[From the Wall Street Journal’s Japan Real Time blog, where the post includes a different image]

Virtual Christmas Dinner Planned for Long-Distance Couples

By Jun Hongo
Dec 11, 2014

In Japan, Christmas Eve is an occasion for couples to go out on a romantic date–even, it turns out, if they’re 400 kilometers apart.

Mobile carrier KDDI Corp. is organizing a virtual Christmas dinner event for couples in a long-distance relationship, with one person in Tokyo and the other in Osaka.

“The dinner will make it feel like the other person is actually there with you at the table,” Ayumi Tsujishita, a spokeswoman at the company, told Japan Real Time. And it won’t be just a fancy video chat, she said.

According to the company, the dinner will take place at Hotel New Otani in Tokyo and Osaka, with partners asked to arrive at the same time in the two cities. They will each be guided to a table and sit down facing a large-size screen, where video image from the other hotel will be streamed live.

Motion sensors will be used to detect movements. When one person blows on the mirror, a sensor will activate a fan on the other table and blow out the candles on the Christmas cake 400 kilometers away.

Twin waiters, one working in each city, will serve the food to give it added authenticity. The dinner will end with a photo opportunity, and the images from the two cities will be composed to look like a single photo was taken at a real dinner.

The company plans to select two couples to attend the 90-minute event, and applications have already been closed.

If 90 minutes together isn’t enough, there’s always the bullet train, which links the two cities in about two and a half hours.