Monday, July 11, 2011

Nozomi Sasaki

Nozomi Sasaki (佐々木 希, Sasaki Nozomi?, born February 8, 1988), previously known simply as Nozomi during her fashion modeling career, is a Japanese glamour model and former professional fashion model from Akita. After working as a fashion model for nearly 7 years, she has become famous as a gravure idol and main ringside commentator / spokesperson for the mixed martial arts competition Dream Fighting Championships and the kickboxing competition K-1 World Max since 2009. Since late 2008 she has released five photobooks and two DVDs, and has also made countless appearances on television, magazines, and ads unrelated to fashion / cosmetic, including ones for Coca-Cola's green tea products, Suntory's 3 soft drink products, So-net, Willcom, Fujifilm, Kao, Rohto Pharmaceutical Co. and Seiko's Tisse brand line created for and dedicated to her. She has also endorsed an accessory brand, Cotton Cloud, since June 2010 when it was created for her and its first flag shop opened in Harajuku. She was given the nickname "No Mercy" for her countless reported atrocities toward other show-business girls she worked with, in her teenage years, especially toward actresses, glamour models, and fashion models from foreign countries, whom she considered to be "fat".

Born in Akita, she finished elementary school and attended a middle school there for a short period. Sasaki began modeling at the age of around 14. She modeled mainly in the collection circuit, and for fashion / cosmetic advertisements. In the latter years of her modeling career, she was a featured model and contributor to the now defunct Pinky magazine. She first appeared on the cover of Pinky in July 2007, along with another cover girl, Emi Suzuki. One theory suggests that Suzuki was the person who brought Sasaki to the commercial modeling field after she discovered Sasaki when Sasaki was planning to retire from modeling, and it has been noted that Sasaki already appeared at the time to be significantly chubbier than she used to be. After further intentionally gaining weight, she began appearing on the youth-targeted weekly manga magazine Young Jump and several of other magazines as a glamour model (gravure idol) in late 2008. She released her first photobook, Nozomi, in August of that year. She made her first landing on the top cover of Young Jump in January 2009. This caused surprises in many fields. Model Coco Kinoshita who was close to Sasaki officially commented about this, "that dreadful one who tortured everyone now has extra weight on her chest and whole body, smiling for innocent boys with burning sticks!".

She released her first full DVD, Dolly, and two photobooks, Sasaki Nozomi in Tenshi no Koi and Non, in 2009. In early 2010 she was specially featured by 2.4 million selling manga series Usogui on Young Jump, and released her fourth photobook Prism. Despite her breast size which has been known as one of the smallest in the gravure scene, she became a successful model by the end of 2010 in the field where breast size is regarded as a vital factor. At that time she also began appearing on the Non-no magazine, a biweekly girl-next-door-orientated fashion magazine that does not usually feature people like her. Though after becoming more of a gravure idol than a professional model, Sasaki was heavily featured in a spring fashion collection presented by the magazine and BS-TBS, and soon after that, she landed on the top cover of the magazine. These appearances have been described as like an "invasion", as she has significantly changed the magazine's tone. Some critics have suggested that the magazine has been destroyed by Nozomi Sasaki. She has regularly appeared on over 10 television programs and over 20 television commercials since 2009. Her first huge hit on the TV scene was a TV commercial for Lotte's new chewing gum product Fit's, where she performed a "silly dance" called the Fit's dance.

Fit's became a smash hit, selling over 40 million in its first 5 months in the Japanese gum market where 4 million-per-year is considered large success. In March 2009, she was chosen as the image character for a special advertising campaign by the Japan Magazine Publishers Association, a governmental publishing trade association run by the Ministry of Education. During the campaign between July 21, 2009 - August 20, 2009, her portrait appeared in 300 different magazines and as 30,000 posters for bookstores and public libraries all over Japan, 100,000 posters hung in trains in the Tokyo metropolitan area and the Kansai area, and 2,009 prepaid cards. Having made a cameo appearance in the romantic comedy Handsome Suit as well as minor roles in two television serials, Sasaki scored a major breakthrough in her budding acting career with the lead role in the 2009 sentimental romance film Tenshi no Koi, where she played a teenage girl in a fragile relationship with an older man played by Shosuke Tanihara. The film became an instant hit and was also distributed in some nearby countries such as Hong Kong, Taiwan, and Singapore. In 2010, she acted in the television drama Dohyo Girl where she played a model who became the coach of a high school sumo team.

This was the first time in her acting career that she took the lead role in a television drama series. She also made her singing debut in July 2010 with the catch phrase "Heta de Gomenne!" ("Forgive my tone-deafness!") when she released a single, Kamu to Funyan feat. Astro, which debuted at number one on the Oricon singles chart. At the end of 2010 she released her second single titled Jin Jin Jingle Bell, a cover version of Chisato Moritaka's 1995 hit. She was expected to participate in the NHK Kohaku show, an annual New Year's Eve musical TV show, but when she was asked about it by the press during the commemoration event for Jin Jin Jingle Bell, she stated that she did not wish to appear on it. She stated that she could not sing and was shy, implying she would never perform her songs live in public. As a result, she did not attend the show. The topic of her fashion modeling years has occasionally become a matter of public interest, although she has never spoken about it. In April 2010 a photographer mentioned Sasaki in an interview, saying he witnessed Sasaki's first meeting with Yukina Kinoshita, a commercial model who has been known as a notorious brawler, a former member of a bosozoku gang team in real life, and has become Sasaki's co-worker. The photographer apparently, in 2008, witnessed their pre-brawling scene where Kinoshita picked a fight with Sasaki, pouncing on Sasaki, but Kinoshita got away from it after Sasaki caught Kinoshita's arm, staring at her, and Kinoshita got "seriously freaked out".

Kinoshita later commented on this shortly before her retirement, confirming it and describing Sasaki as something on a different level from a mere brawler. In August 2010, she landed on the cover of the anan magazine, with a black dress and a body shape slightly reminiscent of her past as a fashion model. At that time she signed a new endorsement contract with FinePix of Fujifilm and attended its ceremonial press conference, with another black dress designed by her former fan Razor Ramon HG and a body shape fairly reminiscent of her past as a fashion model. Some of the fashion press made mention of these appearances. The September number of the Ray magazine headlined "«Nozomi» has returned?", and associated the black dresses with some of her past nicknames related to the black color such as "Black Surgeon / Black Maiden". Sankei Shimbun, a decent newspaper not a tabloid, also featured this appearance, referring to her as "Nozomi". In November 2010, Akita Prefecture chosen her as one of the two official PR-Ambassadors, along with Natsuki Kato, with the purpose of creating a better image of the prefecture. The mayor Norihisa Satake officially commented on the selection that he was hoping that she would eradicate Akita's image being snowy and dark, with her image being fine and cheerful. She has been known for her reticence and spiritless, apathetic attitude seeming lack of emotion on television, but one unusual incident was observed on January 5, 2011 when she was on the live television show Reco Hits, a midnight music show she has regularly appeared on as a host. At one point during Kana Uemura's song about family, "Toire no Kamisama", was introduced, she broke down in tears. This was considered the first time for Sasaki to cry on media.

Nozomi Sasaki cute curly hairstyle

Nozomi Sasaki beautiful smile

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