Sharla in Japan and Sharmeleon are online aliases of Sharla Katalin Hinskens, a Japan-based Canadian YouTuber with a massive following of 614K and 744K subscribers on her respective channels. With over 15 years of living experience in Japan, Sharla creates captivating videos that showcase the country’s food, culture, people, and travel destinations. While she initially focused on livestreaming, Sharla has also made a name for herself as a translator, working on subtitles for popular films like Shin Godzilla and Terra Formars. Additionally, she actively collaborates with local governments and organizations to promote unique local specialties. Notably, Sharla has joined forces with her boyfriend on his Journey Across Japan series, further expanding her reach and influence. In September 2020, she launched the “Neko Neko Post” service, offering a selection of exquisite Japanese stationery for sale.
Quick Facts
- Also Known As: Sharla Katalin Hinskens
- Age: 37 Years, 37 Year Old Females
- Born Country: Canada
- Height: 5’7″ (170 cm), 5’7″ Females
Rise to Stardom
While attending university in Tokyo, Sharla in Japan was requested to keep a blog of her experiences in Japan as a homework project. However, because she felt that she was “absolutely horrible at writing,” she decided to make videos instead. Initially, she filmed “boring” videos of herself talking about her life as a student and other interesting things through her laptop webcam. In December 2010, she created the YouTube channel now known as Sharla in Japan and uploaded her first video, “University Exchange in Japan,” on September 8, 2011. In the video, she spoke Japanese to practice the language, but later started making videos in English. To her surprise, her videos began attracting the attention of strangers, which encouraged her to improve the quality of her content and share more about Japanese culture, food, and travel. In May 2013, she created another channel called Sharmander, which later became known as Sharmeleon after surpassing 500K subscribers. This channel became her primary platform for sharing videos about her life in Japan, including topics such as food, toys, travel, and beauty. Her original channel is now used for livestream content.
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Family & Personal Life
Sharla in Japan, whose birth name is Sharla Katalin Hinskens, was born on April 23, 1986, in Victoria, British Columbia, Canada. She comes from a small family and has Dutch and Hungarian grandparents. She has a sister who has appeared in her vlogs. During her time in school, she chose Japanese as her third language and visited Japan for the first time at the age of 17 through a two-week exchange program between the sister cities Victoria and Morioka. Two years later, while pursuing her business degree in Canada, she decided to return to Japan to make use of her language skills. For three years, she taught English and had various side jobs before going back to Canada in 2010 to complete her university studies. However, after the 2011 Tōhoku earthquake, she became concerned about her friends in Japan and decided to quit university and move back to Japan. She joined an exchange program and began pursuing her bachelor’s degree in International Communication and Languages at a university in Tokyo while also starting to upload videos on YouTube in 2011. After graduating, she took a job but left it six months later to focus full-time on YouTube. Although she has lived in Tokyo and Chiba briefly, she prefers to reside in Morioka in Iwate prefecture. However, she recently bought a house in Tokyo. She has also lived in South Korea and the UK. Sharla has vitiligo and recently underwent surgery to remove a tumor from her thyroid gland. Despite being raised as a vegetarian, she started eating fish at her grandparents’ place and recently began eating meat, stating that her strict diet made her unattractive to potential collaborators.
Relationships
Sharla in Japan was in a long-term relationship with a Korean man, referred to as Keyboard-san in her videos, for seven years. However, she only opened up about their relationship to her fans after five years. Keyboard-san was uncomfortable with showing his face in her pictures and videos but did appear in several of her videos. In a Q&A video from July 2017, she revealed that they were already legally married but had yet to host a ceremony. On June 18, 2018, she announced their marriage, and they moved to his home city, Seoul. However, their marriage broke down a few months later, and she addressed the situation in a video from March 5, 2019, in which she mentioned moving back to Japan. During the COVID-19 lockdowns, Sharla spent a significant amount of time in the UK and often collaborated with English YouTuber Chris Broad, known for his channel Abroad in Japan. This led to speculation among her fans about whether they were dating. In a “juicy” Q&A video on July 17, 2022, she confirmed their relationship, and both of them made separate videos on their respective channels in August to announce it.