he main character, a kindergarten-aged boy whose antics are the basis for the series. His affectionate name is Shin-chan. He is 5 years old and loves chocolate biscuits, especially "Chocobi" and a TV superhero named "Action Kamen", but he absolutely hates green peppers. He is attracted to older girls and women, despite his young age, and pays no attention to girls of his own age. He brazenly pursues any girl who catches his eye. He shares this trait with his father and paternal grandfather, but this often results in Mom's cruel punishment. The only girl he seems to really like is a college student named Nanako, around whom he becomes shy. Some of his strange activities include dressing up (often as an animal), mooning and drawing an elephant's face on his skin, using his penis as the trunk which he calls him "Mr. Elephant".He often removes his pants and undies to kazama to irritate him. He also makes trouble for others and then criticizes their efforts in covering for him. In general, he is brutally honest, highly curious, and has no shame whatsoever, which includes getting rid of his clothes at the earliest opportunity. There have been several instances in which his antics actually solved the problems of those around him. He also displays a surprising amount of talent at various activities including kendo and swimming. On rare occasions, he displays bouts of selfless kindness (for example, in one anime episode he saved a frog from a truck on a rainy day, getting all wet and dirty in the process and risking Misae's ire since it was his last set of clean clothes. In another episode, he gives Masao the change he has even though he knows that his mother will scold him later), but these are often immediately followed by antics that negate the goodwill others feel. There are also times when Shin Chan displays a level of maturity beyond his usual self in his concern for others, and in a few rare instances he shows that deep down he really does care for his family, despite his constant disrespect towards them. This shows up more often than not in the feature length movies as compared to the regular series episodes. ComicsOne, the first publisher of the English manga, referred to Shin-chan as "The Bart Simpson of Japan."^[1]