Legend has it that with Tokyo Disneyland failing, executives at the Tokyo Disney Store decided to gamble on a Winnie-the-Pooh Mini Bean Bag Plush (MBBP) in the hopes of saving their store by cashing in on the bean bag craze. They released one and lo! Instant major profits, happy ending. Of course, the way I heard the legend, the 35th anniversary Winnie-the-Pooh was supposed to be the first, an impossibility given that bean's release date. Whether it was actually a different bean or the story is entirely apocryphal, the Tokyo Disney Store, Tokyo Disneyland, and Japanese Disney resorts have released bean bag toys that are to be found only in Japan. Hong Kong and Singapore have also had some releases of their own.

Of course, so have the United States, the United Kingdom, Disneyland Paris, and Australia. Although Yahoo! Japan is a great place to find Asian-exclusive Disney MBBPs, Western ones turn up there as well, and you may have trouble figuring out whether the Pooh in native Hawaiian dress is Japan's Hawaiian Pooh or the United States' Travels with Pooh Honolulu. If you're just looking for the toy you like the look of best, great--scroll down to the general Pooh searches at the end of the article and browse until you find the Pooh you want in your home. If you need to tell the American Cow Pooh from the UK Cow Pooh from the Japanese Cow Pooh, read on.

I searched the internet for images of every Pooh MBBP that I could find a mention of. I have compared those pictures to each other and come up with a guide to recognizing Asian-release Poohs. I am certainly interested in any corrections collectors out there may have--I am sure a few plain plushes have been included with the beans, for example--but the descriptions below should help shoppers for Asian Pooh MBBPs to find the ones they want on YJ.

As with my previous article, the specific searches are given so that you can recognize what you're looking for. I strongly urge you to go through the more general searches: the search engine does not always return all the auctions fitting the criteria! (I've copied text from auction titles, pasted it into the search box, and still not gotten the auction in the search results.) Also, I suggest that if there is a clickable tab to the left on a search results page, do follow that link, too. That takes you to items that have the key words in the description, and if the Pooh you're looking for is one of a set, his key word may only appear in the description.

First, let me explain which Pooh toys you will find described here. I have tried to include only MBBPs released by Disney itself, not through, for example, McDonald's or Sega. I have done my best to include only MBBPs. When I see a keychain ("dangle") version, I will note it, but I didn't go looking for them. The same goes for the buruburu (pull-string toy) versions. As for my definition of "Asian": Disney apparently groups Asia and the Pacific Rim together, for there have long been Australian "Little Stars" Poohs. Given that many Poohs are released simultaneously in the United States and Australia and that Australian releases will be easier for English-speakers in other countries to acquire, however, for the purposes of this list, "Asian" means originating from the continent of Asia or the islands closely associated with it. Australian Poohs will be included among "Western" ones. For this article, I will focus only on Disney-released Pooh beans that were not released outside of Asia; a toy that was simultaneously released in, for example, the United States and Japan, will not be found below. I realize many of the Little Stars beans were later released in Australia or the United States, but tracking down all of them would've taken too long, so unless I happened to see that something was rereleased there, it is included here.

Second there are two basic Pooh toy designs. The one you'll see in most of the Asia exclusive toys seems to be affiliated with the Little Stars line, so I will call it that. The designation is a little misleading: the American line of Little Stars toys does not use this design, but as those toys will only be spoken of in contrast to the Asian-exclusive ones, that shouldn't be a problem. Little Stars Poohs tend to be rounder in both the head and the body, with shorter, rounder limbs, and their legs are more to the sides than underneath them. Pooh smiles, but his mouth is always closed. His color is also a more vivid yellow than the Western Poohs, which tend to be a true brown, if a pale one. The more usual variety of Pooh--found in Western countries and even in Asia outside the Little Stars line--most often have much longer, flatter limbs; their heads and bodies tend to be more pear-shaped; their legs tend to be positioned completely underneath their torsos; and they have open-mouthed smiles. For the purposes of this article, these will be designated "regular Poohs." These differences are important to keep in mind when distinguishing the toys. Sometimes the only difference between an Asian MBBP and either a Western one or a Japanese regular plush is that the Asian MBBP will use a Little Stars Pooh and the others will use a regular Pooh.

Third, you will see some abbreviations in English letters as you browse the auctions, and these are also clues to the origins of the Poohs. The country abbreviations will of course be familiar, but the Disney-specific ones may not be, so here's a table to show what they mean. I'll be using the unambiguous ones in the descriptions.

Last, when I provide Japanese (or Chinese) characters that appear on a toy, I have endeavored to match the font as much as possible. What you see here should look very much like what's on the toy, even to those who don't read Japanese. If it doesn't, you're probably looking at a different Pooh.

There were some Poohs released exclusively in parts of Asia other than Japan, although most of the Asia-exclusive Poohs were released there. They seem to have gotten little coverage in Western sources, which is a pity, because some of them are quite lovely. My favorite Pooh is from Hong Kong.

Hong Kong Poohs

Chinese New Year Pooh (Jan 2000): Pooh wears a smart red silk jacket and cap. He is beating with puffy white sticks a large drum that is red on its sides and white on top and bottom. The drum has "2000" embroidered in red on its top.

LS Pooh as Bug (Oct 2000): Pooh as a very colorful insect of unspecified species. His body is yellow, his feet are bright pink (as is his hood) and instead of his own arms he has two pale turquoise insect arms on each side. Three red pom-pom "buttons" run down the front of his tummy. It looks like he may have turquoise antennae on top of his head, but the only picture I could find had him tilted so that I could not be sure. There are many other insect Poohs, but none that resembles this one.

LS Pooh as Clock (Oct 2000): Pooh is dressed as a pale pink alarm clock. The bell structure on his head is bright blue, and the clock on his front has poseable arms. The numbers at the quarters are enlarged and in color (3 is green, 6 is blue, 9 is orange, and 12 is purple). As far as I was able to discover, there were no other clock Poohs.

LS Pooh as Crab (Oct 2000): Pooh wears a bright red crab suit that has an orange tummy, three pairs of appendages (legs? antennae?) on its head, and eyes that stick up off the top of the head. Pooh's hands are claws, but they're very small ones, compared, for instance, to the American Cancer (as in the astrological sign) Pooh. Also, this is a Little Stars style Pooh.

Pooh as Fisherman (Oct 2000): Pooh wears a brown burlap hat, a pale blue sleeveless shirt, and bright blue pants with cuffs the same color as his shirt. He carries a fishing net with a fish in it, making him readily distinguishable from the American Fisherman Pooh, who carries a fishing pole. The American Pooh also wears a green hat and a red T-shirt with "Pooh" embroidered on it.

Pooh as Watermelon (Oct 2000):  As you can see from the search, a wide variety of watermelon Poohs were released around the world. The Hong Kong edition has Pooh's body as a watermelon with a slice taken off the front, showing a circular cross-section of the melon. His head wears a close-fitting cap of watermelon (you can see just a little of the pink meat peaking out at the edge). The only other release he closely resembles is the US's Watermelon Pooh (Jun 2001) who has a regular face and body along with an open-mouth smile. His watermelon cap also does not fit as closely as his Hong Kong colleague's; it sticks out a bit over his forehead.

Pooh as Dog (Nov 2000): This Pooh was released simultaneously in Singapore and later (Feb 2001) released in Japan, the only differences being the tags. Pooh is a cute brown dog with floppy ears. His right arm, left leg, and the top of his ears are a darker brown than the rest of him. He has a red and white collar, and the keychain version is identical.

LS Brown Bear Pooh (Nov 2001):  Pooh wearing a chocolate brown bear suit. He has pink insides to his ears and pink pads embroidered on the soles of his feet. The bear's face appears above his. The US Brown Bear Pooh released at the same time was not, however, the same bear. In addition to being a regular-style bear, he's a slightly lighter shade of brown and his pads are a darker brown. He has three toe pads on his feet but no foot pads on his hands.

LS Peacock Pooh (Nov 2001):  This is the one I want! Pooh is absolutely resplendent in his peacock blue outfit, which includes a tail of feathers that are peacock blue and fuchsia with accents of black, yellow, two shades of pink and more peacock blue.

LS Pelican Pooh (Nov 2001): Pooh is dressed as a white pelican with red feet, an orange bill, and a fluffy white tuft on top of his head. Given the size of the pelican's bill, this bean is unusual in having the animal's face to Pooh's right, with Pooh's face essentially looking out the left side of the pelican's head.

LS Lucky Owl Pooh (Feb 2002): I found some disagreement among sites regarding this toy's country of origin: some said only Japan; some said only Hong Kong; some said the Japanese toy had the props and the Hong Kong one didn't. I am inclined toward the last position, so I cover this release (and my reasons for believing it Japanese) under holiday Poohs.

Lucky Year of the Horse Pooh (Feb 2002): I have my doubts that this isn't a Japanese release: the imagery seems Japanese, although I grant my knowledge of Chinese culture is quite limited. Nonetheless, if only Pooh were beckoning, I would've moved this to the Japanese section. The only site that mentioned this bean at all, however, specifies it as a Hong Kong release, and the very rarity of its appearances seems to support the designation. I have only been able to find a picture of the blue variant, although there was also a white one released. Pooh wears a blue horse suit that has a white mane (and I assume tail, but I couldn't find a picture showing it). This leads me to suspect that the white one has a blue mane and tail. The blue Pooh has a red and white collar around his neck and holds before him a gold plaque. I have no idea how the characters would be pronounced in Chinese, but they mean "better fortune":

Beach Pooh (May 2002): Pooh is ready for fun in the sun! This regular Pooh wears turquoise swimming trunks with red trim, a white terry beach coat, a pale blue hat, and black sunglasses. Although there is a Windsurfing Pooh (US/AUS), a Surfer Pooh (JPN), and some Summer Fun Poohs, none of them resemble this release.

Hawaiian Pooh (May 2002): A regular Pooh as a tourist in Hawaii. He wears a bright pink Hawaiian shirt with a pattern of orange flowers and green leaves and a pair of black sunglasses. There was a Japanese release some called Aloha Pooh, but he is clearly distinguishable (for starters, he's a Little Stars style Pooh).

Sunny Pooh (May 2002): This Pooh is also of the regular model, right down to the open-mouth smile. He wears the red shirt usually seen on Pooh toys, which is like the one he wears in the Disney animation only it has "Pooh" embroidered on it in yellow. What makes him "sunny" is the suns that appear all over his body as pale circles with rays throughout his usual gold fur.

Occupational Series Poohs (2002): These were simultaneously released in Japan but were released later the same year in the United States, so I do not cover them.

Singapore Poohs

Pooh as Dog (Nov 2000): This Pooh was released simultaneously in Hong Kong.

LS Cow Pooh (Nov 2000): I have been unable to find a picture of this release. I will give a description of Cow Poohs released worldwide in the Japanese animal section.

Human roles

Pooh has dressed in many ethnic outfits and pursued many human occupations the world over. Here's the Japanese releases I could find information on.

Baby-G Watch Pooh (Summer 2000): At least one site called this "Aloha Pooh." Pooh is dressed as a Hawaiian tourist in a pale blue shirt with a pattern of large white flowers on it. He has a large watch on his left wrist. The one around his neck is a Casio Baby-G wristwatch designed for human wear. It's yellow with black accents and has a bee with a hive on the side of the strap. The closest other release is the Hong Kong Hawaiian Pooh described above. There is a Sega release that is called Aloha Pooh, but he's wearing a pink shirt. There was an American release called Travels with Pooh Honolulu and a Japanese Hawaiian Pooh, but both those toys feature Pooh in native Hawaiian clothing.

LS Clown Pooh (Mar 2001): This and the Kindergarten Pooh were the third and fourth "Disney Fan" Poohs: mini bean bag plush designs created by fans and selected by Disney for production. Pooh wears an off-white suit clown suit with a pattern of occasional small, colored triangles and red ruffle trim. He has two enormous red pom-poms on the front of the suit and one on top of his cone hat, which is of the same material as his suit. He has a red pom-pom on his nose and a pale blue star on his left cheek.

LS Kindergarten Pooh (Mar 2001): Here's a Pooh his most devoted fans can identify with! Pooh heads off to school for the first time in this Disney Fan Pooh. He wears a bright blue shirt with a white shirt collar and white buttons. He carries a yellow satchel and wears the required yellow hat of a first-year student in Japan. (It's required so that others know that this is a kindergarten student and therefore he might need extra assistance.)

National Costumes Series (Apr 2001): This set featured a Pooh in the traditional clothing of six different nations. The Poohs are in the regular style and have open mouths. (My apologies if I refer to some of the articles of clothing incorrectly. I am not as familiar with these other countries as I am Japan.)

Chinese Pooh: This Pooh wears a blue jacket with turquoise trim that is held closed with a light brown belt that matches the floppy hat Pooh is wearing. He's got white leggings and sandals, the upper parts of which are red and the lower brown.

Hawaiian Pooh: This is one of the two Poohs dressed in native Hawaiian clothing. This one has some very furry dark brown material ringing his head and upper arms. around his body there is a band of yellow cloth with a bold pattern in brown. On his legs are bands of red that have long fringes hanging down. Around his neck is a brown lumpy cord that holds what I think is supposed to be a turquoise stone at his throat (it's stuffed, so it's hard to be sure). He is barefoot. The other Pooh in native Hawaiian dress is the American Travels with Pooh Honolulu but he's easily to spot: he's got bright green leaves ringing his head, upper arms, and ankles and wears a long red skirt-like garment.

Mexican Pooh: This Pooh wears a pale red shirt with a white button, white pants, and sandals that are red on the outside but pale yellow within. He has a pale yellow sombrero with a red band. Over his left shoulder hangs a sash varigated in shades of yellow, red, and brown. It has a purple fringe at the bottom. The American Santa Fe Pooh is in clothing of similar design, but the color scheme is very different, featuring mostly pale yellow and turquoise blue with just a little red for accent. His sash is also over his right shoulder.

Moroccan Pooh: The color's not very good in the only pictures I could find. Pooh's ankle-length, long-sleeved tunic is very pale tan or cream. The sash at his waist may be white or very pale yellow. On his head is the headgear of Northern Africa; it covers everything but the front of his face. His shoes may be brown or metallic gold on top; they seem to have toes that curve upward, allowing you to see their red soles. I know it's not a great description, but he's the only remotely Arab Pooh I've seen, so you shouldn't have trouble telling him from the other releases.

Russian Pooh: Pooh wears a brilliant red long-sleeved shirt and loose brilliant purple cotton pants with a belt of nonmetallic gold cord. His hat and boots are also brilliant purple; the boots and the bill of the hat are in a faux leather material, while the rest of the hat appears to be felt.

Scottish Pooh: Apparently the Pooh clan tartan is a very unusual plaid of light blue, lime green, and fuchsia. With his kilt, Pooh wears his usual red shirt, a red pouch, and a white belt and sash. Pooh's hat as a white pom-pom on top. He has no shoes. There was a Highlander Pooh released in the UK, but they're easy to tell apart: Highlander Pooh has a brown shirt, a dark green tartan, brown shoes, and no hat. His accoutrements also seem more detailed than the Scottish Pooh's.

LS Sailor Pooh (Jun 2001): The sixth Disney Fan design is a cute little sailor. Pooh is wearing a long-sleeved shirt with white and pale blue horizontal stripes, a red bandana at his neck, and a cap with an elaborate blue anchor on front and blue piping along its upper rim. The American Nautical Pooh has much bolder blue and white stripes, has a sailor suit collar, wears his "POOH" shirt underneath the sailor outfit, has several blue stripes on his cap and a red sailboat in his right hand, and is a regular Pooh to boot. The CAT Sailor Pooh had a white sailor suit (including pants) with blue trim at the cuffs, a blue belt and bandana, and no blue on his hat. The later Marine Pooh was quite different.

LS Pooh as Cook (Sep 2001): Another Pooh designed by a Disney fan. Here Pooh is seen preparing pancakes in his perfect white chef's smock and with his chef's hat. He has a bright red bandana around his neck. The UK Head Chef Pooh, also released in 2001, is very different: he holds a blue and pink hunny pot, wears a red bib apron, and has "Head Chef" on his hat in red. DLP released a Chef Pooh in early 2002, but I could not find a picture of it. Assumably he wasn't a Little Stars Pooh, though.

LS Painter Pooh (Oct 2001): Pooh dabbles in the fine arts in this Disney Fan Pooh. He wears a white smock with a blue ribbon bow at the throat and a red beret tilted over his left ear. In his left hand, he holds a pink artist's palette with round circles of paint on it (Pooh seems to favor shades of pink in his work). In his right hand, he appears to hold a tube of red paint, but I'm not sure about that identification. There is a DLP edition called Artiste Pooh, but he's got his read shirt on under his paint-streaked apron, a tube of green paint under his left arm, and brushes in his apron pocket. He is also, of course, a regular Pooh.

Occupational Series Poohs (2002): These were simultaneously released in Hong Kong, but they were released later the same year in the United States. Therefore, I will not cover them here.

LS Marine Pooh (Jul 2003): That's "marine" in the sense of the Japanese synonym for "sailor," not as in the USMC. This cute little sailor is wearing a deep blue shirt with a white sailor collar that has aqua trim and an aqua scarf beneath it. His sailor hat is also quite with aqua trim. Over his right shoulder he holds a white duffle bag that has an aqua drawstring (well, it is merely sewn to the top of the nonopening bag) and an aqua anchor on it. The dangle is the same only smaller.

For more Japanese Pooh descriptions, see the next Pooh MBBP article, which will feature holiday and special occasion Poohs!

General searches

No matter which Pooh you want, you should be hitting these searches, so I include them in this first article.

• Pooh stuffed toys under 10cm in size: If you'd like to collect the keychain or "dangle" versions of these Pooh beans, this is probably the best place to start.


• Pooh stuffed toys between 10cm and 30cm in size: Most of the actual beans will be found here.


• Pooh stuffed toys between 30cm and 50cm in size: There won't be a lot of the Asian-exclusive beans here, but there are doubtless many Poohs only released in Japan.


• Pooh stuffed toys bigger than 50cm in size: For when you want a Pooh bigger than the child you intend to give him to (even if that child is yourself!).


• Big Search Warning! All of the above four categories together: At this writing, there are 81 pages of results on this search.


• Just stuffed Pooh searches: These look for anything that could be described as a Pooh stuffed toy: Pooh 1, Pooh 2, and as always, the big one, stuffed Poohs wherever they may lurk, Big Search Warning! Pooh 3.

Happy shopping to all and see you next month, when Pooh celebrates his favorite holidays!