkuma Meets Dr Yellow Statue! So cute! 😍 And the Cafe pics are really great too!! So nice of everyone to share their lovely pictures.😊
Thank you so much for your warm wishes! My trip was really fantastic, even though I didn’t get to bring any Rilakkuma plushies along to tour with me (though I did bring my Rilakkuma carabiner and key cover hehehe).
I wish I could go to the cafe one day! I hope they do this every summer so I can plan my trips ahead of time hehehe.
Wow that is such a cool experience how fun to participate. I wonder if they’ll do it again! You got such cute stuff!! I was on the net shop too thinking it was my computer until they made the announcement and I wonder if that stuff will still be in stock. Tickets to the space con were very expensive $28 so I’m eagerly waiting too. San-x and everyone’s pictures look amazing, I hope to go soon kyaa it looks like so much fun! Oh have a safe and an awesome/fun trip. Can’t wait to hear all about it~ :D
Yeah, the Net Shop crash was so unexpected! I know it’s been slow before, but not quite like this!
Anyway, my sister managed to place an order last week while I was out of town when the store reopened so whew! She said the site was still really slow, but at least she was eventually able to get through! So glad to see these bears soon!
You didn’t happen to order multiple JAXA kumas, did you? Or maybe just know some way to get one? ;_; I missed my opportunity on getting one because I didn’t know they were even a thing until it was way too late, and now I’ve been scouring the internet to find a way of getting my hands on one but had no luck at all!! (*´；ェ；`*)
Hey, sorry, I didn’t order any extra, but there are a few on the Japanese auctions if you wanna try there? http://auctions.search.yahoo.co.jp/search?p=%E3%83%AA%E3%83%A9%E3%83%83%E3%82%AF%E3%83%9E%E3%81%AC%E3%81%84%E3%81%90%E3%82%8B%E3%81%BF+JAXA&auccat=&aq=-1&oq=&ei=UTF-8&slider=0&n=100&tab_ex=commerce
I order from Japanese auctions through Buyee – a little pricey on the shipping since it’s EMS, but reliable for real-time bidding for items that are hard to find elsewhere.
Thank you so so much!! I’ll see if I can work it out with Buyee!!!
Good luck!!