KONBANWA! World, I need to tell you about a show I’ve been obsessed with since around November… you’d easily scroll past it on Netflix and I feel you all need this goodness in your lives!

Recommended to my by my good pal Eeva (check out her company Splendette), Terrace House is a Japanese reality tv show where 3 guys and 3 girls are given a house and 2 cars, then are pretty much just left to live their lives while we watch! The residents all have different personal goals to achieve while they’re in there (love, work, other personal aims) and have the option to leave at any time, at which point another person of the same sex is brought in as a kind of trade.

There are a lot of people with ‘model’ as a job title, varying ages though nobody above 40 has gone in so far and pretty much everyone is beautiful though I think the Japanese are gorgeous overall as a people. Many enter Terrace House wanting to find love, and we all like that sort of thing don’t we, but this isn’t a Love Island kind of deal it’s more genuine and “pure” (they love that word). I’ve seen it described as the ‘nicest reality show’ there is and I wholeheartedly agree. The cultural difference is so interesting. Everyone is so polite with dating and communication rituals being so subtle and kind of structured/official. Watching people live their lives is strangely addictive and we’ve gotten properly invested in the characters, relationships and stories unfolding. Special note goes to Taka and Shohei being crying buddies as well as a few others but *SPOILERS*.

As well as the house dwellers, Terrace House also has six “hosts” which intro each episode and discuss what’s happened at various points through the show… I’m in love with them. Again there are three females and three males. I need to catch up as already there have been a few seasons of Terrace House in different locations (Karuizawa, Hawaii, Tokyo) and five (or at least four) of the hosts are the same throughout and they get in a younger chap each series who changes from time to time… they tend to be mid to late teens to follow up with a more youthy opinion on what’s happened in the episode.

I think you’ll develop favourites from the host group very quickly… mine are Yamachan (Ryota Yamasato) and Yoshimi Tokui … Yamachan is just a mega bitch who loves digging into any of the candidates where he can, a cynical and bitter egg but it’s all banter and he has the best deep voice and shifty eyes; I love him. He recently replied to me on Twitter after I tagged him in a photo of me wearing his face on a tshirt, and I literally shat my pants with joy! Tokui has a habit of creating scenarios for the contestants in his mind which haven’t happened (and will probably never happen) but they’re hilarious, he half acts them out and does the voices and facial expressions usually with this half smile on his face. Pure love. I also love the shirts they wear and there’s an episode where they don homage festive jumpers… SWOON!

For the ladies we have You (that’s her name, I don’t mean YOU!) and Torichan as a kawaii cute and babely pair sitting at the back, often falling in love with the new men who enter the house but taking no shit. You joins in making up scenarios with Tokui as a double act and provides the intro to every Terrace House episode. Lastly we have Azusa Babazono who is a Japanese comedian, coming up with some wittiness but I think she’s the quietest of the bunch though this isn’t necessarily a bad thing. The others need the banter time.. I think Yamachan would implode without it and sometimes he looks like he’s going to if the house is too peaceful at any one time.

I’m not going to say too much and I’d ask that you do yourself a favour and don’t look up the series before you watch to avoid *spoilers*, but let’s say I started watching the Opening New Doors season around October/November 2018 and by Christmas 2018 I’d got my fella and Eeva pillows with pictures of the hosts on them as gifts. Tokui actually responded to me on Instagram once after I tagged him in a story featuring the pillow with his face on (you never actually expect people to reply, amirite?!) telling me he was so happy to see the pillow! So he knows I’m alive with a cushion of his face. AND IT MADE HIM HAPPY. Love it….what a babe. Anyway, we got involved with the show so quickly and in no time found ourselves replying to our TV with regularly said Japanese words when the hosts would say “good evening” or the residents would “cheers”.

I bloody love the show. If you don’t fair enough – BUT NOT REALLY FAIR ENOUGH BECAUSE IT’S MY LATEST LOVE INTEREST. It’ll make you feel warm and fuzzy, cynical, sad, tense, awkward and hopeful with a lot of LOLs in between. I hope you love it as much as I do.

Terrace House: Tokyo is out very soon so keep your eyes peeled!

Adoringly watched by Stefpuff.

Website: www.fujitv.co.jp/terrace-house

Instagram: @th_6_tv