Hello Kitty可以说是现代文化中最容易一眼就认出的卡通形象。她是没有嘴巴的微笑的蒙娜·丽莎。就在今年Hello Kitty迎来了自己40岁的生日。不过你可知道Hello Kitty其实不是猫？

其实Hello Kitty是个英国人，住在伦敦郊区，她的真实身份是一个小学三年级女生。她的真名叫做Kitty White，生日是11月1日，所以Hello Kitty应该是天蝎座的。Kitty有一个叫做Mimmy的双胞胎妹妹，还养着一只长得和她一模一样的宠物猫，名字叫Charmmy Kitty。也就是说，长得像猫但不是猫的东西养了一只猫！

创造Hello Kitty的日本三丽鸥公司更正说，Hello Kitty不是猫，她是一个卡通角色，一个小女孩，她是我们的朋友，但她不是猫。从来没有出现过她四足着地的样子，她和两足生物一样坐立行走。

As preparations are made for the roll-out of Hello Kitty's 40th birthday festivities in Los Angeles, the company that makes the beloved mouthless feline wants to set the record straight:

Hello Kitty is not a cat at all, says Sanrio.

She's a real human little girl who lives outside of London, has a twin sister and a cat of her own and will forever be in third grade.

It's part of Hello Kitty's origin story that most of the world never glommed onto as the Japanese character steadily won over hearts and minds across the globe beginning in the early 1970s.

And it's finally been dug up with the help of anthropologist Christine R. Yano, who's putting together the Hello Kitty retrospective in Los Angeles to honor the character's 40th anniversary.

The truth came out as Sanrio edited Yano's script for the retrospective at the Japanese American National Museum.

'I was corrected — very firmly,' Yano told the LA Times. 'That's one correction Sanrio made for my script for the show. Hello Kitty is not a cat. She's a cartoon character. She is a little girl.

'She is not a cat. She's never depicted on all fours. She walks and sits like a two-legged creature. She does have a pet cat of her own, however, and it's called Charmmy Kitty.'

As it turns out, Hello Kitty has an entire backstory created at a time when Japanese women romanticized life in England.

'She has a twin sister,' Yano continued.. 'She's a perpetual third-grader. She lives outside of London. I could go on.'

Why Sanrio chose to portray the little girl as a cat with no mouth, Yano did not say.

Instead of pondering Hello Kitty imponderables, it may be best to concentrate on the character's accomplishments.

Besides reaching the ripe age of 40 without so much as a wrinkle, Hello Kitty recently made her first trek to outer space.

A 4-cm (1.6-inch) tall Hello Kitty figure is aboard the Hodoyoshi-3 satellite, looking through a window at Earth, Sanrio announced this week.

The satellite, which is about the size of a large rubbish bin, was developed by Japanese researchers as part of a $40 million program funded by the education and science ministry.

Hello Kitty's retrospective opens October 11 and will remain on view through April 2015.

The inaugural Hello Kitty Convention will also be held in Los Angeles from October 30 through November 2.

（来源：Daily Mail 编辑：丹妮）