Korean Tiger Tattoo

Kotetsu Boku is known as the, “Korean Tiger,” by his friends and throughout the mixed martial arts world. So he decided to get a permanent reminder of who is by tattooing the beast on his ribs. Here are a few pictures taken at, “Tattoo Soul,” in Ikebukuro while tattoo artist Akilla of the Horitoshi family worked his magic.

If you’ve browsed this blog then you’ve seen Akilla’s work and you know that he’s a traditional Japanese tattoo artist who practices the art of tebori – hand poked tattoo.

And if you’ve spent some time here then you know Boku has a bad attitude and likes to flick the bird.

Look closely and you’ll see some letters inside the stripes of the tiger. It’s says, “Krazy Bee,” which is the name of Boku-san’s gym.

Japanese MMA fighters are allowed to have tattoos… but they aren’t allowed to have traditional Japanese, “wabori,” style tattoos which are often associated with the Yakuza. So since he couldn’t get wabori on his body, the tiger’s legs have wabori on them!