Oricon recently surveyed 2,000 people, asking them which celebrity Japan can be internationally proud of. Not too surprisingly, the #1 answer by a landslide was Seattle Mariners outfielder Ichiro Suzuki. He received more than 700 votes, with the closest competition coming from actor Ken Watanabe (146 votes) and director Takeshi Kitano (145 votes). Fellow Major League player Hideki Matsui received only 39 votes to rank 5th among males, right behind Takuya Kimura.

Competition among the women was tighter. Actresses Sayuri Yoshinaga and Rinko Kikuchi tied for first, both one vote ahead of pop star Hikaru Utada. Ayumi Hamasaki tied for fourth with judo superstar Ryoko Tani, five votes behind Utada.

Rounding out the top ten in the male category were soccer player Shunsuke Nakamura, former soccer star Hidetoshi Nakata, director Hayao Miyazaki, Arashi member Kazunari Ninomiya, and the late Akira Kurosawa. Meanwhile, the women's list included 74-year-old talento Tetsuko Kuroyanagi, current Miss Universe Riyo Mori, figure skater Shizuka Arakawa, Yoko Ono, Sadako Ogata (president of the Japan International Cooperation Agency), and teen figure skater Mao Asada.