The Japanese city blames the NPR viral report for the flood of ninja employment surveys

A Japanese town is fighting a bombardment of wannabe ninjas after a viral story has sparked an Internet interest frenzy saying "everything is wrong".

Iga, a small central Japan town about 280 miles from Tokyo, has long been taxed as the home of ninjas dressed in black, starters, wielding swords – even going as far as. to offer shows and to offer "ninja experiences" to tourists.

Last week, the city was featured in an NPR report that went viral, and which seemed to assert that Iga was facing a shortage of ninja artists.

The report went on to cite potential salaries, claiming that artists can earn anywhere from $ 23,000 to $ 85,000 a year.

"It's fake, all wrong," said Motoyoshi Shimai, a manager of Iga's tourism strategy division, to Reuters. "There was no discussion about it, and we did not mention the money."

On Wednesday, the city received requests from 115 ninja wannabes from 23 countries, including Japan.

"Most of the questions were whether we are really hiring, but there are some who begged us to use them and tried to promote themselves," Shimai added. in their bodies and in their strength. "

He told the Japan Times that neither the city's execution groups nor the ninja groups had planned to recruit new artists. was forced to publish a statement on his website warning people of "false news."

"(The city) is the birthplace of Iga-style ninjas. We can feel the breath of the ninjas at every turn of downtown, "he says.

City officials said they were surprised – and not necessarily upset – by all this fuss and hope that the interest will attract more tourists. "We have been made to feel viscerally how much interest in ninjas is all over the world," Shimai told Reuters