This winter season, the purrfect cat-anime to warm us during the cold weather outside will start airing. On 9 January 2019, Doukyonin wa Hiza, Tokidoki, Atama no Ue will tell the story of a clumsy young man and a single stray cat who start living together. On 1 December, during the special event ‘Nyan Fes’, the first three episodes were shown in a premiere screening.

The series is based on a popular manga, which is currently being serialized on COMIC Polaris and shows how one man can find some kind of peace in living together with his pet. The main character is Subaru Mikazuki, an author who is not good at socializing with other people. He starts living together with former stray cat Haru. The charm of this work is that fans get to see the story from the point of view of both the author and his cat. As time passes, they learn how to find happiness together.

‘Nyan Fes’ was a special event held to celebrate the series before its official broadcast starts and many guests attended the event: Kensho Ono (voice of Subaru Mikazuki), Haruka Yamazaki (Haru), Hiro Shimono (Atsushi Kawase), Shun Horie (Hiroto Yasaka), Chika Anzai (Nana Oukana), Yoshiki Nakajima (Yuugo Oukana), Kanjiro Tsuda (Roku) and the ending theme artist and voice of Harutomo Akimoto, Yoshino Nanjo. The set on stage was made to look like a Japanese home, where the guests could sit around the kotatsu (heated table), which perfectly represents the warm feelings of this work. The event started by taking a commemorative picture of the audience together with the guests, who all wore a mask of Haru, which was given out when they entered the venue. They then screened the first episode.

After the first episode, the guests came back on stage and told stories from the recordings and shared things to note about their characters and their behavior. The cast talked while eating tangerines that were prepared for them; it made the atmosphere seem very intimate and carefree. They must have been very delicious as some of the cast members kept eating and commented that they just ‘can’t stop eating them!’.

There was also a game segment called ‘Kachinuke! Nyanko Battle!’ (Tournament! Kitty Battle!). The cast was divided in two teams, the Subaru Team and the Nana Team, and started a hot battle. The most fierce one was the third game, which was called ‘Nekottama!’, a ball game. The game was far from a serious competition as there was a lot of missing and laughing while they were trying to get the balls in, which was accompanied by loud claps and laughs from the audience. As the game corner ended, Team Nana took the victory! The prize for the winners was a high-class Ochazuke.

In addition to the game there was also a live reading where the cast read a scene written by the manga author specifically for this event. The event ended with a live performance of the ending theme ‘Kimi no Tonari Watashi no Basho’ (Next to me, my place) by Nanjo.