Kashimashi is an anime revolving around a young boy named Hazumu. We start the anime with Hazumu hiking up Kashima mountain as he tries to forget about the girl who had just rejected him. However, little does he know, that when he reaches the top of the mountain, nothing will ever be the same again, his whole life is about to turn upside down in the space of a few minutes. No sooner does he reach the top of the mountain, than a large spaceship crashes into him as it loses its orbit around the earth where it had been studying human evolution in secret.
Due to interplanetary laws, the aliens regenerate Hazumu's body and apologize to the people of earth for the accident that has occurred, broadcasting his image to every nation and explaining in every language what has happened. Due to a mistake in the regeneration process, Hazumu's gender has now been reversed and a fun love triangle between the now female hazumu and two other girls is about to begin.

Kashimashi is a bit of a blast from the past for me, I adored this anime when i was younger, and even now I find it to be one of the most interesting gender-switch anime out there. Kashimashi did start as a manga, but in my opinion, the somewhat faster transition from hazumu's male persona to his female acceptance is better portrayed in the anime as Hazumu is constantly shown to have been very effeminite even as a male. I have found little to complain about in this anime as it shows a touching love story with many comical moments, but also deals with the dark underlying problems with human interaction.
Throughout this anime, you find yourself routing quite happily for both girls in turn, whether it be the tomboyish childhood friend Tomari, or the calm and almost antisocial girl Yasuna who had been the girl who had turned Hazumu down in the beginning, and now he is a girl seems to be doing everything she can to get Hazumu to go out with her.

I found the anime a bit of a disappointment at the end of episode 12, the original ending not being one that I was most pleased with, however with the addition of the OVA, also known as Episode 13 of this anime, the anime artists were able to turn this round into a wonderful and perfect ending for Hazumu. If you find you like the anime ending at episode 12, you need not watch episode 13, this gives the anime a sense of choice, though I do find that if you watch to the end of the credits on episode 12, you might just see the need for episode 13.

This anime is a must watch for those who love Yuri, Gender-Switch or just soft romantic anime, whether you be male or female, and I have often found myself recomending this to others as an anime which people should watch atleast once. I hope if you guys take my suggestion and watch this anime, that you enjoy this anime as much as I did.

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