S²

156. The Ephemeral (Japan)

2012-01-30T17:47:00.003-05:00

As a part of my research into the psychological workings of the Japanese people after the March 2011 Earthquake, I have been paying attention to personal blogs in Japanese. One that I have encountered a week ago is written by a middle-aged man (Mr. Y) in Osaka, whose brightly-colored blog (the sidebars adorned by cartoon animals) contains many posts about loss. The man appears to be deeply affected by the Earthquake, and in August 2011, posted the following brief but controversial post:

Quote:
『世界中のみなさん、原発事故を起こしてしまって、本当にすみません。地球を汚してすみません。謝る言葉も見つかりません。知床を世界遺産に認定してもらったにもかかわらず、原発を再稼動してすみません。馬鹿ばっかりで本当にすみません。そして東北のみなさん、本当にすみませんでした。また、多くの野生動物や犬や猫のみなさんには、多大なるご迷惑と放置したことを心からお詫びします。本当にすみませんでした。』Date: 2011-08-19

Translation:
"To the people of the world: We are truly sorry for letting the nuclear disaster happen. We are sorry for polluting the earth. We cannot find words to express our regret.It doenst matter how many world heritage sites we have, we let the nuclear issue rise again, and so we apologize. We are stupid. To the people living in Tohoku (the northeast), we are really sorry. Also, to the thousands of wild animals and pets, we have caused you much trouble and we wish to apologize with all our hearts." Accessed: 2012-01-23

Accompanying the text is a blurry photo taken from an ancient play, where feudal lords are holding a conference with one figure in the foreground bowing in submission.

There is great significance to the above writing. Why has the author written a fictional apology in the voice of feudal Japanese lords? What is his point? From various other posts made by the author, I see that he has an interest in politics. The apology, therefore, could be understood as a hope for political figures to step up and assume responsibility, something that has always been unaddressed, especially in August 2011, when protests rose in Japan against issues ranging from Korean-Pop to Fukushima Children's Urine. The issues are often disconnected logically, but emotionally can all be traced to the Earthquake.

Allow me to use a metaphor. If a boy experiences the death of his mother, everyone around him will speak to him from this day onward with the knowledge that he is changed by a dramatic loss in his life. It does not matter if it is true, but once the idea becomes a consensus, even the boy's own thoughts can reflect the expectations other have for him to be abnormal. For most Japanese bloggers, the reflections were shown in the few weeks directly after the Earthquake. The majority of bloggers would return to their usual language and subject matter a month later. However, Mr. Y has continued to express his thoughts regarding the national, collective loss explicitly, many months after the Earthquake. This is why I use him as my example. His semi-absurd political mockery, demonstrated in the above excerpt, is only a bonus.

The inspiration for me to post his writing, however, is the fact that Mr. Y has deleted more than half of the blog contents within the last week. When I tried to access his posts regarding volunteering for the rebuilding of Tohoku, I could not locate the posts. I resorted to using internet cache files and archives to restore his blog, and succeeded in quoting the above.

Mr. Y explained the reasoning for deleting the posts:

Quote:
また私事ではありますが、体調面の問題もあり、療養に専念したいとも思っており、長らくブログ記事の更新も出来ず、このブログを続けるべきか悩んだ結果、終了することに至りました。
少しばかりですが、過去のブログ記事を暫く残しておこうと思います。

ブログの中には、あまり相応しくない記事や表現、発言もあったように思っており、皆様には多大な失礼とご迷惑をおかけしましたことを心よりお詫び申し上げます。Posted: 2012-01-30

Translation:
Due to personal problems, including my health and recuperation, I could not update my blog, and even thought about deleting the blog all together. For now, I will begin the blog anew. Although not great in number, I have left a few old posts in place.

Within this blog, I may have caused the readers discomfort with insensitive comments, I sincerely apologize. Accessed: 2012-01-30

Is this a good reason to delete blog history? I wondered. Except for the one instance where I wrote over a previous post, losing that post in the process, I have never deleted anything from this blog. Even if the links to the posts are not visible in the Archives, by accessing links directly, anyone can read what I have posted onto this blog. I believe in keeping a record of my internet activities, and had I ever written something such as, "I apologize to the people of the world", I would have given enough consideration beforehand to leave it on the internet.

At the most basic level, the issue is caution, to take the internet publishing platform as seriously as you would in paper print, and to recognize that nothing is ephemeral. On top of that, I propose to speculate further on the possibility of psychological denial of the overarching ideology that "Japan has suffered" by the Japanese people.

If I believed in conspiracy theories, I would say an external force has pressured Mr. Y into deleting his writing, due to the majority of the deleted contents contained comments regarding the Earthquake. For now, I will understand it as a gesture that the people getting tired of the suffering, and are ready to move on.

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Written by micr0q. Copyright 2012. No image copyright infringement intended. This is a non-profit blog.

155. Your Trip to Boston Part 3

2012-01-11T15:39:00.003-05:00

You are tired from having to go to the Convention Center a Third time due to a last-minute interview they assigned you. But the thought of being able to work in Japan speaks to you more than the thought that Japanese companies would not easily go out of their way to bring a foreign national into Japan. You wasted your third day after spending the morning at the convention center and the rest of the time eating lunch with two friends from Toronto.

You feel a bit better after learning that one of your two friends, who is Japanese, also did not receive any job offers at the Career Forum. The other friend, however, already has had dinner with the representatives from a Japanese bank, and is basically ready to sign a work contract. A girl whom you met the night before also has gotten a job offer with a famous consulting company. You realize that unlike them, being a foreigner who seems to be from China is in fact a big turn-off for most Japanese companies. Although in the mission statements, the companies may claim that they would want to enter into the Chinese market more than ever, when in reality, they are just as nationalistic and in-group-oriented as ever.

So what was the point of coming to Boston again? You think to yourself. You want to be able to call the city your second home again. You ride the T up to Cambridge, getting off at Central Square. Everything seems the same way that you have left them. The only noticeable change is the opening of a 7-Eleven on the street corner of the Post Office and the City Hall. You take note of the building style of houses, and as you walk onto the street you used to live, you feel foreign: There were not as many houses and trees in your memory of the street. You update your memory as if refreshing a webpage, in the hope that the new images will remain with you.

In the old apartment building, you speak with the superintendent, a crude, chubby Irish man going into his 60s. He remembers you. You shake hands. He goes back to his chores suddenly. You realize that there really was not much relationship with each other after all. You start to wonder how many of your classmates in Cambridge would continue to call you a friend. You are glad to have at least the friend you are staying with.

The three of you eat lunch in Harvard Square, and you pay for the lunch with your credit card. You feel the action of swiping your card is a significant moment when you have visited Cambridge as an adult. Inside your heart, you know that the gesture is a pathetic excuse for adulthood. As you leave the restaurant you begin to see your surroundings in a pastel-colored filter, as if the pictures taken by your eyes, which will enter into your long-term memory storage, are corrupted from the beginning. You wish, at that moment, to not have gone to the Career Forum at all, and instead have spent more time taking memory snapshots.

On the T back downtown, you see a high school friend from Toronto who made it into Harvard. Although you have disliked him in the past, the sight of each other cheer both of you considerably. The high school friend invites you back to Boston again, when he would take you on a tour. You chuckle inside at the irony of the statement, but smile and reply that you would be delighted. You love yourself for being in town long enough for you to run into the high school friend. You acknowledge the probability of meeting any one person increasing in proportion to the time you spend in the proximity of that person. Even so, you wonder if the chanced meeting of the high school friend is the highlight of your trip to Boston.

At the time of writing part 3 of the trip to Boston, you have returned to Toronto for almost 2 months. The new photographs in your memory, which were a bit faded to begin with, are now rotten with small cigarette burns. You know that fundamentally, the trip has changed nothing in you or in your life. However, if you were to ask yourself if the trip was worth the time, you answer with a strong Yes. There will come a day, you tell yourself, that you would visit the city not as a child, not as a half-adult observer, but as an active ingredient, the last step in coming to terms with a city which held for you your teenage ambitions, your values, and the foundations of your understanding of the world.

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Written by micr0q. Copyright 2012. Image belongs to EMI Music Japan, no infringement intended. This is a non-profit blog.

154. My Communities

2012-01-04T16:00:00.003-05:00

Like anyone who has been acquainted with the internet for a few years, I belong to quite a number of online communities. Most of them I have abandoned due to lack of interest or inactivity, but I took a look at a few places that I still pay visit, and thought about why I continued to visit. The following is a summary of all of the communities to which I call myself a member and which accepts me as one.

1. Detective Conan Forum (ProBoards)
I first stumbled upon the forum in 2005, from another website called DC's Mystery Files hosted by an administrator called Pound. Perhaps it was due to the main website losing popularity, the forum became the main place for a group of Detective Conan fans. When I joined, the fan art section was very busy with new uploads daily. The average age of the members were around 16 years old, and so we spoke in a similar demeanor and got along. The board began to become inactive when most of the moderators went off to college or began to work, and by 2008 it was almost abandoned. Some of the members, like me, continue to check the forum once every few weeks to leave a note of greeting. For holidays, we would also wish each other well.

2. Sora-mado (Weathernews Network)
The first time I saw Weathernews was on Youtube in early 2010, where they posted daily videos of their 24-Hour weather channel. I followed the Twilight program for a few weeks, listening to my favorite weather girl Ms. Arisa. I was also learning Japanese, or so I told myself. I joined the mailing list soon after and then joined the live-chat community, Sora-mado, when I lived in Japan. It was very liberating to pop into the chat at anytime, and leave a message commentating on whatever is showing on screen, or exchange greetings with random members. Sometimes, the weather reporters would set polls in which community members could vote by the press of 1 out of 4 buttons. I do not check it as often now, but each time that I do, I feel very much welcomed.

3. Team-B no Fan yori (チームBのファンより on Goo)
This blog is a special little community of its own. The main writers are two older Japanese businessmen in their 50s, who would comment on the Japanese pop industry, especially relating to female idol groups. It opened my eyes to a subculture of idol-writing, where the old men are 100% serious about their hobby. In some of their pieces, they analyze TV ratings with statistics, pasting pages of numerical charts into their writing. It was here that I learned of many recent events by the AKB idol group, and also where I met my friend B, who hung out with me in Akihabara after only one email exchange. I check the blog weekly to see what the old men are interested in, to learn proper Japanese writing, and to sometimes submit some of my own opinions on the entertainment industry in Japan.

4. YouTube
I am ashamed to admit, but I have attempted to become a respected member of YouTube from 2008-2009. I did not leave messages or upload video replies to videos made by popular users, instead, I made very crude videos of myself singing in a dark room, and made a lot of them. Some of my real-life friends loved them, but soon I began to dislike them for their low quality and boring composition. I then made most of them unavailable to the public. However, from time to time, I would still upload videos taken with my crude camera, but I would intentionally leave myself out and have something else become the subject. Surprisingly, the videos receive consistent views. I am not a truly active YouTube videomaker, but I am still a member.

5. Last.FM
I installed the Last.fm program on my computer in 2008. As of today, I have around 45,000 songs played. I've heard that Last.fm was the most popular between 2007-2009. I've never joined any heated music-related debates or uploaded videos or pictures of performances (it would also be illegal to do so), but I have used the concert listings to visit bands, as well as having found many musicians that I would not have found otherwise. Some of my best friends in real-life are also connected with me on this website. Aside from all of the above, Last.fm is special to me for two reasons: It was the first website in which I used my current web-handle --- micr0q; It was also the place where I further explored my personality in show, since my most played songs would be displayed for all members of the website to see. I then crafted a profile page full of bands which I thought gave a very positive impression of me as an avid listener as well as someone knowledgeable in Japanese music, before I even went to japan!! Of course, I've embodied the truths until today, and I've tried to abandon the falseness. Today, I still use the program to track my music playback, although the reason is more for record-keeping.

I was inspired to write this summary-blog because I've been isolating myself from the rest of the world, including my online communities, for almost one week, since before New Year's Day. I've been watching classic films such as All About Eve and Japanese dramas such as Karei naru Ichizoku (華麗なる一族). This morning, I awoke from my slumber, and connected with my friends. I spoke to my fan communities about the J-drama, since they were always the ones who watch drams and I was not. I spoke to my high school friends about having dinner tonight. I greeted my Weathernews friends. I read books. It was a very productive day, with a very fun evening ahead. Most importantly, I felt the happiness of being in a connected, human community again. I do not even want to spend time analyzing the significance of that happiness, or if it goes against my philosophical beliefs to sink back into this cycle. I enjoyed today and I hope to enjoy tomorrow equally.

Until next time, when I finish pondering about my trip to Boston and the winter of Toronto.

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Written by micr0q. Copyright 2012. Image completely unrelated to content and does not belong to me. No infringement intended. This is a non-profit blog.

153. Hiphop for Us All

2012-01-03T15:33:00.002-05:00

Happy New Year!

I have been watching a lot of videos of rap MC battles on the internet. The more I watch, the closer I feel to the culture of Hiphop. I am not good at rhyming, nor do I know enough pop-culture references that the battle-rhymes usually contain, but I feel I know how to appreciate a good freestyle.

Of course, many people reading might be already calling me out and say that saying something such as enjoying hiphop culture is not nearly enough for me to have any authority to analyze it. I understand their concerns, but I want to understand better via writing words down. From the video of Scribble Jam 2004, I will show some fundamental understanding I have of hiphop culture and its appeals.

Scribble Jam 2004 Complete Footage

A basic summary of each battle is as follows. I have outlined each person's performance traits as well as the strength of their content. Each rapper will be referred to by their initials as well as the verse number.

-Preliminaries-

Deuce Leader vs Vendetta
DL1 - Rhymed boy with boy, main attack on opponent's preacher gown
V1 - Opponent's mother's death, insulting opponent's skills
DL2 - Rhymed Savior with save ya, "gay rape-r"
V2 - Reference to Judges' names
Winner: Deuce Leader

Illpoetic vs Ron Noodles
I1 - Defiling the opponent's girlfriend
RN1 - Rhymes include opponent's outfit (turban, south pole shirt)
I2 - Rhymed shit with shit, death threat
RN2 - Referring to judges, saying opponent wastes time
Winner: Ron Noodles

Met4ce vs Borat
M1 - Opponent's hairstyle, "matter of fact"
B1 - Aggressive shouting style, Opponent is Ugly, Nintendo powerglove joke
M2 - Breaks down without rhyming
B2 - Self-reference with opponent's girlfriend, attack on opponent's facial features.
Winner: Borat

Okwerdz vs Mac Lethal
O1 - Opponent's image is nerdy, referring to previous encounter (punch you)
ML1 - Response to punch, Broken syllables to fill all beats, comparing opponent to genitalia
O2 - Attack on opponent's originality, Ackowledges action - ML shows money, humor on genitalia
ML2 - Use money (lapdance), refer to personal connection, referring to Judge panel
Winner: Mac Lethal

Dece vs Presence
D1 - Attack on opponent's clothing (Old navy), Opponent's age (36), weak stature
P1 - Weak rhymes, Reference to Revenge from the Nerds
D2 - Attack on Clothing, written lines
P2 - Calling opponent a lesbian, Reference to Lord of the Rings
Winner: Presence

Nova Illa vs Jack Cracker
NI1 - Rhymed motherf*cker with motherf*cker
JC1 - Opponent's style is weak, incorporating own name into attacks.
NI2 - Reference to Friends, Reference to Fresh Prince of Belair
JC2 - Response to "TV-Star", CD-R pun, Dependent clause rhymes, Reference to Star Wars
Winner: Jack Cracker

Seez Mcs vs New MC
SM1 - "White people cannot rap", Attack on Opponent's age and image (old lady)
NM1 - Opponent's hairiness (gorilla), Knowledge of opponent's loss last year, Reference to Denver Nuggets.
SM2 - Circular sentence structure, opponent cuffing the microphone
NM2 - Opponent's fake New Jersey accent, overall better rhyming scheme
Winner: New MC

Iron Solomon vs Charlie Brown
CB Jokes to audience before battle (↓)
IS1 - Attack on opponent's image (abercrombie and Fitch, gerbils in the hair)
CB1 - Spoken-style, weak pop-culture references
IS2 - Shouts "shut up", defiling opponent's grandmother
CB2 - Reference to Spike Lee and the KKK
Winner: Iron Solomon

Cipher Divine vs Franco
CD1 - Referring to own name, Calling opponent Monica Lewinsky
F1 - Saying opponent wants to kiss (homosexual), Sudden speeding up of rhyming, self-reference (skinny white and little)
CD2 - Leviathan rhymed with "try again"
F2 - Calling opponent illiterate (You don't read Thomas Hobbes), quick rhyme with reference to Cash Money, reference to Juvenile, reference to location (Ohio)
Winner: Franco

Maddillz vs White Mic (both start to jump around the stage)
M1 - Kicks off shoe (kick your ass)
WM1 - Self-reference to whiteness (Mr. Clean), Opponent's image is weak, response to opponent's lack of shoe
M2 - Opponent is too white, Reference to Macy Gray
WM2 - Pun (Hitchhikers don't give you thumbs), Physical threat (nosebleed)
Winner: White Mic

Johnny Blaze vs Illmaculate
JB1 - Attack on Opponent's skills, opponent's short stature
I1 - Incorporate "I'm short" into attack on opponent's skills, tight rhyme structure, self-reference to young age being able to win.
JB2 - Circular rhyming, opponent's height (again)
I2 - Defiling opponent's sister (humor), Conjunctions are swear words, self-reference "Mustache/muskrat"
Winner: Illmaculate

-Second Round-

Ron Noodles vs Deuce Leader
RN1 - Opponent's lack of skills, incorporating "opponent is weak" into rhyme, reference to 50 Cent and G-Unit
DL1 - Angry country voice, opponent's dress, random attacks, Stutter
RN2 - Reference to opponent's obesity, Reference to Nick Lachey and Chris Farley
DL2 - Response to Chris Farley's death, opponent's shoes and socks
Winner: Ron Noodles

Mes vs Borat
M1 - Opponent's scared, "white boys cannot rap"
B1 - Response to "fear", Direct insult to opponent (bitch), Refence to Ken Griffey
M2 - Opponent did not catch pun, opponent is scared (again), opponent is not smart
B2 - Shouting style, Opponent is "wack" multiple times
Winner: Borat

Jack Cracker vs Presence
JC1 - Incorporating own name into rhymes, calling opponent weak
P1 - Reference to A Christmas Story, Reference to M.A.S.H
JC2 - Opponent is unoriginal, Ex-girlfriends who "put up better fights"
P2 - Random reference to Charles Bronson, KFC
Winner: Jack Cracker

New MC vs Iron Solomon
NM1 - Gives opponent middle finger, Calling opponent near-sighted
IS1 - Response to "four-eyes", Self-reference to short height, shouting style
NM2 - Calmly insulting opponent's height, Reference to another battle
IS2 - Attack on opponent's skinniness and facial features (shaved with lawn mower) , opponent is "wack"
Winner: New MC

Franco vs Ad
F1 - Opponent's clothing, attack on opponent's originality
A1 - Insult on opponent's genitals, faster rhymes (prewritten) in response to attack on originality
F2 - "go back to Massachusetts", Opponent's facial features, Reference to A Tribe Called Quest
A2 - Opponent's body odor, "your odor has gone over to my girlfriend's house" (↓)
Winner: Franco

White Mic vs Ubiquitous
WM1 - Attack on opponent's nerdy appearance (Abe Lincoln)
U1 - Skipped a beat, "I'm about to blow you down", Pre-written "you suck" rhymes
WM2 - Reference to Blossom, Attack on opponent's hairstyle
U2 - Reference to Street Fighter, other random attacks
Winner: White Mic

Swann vs Illmaculate
S1 - Attack on Opponent's size and short height, Reference for Paris Hilton
I1 - Calling opponent homosexual, Reference to Macy Gray after a shave
S2 - Opponent is short (again)
I2 - Opponent is fat (humor), conjunctions "anyways", death threat at the end
Winner: Illmaculate

-Third Round-

Borat vs Ron Noodles
B1 - Having relations with opponent's sister (body gesture)
RN1 - Opponent's clothing, opponent's weakness
B2 - Slow dance, defiling opponent's girlfriend
RN2 - Documenting opponent's loss, Reference to hometown, Opponent's weakness
Winner: Ron Noodles

Jack Cracker vs Mac Lethal
JC1 - Opponent is unoriginal, Reference to Madison (famous for freestyle culture), threat
ML1 - Aggressive style, rhyming on the downbeat, "Ninja"/"Flipping" circular rhymes with "flip"
JC2 - Incorporating own name into every line, ends with "I'll suck a dick, bitch" (↓↓)
ML2 - Response to opponent's Freudian slip, Reference to Kill Bill 2 (Five Point Exploding Heart Technique), Opponent's clothing (camouflage to hide from me)
Winner: Mac Lethal

Franco vs New MC
F1 - Credit: won the Preliminaries, Insult with reference to genitalia
NM1 - Attack on Opponent's small size
F2 - Prewritten lines on California, fast rhymes, humor imagery (Ate a hockey stick), Calling opponent poor
NM2 - Says opponent has bad content (blah blahblah, reverse the tape)
Winner: Franco

Illmaculate vs White Mic
I1 - Opponent's bad dress style, opponent's dance, How dominantly he will win
WM1 - Opponent is an amateur, repeated lines, "you look like a muskrat"
I2 - Attack on opponent's age (retirement plan), response to own line "didn't I just bust that", joining lines with "f*ck you"
WM2 - Repeated "shut up" (buying time), reference to Buck Bundy
Winner: Illmaculate

-Semifinals-

Mac Lethal vs Ron Noodles
ML1 - Opponent's facial features (Tyra Banks), Opponent's shoes, Reference to Sage Francis' voice loss
RN1 - Opponent's image is a white raver, Opponent's weakness
ML2 - Calling opponent's attack useless (I have more black people in my crew), Broken clausal raps, insulting with body fluids reference
RN2 - Opponent is saying nonsense
Winner: Mac Lethal

Franco vs Illmaculate
F1 - Reference to Rick James, Fast rhymes, attack on opponent's unorthodox hat, knowledge of opponent's hometown
I1 - Response to hat, response to coffin, "Can I beat Franco I got a crowd that can answer that for me"
F2 - Opponent is saying nonsense, death threat, Reference to KRS
I2 - Opponent is "lame", "If we battled earlier you wouldn't be here", tight rhyme scheme
Winner: Illmaculate

-Final-

Illmaculate vs Mac Lethal
I1 - Opponent's fame is overrated, opponent has no skills, Opponent is arrogant, Opponent is poor
ML1 - Reference to Jay Seacrest, rhyme with Margaret Cho, Name contains "Mac"
I2 - Opponent's content was not strong, "I beat you, but even you know", Spanish (punto)
ML2 - Opponent's shortness (Eyedea got shrunk in the dryer), Mustache hair and anus hair
I3 - Opponent is arrogant, opponent's CDs sound bad, Reference to opponent's previous losses
ML accepts loss at this point.
ML3 (extra) - Audience topic in hope that opponent is bad at topic rhyming
I4 - Opponent is bad at rhyming, incorporating "f*ck you" whenever possible, Opponent's next album will also be bad, young age being able to win
ML4 - Opponent's shortness, opponent has no published works
I5 - Opponent's CDs are worthless, direct insults (you s*ck so much dick)
ML is cut off from verse 5

Final Winner and Champion: Illmaculate

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There are a couple of very interesting trends in the above example:

1. Out of the 11 battles in the preliminary round, 9 of them were won by the person speaking second. This shows that going second has an advantage, especially in the early rounds, where the skill levels have more imbalance. The second person would respond to the attacks used by the first and be able to strike back if there are any flaws in the insults.

2. Each time that a black MC mentioned to a white opponent, "white boy cannot rap", the black person lost the round. The "nerd" image of Borat and Franco and White Mic are examples of this, as they all fought through non-Caucasian opponents who referred to their skin color. The audience cheered the hardest when the white rappers gave some forms of self-deprecation or reference, such as "I know I'm skinny, white, and little". The surprise of a good rap coming from someone who does not possess a traditional "hiphop" look works wonders to the white person winning the round. The final round features two white rappers.

What I learned from this competition is that by using the elements of surprise, by overturning the opponent's insults, and by having an overall focus matter more than using fast words and using pop-culture references. Rap battles are interesting for their constant observation, where each rapper must take advantage of whatever they see and hear, and the audience judges harshly. Illmaculate won because he was able to listen attentively and respond effectively against all of his opponent's attacks. Some rappers lost their round by giving a weak second verse containing physical threats or even making Freudian slips like Jack Cracker did in the Third Round. Vocabulary is always important, as well as an understanding of rhyming schemes and the opponent's background. Oh, and if you dance randomly or wear silly clothes, you will become disliked very quickly by all spectators.

If I were to show the video to my mother, she would only look at the body language of the rappers to determine the winner, since her English is not good enough to follow the words. Surprisingly, the more aggressive body gestures usually foretold the winner of each round. Freestyle rap works beautifully this way: If you do not have anything of content, your body knows, and it shows. The performance of the freestyle, therefore, reveals all. If not for anything else, I love hiphop for this fact, and I maintain my right to enjoy the subculture like anyone else.

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Written by micr0q, copyright 2012. All images found during research, no infringement intended. Silent Scribbles is a non-profit blog.

152. Your Trip to Boston Part 2

2011-12-08T00:54:00.004-05:00

You are playing catch-up all day long. You take the metro to South Station, and feel a bit regretful that you cannot explore downtown today due to the urgency of the Career Forum. You see tents for Occupy Boston nearby, but you also do not have time for them. Your suit jacket flaps in the wind as you walk toward the convention center.

From afar, the place looks like Makuhari Messe in Tokyo, and up close, it feels even more so: There are only students and businessmen of Asian background walking about. Everyone is suited up in the darkest black and whitest shirt. You, on the other hand, have decided prior to the trip that you would not appear too serious by wearing a grey shirt. You wonder if you are leaving a bad impression on the recruiters almost immediately after you enter.

There are 6-7 rows of booths, but the far end rows are not open to the public. They are for interviews for selected individuals. You take a package of information but do not find the map. You wander aimlessly, stealing glances at company signs, looking for the one or two you have looked at before leaving home. Most booths are full: they are showing introductory videos; the speakers are making presentations. In these 2m x 3m booths, somehow, 8 applicants could be seated, including the monitor and speaker. It was a total classroom setting.

You remind yourself that the suited-up people around you are your peers, people who may be less qualified than you; no, most likely to be less qualified than you. You strut forward with confidence, as if you were a person who already has a couple of offers in tow. Suddenly, you run into an old friend from Japan. He was there for a degree program, and is now back in his home of Singapore. He seems down. He tells you that the company that told him to come to Boston for a third interview has just turned him down. He feels the trip has lost its purpose.

You try to cheer him up with your normal cheerfulness. You also try to learn the layout of the booths from him and hopefully some advice, too. You remember that you were feeling down about having to pay $200 extra for the trip on ticket change, but your friend's worse circumstance makes your situation more bearable.

After your friend leaves, you begin to follow his advice of forcing your resume on companies that are willing to take them. You attend a couple of intro seminars, and make notes on the seminars the next day. Soon you are bored.

You leave the convention center hating all the elements present: The expressionless, soulless walking suits; the whiteness of the booths; the ambivalence of companies; the drone of the building; the lack of oxygen, the emptiness created by the ceiling; the hopeless redundancy of the job selection process that will ultimately not pick you.

Good thing you have your friend, who after you return, decide to cook lobsters at home. You enjoy a wonderful dinner of pasta, lobster and wine. You remember that the trip is more about discovering how your current self fits with the old lifestyle, or, rather, a possible lifestyle in New England America.

Join me next time when you visit your old home.

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Written by micr0q, copyright 2011. Image found during research and is used only for visual context. No infringement intended.

151. Sennen Kofukuron／千年幸福論 (Review)

2011-11-21T20:18:00.003-05:00

Info:
Title: Sennen Koufukuron (千年幸福論)
Band: amazarashi (アマザラシ)
Label: Sony Music Associated Records
Release Date: 2011.11.16

Tracklist:
1. デスゲーム (Deathgame)
2. 空っぽの空に潰される (Karappo no Sora ni Tsubusareru)
3. 古いSF映画 (Furui SF Eiga)
4. 渋谷の果てに地平線 (Shibuya no Hate ni Chiheisen)
5. 夜の歌 (Yoru no Uta)
6. 逃避行 (Touhikou)
7. 千年幸福論 (Sennen Koufukuron)
8. 遺書 (Issho)
9. 美しき思い出 (Utsukushiki Omoide)
10. 14歳 (Jyuuyon sai)
11. 冬が来る前に (Fuyu ga kuru mae ni)
12. 未来づくり (Mirai Dzukuri)

Review:
Although signed onto Sony Music, amazarashi is a name that most people have not heard of. Sennen Koufukuron (trans. Thousand-Year Happiness Theory) is the debut major album of the band, and wastes little time in getting started. amazarashi's sound is a cross between Sakanakushon and kariyushi58, with perhaps a weaker bass and a greater focus on electronica mixing. In track 4, "Shibuya no Hate ni Chiheisen", the band does an ambient techno mix for half the song, building an atmosphere of an early morning Shibuya, where the sun is just risen out of the horizon.

Creating an imagery with music seems to be an important element in amazarashi's work. Their hometown of Aomori, the northernmost prefecture of Honshu island in Japan, may be their greatest source material, as it is known for its sea coasts and scenery. In a later track, "Fuyu ga kuru mae ni", amazarashi again does a slow tempo spoken piece about "Before the winter comes". The subject matter seems to revolve around Tokyo. The juxtaposition of the Aomori quiet with the hustle-and-bustle subject of Tokyo creates a very nice album that sits well within the metropolitan music scene.

I would say the songs most representative of the band's style is track 2, "Karappo no sora ni Tsubusareru" (trans. Beaten by an empty sky), and track 9, "Utsukushiki Omoide" Both songs start out soft on vocals but build up to nice, un-annoying choruses that echo on and on. They are tunes that get stuck in your head in a good way.

Amazarashi's sound is simple but it seems to have a lot of embedded style and direction, and I would like to see them further develop their sound in future albums.

SS Rating: [87%]
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A review by micr0q, copyright 2011. Album art belongs to Sony Music Records, no copyright infringement intended.

150. Your Trip to Boston Part 1

2011-11-14T21:57:00.006-05:00

It is a trip that never belonged to you, and never will be. This is what you remember from it.

You go back to a city you have lived in after seven and a half years. You tell yourself that your main purpose is to revisit the old, familiar places, to see if anything had changed while you were gone. In fact, you spend most of the time stuck at the Convention Center, speaking to random corporate people in broken Japanese. Your friends are also preoccupied with work or school, and cannot communicate with you like vacationers do.

But, before all of that, you want to give a recount of your weekend from Day One.

You arrive at the airport 35min prior to departure, but is refused to be checked-in because customs "may take a while". You also find that somehow, your first name and last name are switched, and so you spend the time correcting it while imagining the engines booming over your head as the plane you were supposed to leave with take off. The next flight to Boston is the next morning at 6:55, but check-in and customs begin at 3:45am. You do not want to take any chances, and decide to stay at the airport overnight.

The airport on a Thursday night gets quiet quickly, especially after 8:30pm, the most activity comes from airport staff who talk in accents about co-workers. You sit down on a bench out of the way, and begin to read the New Yorker magazine you were supposed to have read the week before.

Morning finally comes, and the small plane carries you and 6 other passengers to Boston. Toronto's cityscape looks like a bunch of curled up worms, full of newly built townhouses in the suburbs. Boston, on the other hand, looks much more Atlantic, full of independent houses and old roads that do not resemble a grid. The leaves turned the week before, and you want to go visit cemeteries.

There are a great deal less people of Asian backgrounds in Boston. At Airport station, you buy a CharlieTicket with your credit card, and chuckle to yourself at three Japanese girls who are trying to break a twenty. You tell yourself that this is your city and you should appear local in no time. As you pass the Orange Line on the train, you remember that you have always associated it with Chinatown, and feel a bit relieved that you did not transfer at the station because the people around you may stereotype you as a Chinatown-goer. You take note of strange station names, and ask yourself whether you have seen those names before. There are a lot more proper nouns to memorize in Boston.

You arrive at your best friend's house, and buzz him at the door. While waiting, you remember the old apartment building you used to live in, and how you have lived without buzz codes for a long time. The building is warm, and your friend's home is cozy. You do not have much time, and change into your suit and leave for the convention center. On the way there, you see the clothing worn by regular Bostonians, and you remember the online ranking of Boston as America's "Worst Dressed City". You wonder if your outfit is too out of place.

Join me in Part 2 when you enter the business world of the Boston Career Forum.

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Written by micr0q, copyright 2011. Streetview found on Google and is only given to show context; no infringement intended.

149. Not Enough Time

2011-11-08T11:27:00.003-05:00

Film still of GO, property of Toei Production.

My recent habits have greatly shortened the amount of time I have in a day. Below is an example of my day. May you find some resonance in my recount.

8:38am -
Alarm; Wake up more than one hour earlier than my class because it usually takes me 30 minutes to check all the reading I missed the night before, and to reply to new messages. The rest of the time is spent washing and eating.

1:30pm -
It does not matter if I have a class or work, I eat lunch around this time. Go back to school or work afterward.

5:15pm -
Return home, usually with a bento or packaged food in toll, and begin watching videos or read comics online. I often find myself watching an entire movie and skipping to do homework.

8:45pm -
Hungry again; would go out for coffee and a snack, and come back to talk to family over the phone.

11:00pm -
Actually begin to do research, homework assignments, but often leaving 60% of the work for the next morning.

12:30am -
Take a break for an hour browsing blogs and watching old comedy videos.

2:30am -
Go to bed after noticing the drool on my face and arms, where I have been resting, thinking of the possibility of skipping breakfast to finish assignments.

On top of this wonky schedule, I must report to the school radio twice a month, work 2 days per week at the library, and apply for jobs. But I often find myself taking away from my homework time to complete these very physical and pragmatic tasks.

I need motivation to act, because although thinking and planning is important, at this stage in my life (nearing college graduation), I must take everything as if I were doing free-writing, and put concrete marks on paper. A few friends of mine are even worse: If they are late for the first class, they would fall into a slippery slope and skip the entire day. This post is more of a meditative writing exercise for me to come to terms with my recent lifestyle. I know I must switch to a healthier schedule.

Although I hate traveling, based on my past experiences I continue to believe that I could become more focused in reading and writing on the road. I plan to utilize my trip to Boston for an overall preparation into my life next year.

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Written by micr0q, copyright 2011. Image taken from Google; No copyright infringement intended.

148. Looking at Places Past

2011-10-26T11:44:00.004-04:00

My grandparents on my mother's side went for a visit to my parents' home in Beijing 4 weeks ago, and stayed there until last week. They were there to have a vacation in Beijing, to see their granddaughter (my cousin) who is pregnant, to see my uncle-in-law who has cancer, and to get treatment for my grandfather, who was having problems with his blood pressure. All in all, they were very practical reasons. Since I was not there, they had an extra bed to sleep in. They arrived by car, driven by my uncle (mom's older brother). He and my aunt-in-law were not staying with us -- they were going to stay at their daughter (my pregnant cousin)'s house.

Mom was exhausted from their visit. Little did she know, her parents had many unhealthy and unsanitary habits. Grandmother would perform her morning exercise by slapping her thighs and arms hard, and created an unimaginably large sound that could be heard by people walking on the sidewalk. Mom and dad were always awoken by the sound. Grandfather's was never the sociable type, but his gloomy attitude persisted until either my aunt or my cousin visited. When he was in the house, he would rotate between three spots: The armchair in the living room, the sofa in the living room, or the chair in the balcony -- a grand total of 3 meters in distance separating the three. Since he wasn't really moving, when he was eating things like cashew nuts, he would flick the shells so that many landed on the carpet, and stayed there until mom cleaned them up. My parents tried getting him a large platter to hold the shells and fruit skins, but he would not use them. Mom spent 2 hours each night vacuuming and washing everything they used during the day.

After my grandparents finally went back to the countryside, my parents and I chatted on Skype. Mom looked thinner than before. They could not stop ranting about the personal misdemeanors of their parents. Mom mentioned how she finally remembered hints of my grandparents' selfishness and laziness apparent in her childhood, which, along with her life in the countryside, she has abandoned for over 30 years. She told me how grandmother would sometimes grab forks and spoons out of her hands without any prior notice. I listened.

When I was in elementary school, I wrote an essay about my grandparents. I said they were people with big hearts and acted in a careless demeanor. Upon hearing my parents' stories, the memory of my loving grandparents began to crack. I knew they had a favorite child in my uncle and that mother had not been living with them for many years, but the troubles my parents had with coping with my grandparents' stay showed that they were not as big-hearted as I had imagined them to be. They are still nice people, granted, but their world is closed, even to some of their children like my mom. My grandmother was quoted saying, "Your house is so clean, like a hotel!" She indeed treated my parents' house like a hotel, and not the home of their daughter.

On an unrelated note: I will head down to Boston in mid-November for the Boston Career Forum for Japanese-English bilinguals. I will be able to meet some of my middle-school friends and Japanese friends who plan on finding a job back home. But on top of my agenda is the rediscovery of Bostonian culture. Since leaving Cambridge in 2004, this will be my first time going there. My memory of Boston is that of a child, who biked all day just to window-shop at malls or went to the library only to play video-games. This time around, I will be looking at it from a different perspective. The things I ignored before may hold new significance for me. Like my memory of my grandparents, my memory of the city needs to be updated.

I look forward to all the surprises Beantown has to offer.

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Written by micr0q, copyright 2011. Images belong to their respective owners. No copyright infringement intended.

147. Indie Music Japan@Toronto (Review)

2011-10-16T20:00:00.006-04:00

- Info -

Concert Title: Next Music from Tokyo Vol. 3
Date: October 15th, 2011
Location: The Rivoli (Toronto, ON, Canada)
Website: Next Music from Tokyo Official Website
Bands:

-Akai Kouen (赤い公園)
-Chiina (チーナ)
-Merpeoples
-Hyacca (百蚊)
-NATSUMEN

- Review -
(In the order of performance)

Akai Kouen Live @Rivoli, 10.15.2011

Akai Kouen opened the show, all of the members wearing white dresses. But if you thought they would sound all lovely and idol-like, then you will be mistaken. They deliver a fresh punk sound mixed with some well-calculated beats. Each song was different, showing the variety of their repertoire. The band is from Tokyo, with four females. The drummer and bassist were very precise and gave them a very unified sound, despite having little sound-testing. Before each slower song, the vocalist, Chiaki Sato would shout into the audience, "I am very lonely!" The first time, I replied with, "I am lonely, too!" It was especially courageous for them to say anything in English, since the band members do not speak much English at all; it was more courageous for them to open the show, and I wanted to contribute to the connection between performer and audience. The audience at Rivoli did not disappoint, and came out in huge numbers even at the beginning of the show. There was less and less standing room.

Chiina is a band with two males (drummer guy is temporary) and three females, also hailing from Tokyo. The girls brought a contrabass, keyboard and violin into the equation, and immediately started making some loud sounds after the get-go. Violinist Yukako Shiba and keyboardist Kyoko Shiina are both always smiling, fully enjoying the music. Their more progressive take on punk and pop rock was successful, but at times, the guitar and violin combo did not sound very unified. Nevertheless, Shiba's headbanging with her violin was a splendid sight to behold, and everyone could tell their excitement at being able to perform in front of a large, non-Japanese audience.

Merpeoples live @Rivoli, 10.15.2011

Some great-looking (and tall) ladies from Merpeoples stepped on stage, wearing fashionable skirts and tights, prompting my friend to flash his camera countless times. The four girls of Merpeoples play guitar, bass, keyboard and drums. They opened each song with the drummer, who is actually a temporary tour member of the group. This was a bit of a miscalculation, as the generic beats made all the songs sound a bit bland. Merpeople's sound is more pop-oriented, with influences from Shiina Ringo and (in my opinion) the Shibuya scene. One thing that stood out for me is the high pitched keyboard notes that they throw in the choruses. It was a fair performance, but lacking in explosiveness or variety.

I had bought the tickets in person from the organizer of Next Music From Tokyo, Steven Tanaka, a second-generation Japanese-Canadian who has an insatiable love for Japanese rock music. Since last year he has organized Japanese indie rock concerts in Canada, paying for the members' flights and accommodations out of his own pocket. During the concert, he would introduce each band and then proceed to do his famous stage-dive. Although he failed in the beginning, the audience got into the spirit. In any case, his devotion to the show was clearly on display to all around him.

Hyacca live @Rivoli, 10.15.2011

Mr. Tanaka then presented the next band from his parents' hometown of Fukuoka, Japan -- Hyacca (百蚊), meaning "a hundred mosquitos". He claims that if there was a band that can generate a mosh pit with their music, it would be this one. How true were those words! Hyacca's double guitars tore out some ear-shattering, distorted sounds, and the drummer gave strange beat patterns of 5/4 and 6/8, confusing some of the audience, but quickly befriending the rest. They were the definition of "hitting hard and heavy", and people indeed started to mosh. The vocalist, Hiromi Kajiwara, is a tiny woman whose stance told everyone that "she was not one to mess around", as she sings in a call-response style with the male members of the band. Their music reminded me of some progressive ambient metal I heard a couple of years ago. I let the music take hold of my body, and my casual sways became violent headbangs. The audience was alive. Near the end of the set, Kajiwara jumped with her guitar into the crowd, and the mosh pit carried the guitar in a circle --- everyone wanted to touch it. It was beyond crazy, and everyone had a good work-out.

The last band of the night was Natsumen, with seven males and one female, and little explanation prior to their performance. They filled the stage: three members were on trumpet, alto sax and tenor sax, two members were on guitar, and rounding it up we have a bassist, keyboardist and drummer. You can tell that they were gonna shatter some glasses with so many different sounds. The guitars were a bit messy, but in the choruses somehow the sounds were able to cooperate and give a punky big-band feel (mainly due to the brass instruments). They also went out of the normal tempo, going in 3/4 and 6/8 constantly, making it hard for the tired audience to rock-out with their bodies. The vocalist, AxSxEx was the one rocking the hardest. He let his long hair dangle freely, covering his face, and spun on the floor with his guitar. By the end of Natsumen's set, AxSxEx's guitar has no strings intact, and had the audience clapped harder, I fully expected him to smash it entirely. It was a great last set.

After the concert, I purchased a CD from Hyacca as well as some buttons from Merpeoples. Unfortunately, I was not able to buy the DVDs or T-shirts due to my low budget, but in the Japanese musician-fan tradition, I shook the hands of all the girls. They were very friendly, and although I spoke Japanese to them, it didn't seem to matter whether I knew Japanese at all.

Had I been in Toronto last October, when the first volume of Next Music From Tokyo came, I would definitely have gone. The night was memorable because the bands (especially Akai-koen and Hyacca) changed my opinion on female Japanese rockers and indie bands in general. There was good stuff in Japan, and I regret not having delved into the underground music scene while I was still there. Akai Kouen, in fact, is going major and has an album due out early 2012. I look forward to hearing news of their new releases in the future.

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A review by micr0q, copyright 2011. Concert images courtesy of Michael Zhang. All visuals are not being used for any commercial gains, and will be removed upon notice. No copyright infringement intended.

146. For the Audience (Thoughts)

2011-09-21T11:50:00.006-04:00

A live concert with an audience.

I wrote for a student-run newspaper all of last year, and throughout the past summer. It ended with my editor telling me that my style is too "blog-like" (not suited for the newspaper), and my output is not prolific enough. Also, he indirectly claimed that my articles did not pertain to students' lives, because my web-based publications were getting half the amount of views as "news". I then fell into a bit of a slump in writing, and have not submitted any pieces to the newspaper in the last two weeks.

In the print issue of the newspaper published yesterday, September 20th, there were mainly 5 writers. Two girls contributed 2 and 3 articles each, and took up a significant portion of the newspaper. In the final page with comics, the editors added an empty square for "doodling". In the letter from the editor page, the editor wrote a less-than-editorial blog on eating dinner with his cousins, all while claiming the article was a "space-filler" due to the lack of contributions. Well, how much more meta-conscious can you get?

I have long been an opponent of student organizations taking themselves too seriously. The world as a whole never does, so why should the students themselves? In high school, the newly arrived music teacher was organizing her first autumn recital, and was visibly nervous. I told her to not worry too much, and she mockingly repeated what I said to the students in the class. It turned out to be a fine recital, as fine a high school student concert where half the students were learning how to use their instruments could be. There were no glass-shattering accidents; it was another night in a public secondary school.

At Waseda University, I witnessed the amount of work students put into an organization out of their own time. In the male choir, a few members were working 6-8 hour late-night jobs, sleeping for 3-4 hours, going to class and immediately afterward to a 5 hour choir rehearsal. They were always tired, and like their fathers, let loose only at the drinking parties or when they put on a costume (for special events). For all the work that they put in, they barely receive any growth in audience members for upcoming concerts --- mainly composed of neighboring school choir members anyway. I wanted to shout to them: Hey, guess what, you are not doing ground-breaking stuff so don't invest too heavily in yourselves.

The newspaper is the same, with its inconsistent contributions, a nowhere-to-be-found audience, and self-parodying, it will not break free of the mold of "student newspaper", which it tried to do by including "serious topics", topics that I could not bring myself to write, and ones that the current writers are not writing.

I have said it before in a previous blog: I write to improve my grasp of the English language. I like to play the game of rhetorical exchange, even though there are often too many fallacies to count. I do not write with "generating an audience" in mind; most of my articles are for my own viewing. It is the reason why I did not enable advertisements or madly promote my blog online. If you chanced upon this blog, read how ever much you may, and move on.

I learned about the concept of "breaking the fourth wall" from the Wikipedia description of Effie Stonem, one of the main characters of the British TV series, Skins. In the Season 2 Finale, Effie stares at the camera in bed as the episode ends. It was both a seduction of the TV audience and a teasing revelation of the imagined world of TV versus reality. But the term no longer applies.

TV used to be mysterious: For viewers 60 years ago, TV was a box in which, somehow, pictures move, and little humans interact with other little humans. Recently, with shows from 30 Rock to Hannah Montana, the world inside the TV has suddenly gained its own consciousness: It knows that you are watching, and it knows how to make you watch it in the future. There is no more need to break the fourth wall because the TV never assumed there was a wall to begin with.

An artist's studio with a cat.

I've been reading Seven Days in the Art World by Sarah Thornton. In the introduction she writes, "Art needs motives that are more profound than profit if it is to maintain its difference from -- and position above -- other cultural forms." What she means by the statement is the artist's intent. If the intent is to create a visually appealing/challenging object, it would be a "pure artistic intent". If it is to create a commercially successful work, it would not be. But even artists cannot lie, they need money to survive, so they must make some pieces that they know will sell. To be honest, the majority of the works I make for school are ones I know will have a good chance to garner high grades.

So what about the student newspaper? How much of the audience does it need to keep in mind? Does the audience matter? From my observations, most of the students who read the newspaper are already affiliated with either the creation process, or the creators. But then again, those who are close to the writers would probably already have an idea of the ideas coming out of them, and so the articles would not bring any challenge. If the goal is to appeal to the audience, then the audience will become even more homogeneously mixed with the creators. Herein lies the great dilemma of a student newspaper: The ones who write are also the ones who read. In that case, it is no better than this blog.

Show me how you are different.

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Written by micr0q, copyright 2011. Image randomly chosen from Google, no infringement intended. micr0q is not bitter at being rejected by any student organizations, so please stop worrying.

145. Cut カット (Film Review)

2011-09-12T22:30:00.007-04:00

Shuji (Hidetoshi Nishijima 西島秀俊) with director Amir Naderi.

I have talked before about my feeling of loss towards the fact that I left Tokyo before my study term was over due to the Earthquake in March. Since coming back to Toronto, I have regularly attended the weekly language exchange meeting at my local Japanese community. Other than that, however, I haven't done much to improve my language skills or to learn more about the culture. And so, when the Toronto International Film Festival came around, I lined up for tickets to see a Japan-related film. The film I randomly chose was Cut (カット), by Iranian director Amir Naderi. I did not notice the director's last name until I had bought the ticket. While I questioned the authenticity of the film being Japanese, I nevertheless embraced the TIFF spirit of internationalism and eagerly waited for the screening.

SPOILER ALERT: There will be spoilers to the film, Cut, after this point. Please be warned.
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Cut is a film about Shuji, a young, struggling director who dreams to create artful films much in the footsteps of classics like Stanley Kubrick's Path of Glory or Akira Kurosawa's Roshomon. He holds regular private screenings of old films on his rooftop in an urban city in Japan, and is seen running through the streets with a megaphone telling people to "wake up and see the world through cinema". Suddenly, he receives news of his older brother's death. It turns out his brother was a part of the mafia and was beaten to death in an underground toilet. Shuji is told by the mafia that his brother owed them 13 million yen, and that he has 2 weeks to pay it all back. For some unknown reason, there is a boxing ring in the underground lot, where gangsters who lost money while gambling go to punch a punching bag to relieve their frustration.

Shuji comes up with a brilliant idea: he would become their human punching bag, and each punch that he takes, they would pay him 10000yen. Meanwhile, there's a barmaid in the mafia who was obviously in love with Shuji's older brother, but has now transferred her love to Shuji; there's also an old guy (the incinerator man from Departures／おくりびと) who bows a lot but does absolutely jack shit except to account money for Shuji while he gets beaten. The film then flips back and forth between Shuji's meditative states and the violence inflicted upon him... for the next 1.5 hours. Finally, Shuji is close to finishing the goal, and for each one of his last 100 punches, white words of classic film titles from all over the world pop up on screen. Even after the very last film, Citizen Kane, appeared, Shuji was tanking the shots inhumanly and lived to repay his brother's debt. He then asks the mafia heads for a loan of twice the sum of the debt he has just paid, just so he could get started on his independent, artful film. The film ends with a black screen and the sound of Shuji shouting, "Ready... Action!"

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The director, Amir Naderi, was at the screening. It was already past midnight, but he held a Q & A session regarding the film. Here are some of the more significant questions he answered:

Q: How did you decide on the "100 films"? Why are there no films from the most recent 20 years?
A: Those 100 films have always been among my favorite films of all time. Since this is a Japanese production, I feel obliged to include Japanese films. As for the exclusion of recent films, I feel the films of today must be examined 10, 20 years into the future.

Q: How did you direct the film? Are you fluent in Japanese?
A: I do not know Japanese. (Laugh) It is a very difficult language. However, I teach Japanese cinema in America, and I have always worked between Tokyo and New York.

Q: In many of your films, the characters are similar. Is Shuji drawn from previous works?
A: Yes, many of my characters have a goal they work hard towards. Shuji is one of them.

Q: In the film, you express a frustration at the disappearance of classic films from our cinemas. It is true that most of the films you listed are not being shown anymore, but with the internet, we have access to all films. What are your thoughts on that?
A: The internet is very useful and with Netflix and such it is possible to watch all sorts of films, but my point was that the cinema-going experience is being lost in today's world. It used to be people gathering in a dark room and sharing a moving picture together. It is supposed to remain that way. Watching films on the computer is totally different.

Q: I feel you are making a comment on popular culture. Are you saying that the traditional model of cinema is superior to the commercial cinemas of today, or are you criticizing popular culture in general?
A: I understand that even 80 years ago, there was commercialism in the cinema, but what I wanted to say is that we need to preserve the cinematic environment. You know, in cities like Los Angeles, there are only about 2 cinemas showing art films. Toronto is a great city, but maybe only 3 cinemas that would show those films, it is a dying form of art, and we need to revive it.

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To be honest, my opinion of the film was not very high. For starters, it was a gruesome 2 hours of self-torture featuring a fullscreen super-close-up of the protagonist's beaten face. I understand where Naderi was coming from: his background of parental loss, the banning of his films by the Iranian government, divorce, and expatriation make their incarnations in Cut. In a post written by Kim Jisok of the Pusan International Film Festival, he describes that Shuji represents Naderi in that they both express a great love of films. The Wikipedia entry for Naderi also states that Cut is a film about "a young filmmaker giving it all to make his next movie". I do not fully agree.

If it weren't for the final scene where Shuji demanded funding to his filmmaking, the only thing people would remember from the film would be the torture he goes through and his seemingly love of getting punched. There was just too much violence; it was heavy-handed. I do not know how much Naderi has suffered in the past, but putting his audience through 2+ hours of masochistic torture is not a good way to express his want to "preserve traditional cinema". If Naderi's "Top 100 films" were significant and deserve continuous recognition, flashing their titles over a person getting his ass kicked only makes people cringe. There is also a possibility that people will associate the making of those traditional films to violence and sacrifice. But then again, logically, why would you want to preserve something that makes you sacrifice so much?

My second problem with the film was the lack of character development. Shuji is adamant about repaying his brother's debt via selling his body to gangsters, and every other character basically just stood there and watched him. The people in the theatre, too, were watching. It was horrible because no one wanted to be the spectator and no one wanted to be the protagonist. If Naderi intended for the film to both repel its audience and to forcibly make them conscious of their "involvement", then well done.

Cut has artistic merit. I enjoyed the superimposed images on the naked torso of the protagonist near the end of the film. Sometimes the imagery synced and made wonderful, surreal textures. I commend Naderi for doing that.

What I do not commend is Naderi's Q & A session. It was a time when all of the audience was reflecting and wondering if the director had anything deeper that he would have liked to express, but he did not deliver. In fact, in the above questions, especially in the question regarding contemporary popular culture, Naderi never addressed if there is any immediacy to cinema in today's world. What if contemporary culture has no need for cinema? Many of his viewers were no doubt reminded of the criticisms of the Frankfurt School such as Horkheimer's essay on the change to the nature of the cinematic environment. But Naderi gave no response.

I asked one of my friends who I saw by chance at the screening. He said he also did not have a high impression of Naderi in person. We agreed that perhaps Naderi had not expressed his thoughts fully, but as it stands he seems like an old man holding onto something that is crumbling, and all his efforts, including Cut, a film in the making since 2002, was not enough to reverse the process.

S² Rating: [6.5/10 (65%)]
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Review written by micr0q, copyright 2011. Image belongs to Amir Naderi, Tokyo FILMeX, no copyright infringement intended.

144. azusa (CD)

2011-09-06T12:00:00.001-04:00

Info:
Album Title: azusa
Artist: azusa
Release Date: 2011.8.31

Tracklist
1. 明日晴れたら (ashita haretara)
2. i Love
3. マングローブの森 (manguroopu no mori)
4. 夢ノート (yume note)
5. ふーるふーる (fu-ru fu-ru)
6. 真夏のフォトグラフ (manatsu no photograph)
7. ナミダアメ (namida ame)
8. Two of us
9. 好きよ (suki yo)
10. 君のままで (kimi no mama de)
11. Just be a friend
12. 夏祭り (natsu matsuri)
13. フラワー (flower)
14. stories ~azusa self-cover ver.~

Review:
I saw this self-titled album by chance, and decided to check out who "azusa" is. Turns out I have heard her before from the GIZA Studio band called, Sparkling Point. After disbanding, she signed with Pony Canyon, the same record company as popular artists such as KREVA or Watarirouka Hashiritai (渡り廊下走り隊). This is her first full-length album.

azusa's voice is like a more childish version of Kaori Mochida from Every Little Thing, with a similar range of notes but closer in quality to the idols of the mid-1990s. It can also be described as soft pop music. Her single, "i Love" and "Kimi no mama de" were used for the anime "Amagami SS", and so she is also associated with anime songs.

All of her songs are catchy and cute, but to be honest, there really isn't a lot of diversity in the lyrics and the sound. She almost always goes for a high note in the chorus, and hold it for a couple of seconds, and gradually progress down in chords. Out of the 13 tracks on the album, there are about 5 slow-tempo songs, but only "Two of us" had anything close to a groove that we associate with slow jams.

It is pretty hard for generic sounding artists to make it big these days. If it weren't for her songs being featured in animes, azusa will continue to remain nameless. As it stands, this 1st major release can only be said to be doing "okay". She needs to either go MORE in the route of an anisong singer, or reinvent her sound to attract more audiences. She's still young, though; she has the time.

S² Ratings: [7.8/10 (78%)]
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Reviewed by micr0q, copyright 2011. Research from wikipedia.jp, GIZA, Oricon Style and Pony Canyon. Image belong to Pony Canyon, no infringement intended.

143. Pigeon Love

2011-08-31T23:59:00.000-04:00

In the three days that I went to Montreal, I did not get a chance to check my bookmarked blogs. When I returned, I found out that the number-one best-selling game of the week was a dating simulation game called 「はーとふる彼氏」("Heartful/Pigeon-Full Boyfriend") by Circle PigeoNation Inc. What is different about the game is that instead of anime girls, you play as a female pigeon, and try to win the hearts of male birds, all in a Japanese high school setting.

This must be a joke, right?

At one point in the game's history, it was. "Heartful Boyfiend" was originally an April Fool's prank, but gained support of the otaku community and made into an actual indie game. The players navigate through school life in St. Pigeonation School (プレイヤーは聖ピジョネイション学園の生徒となって学園生活を送ることになります), and try their best to date the 8 birds available to them. Like all dating simulation games, the player must engage with a character long enough to "go on the route to winning (their heart)". According to Earlbox, an avid game/anime blogger, if the player fails to enter any "route" to the male birds, the protagonist will be killed by a mysterious assassin.

So what made this game popular? From the advertisements in Akihabara shops, we see that fans are incredulous to the fact that a game like this was actually made. Of course, there are plenty of pigeon-philias who have been "waiting for a game like this for years". One tag simply said, "I can no longer love anything other than pigeons!"

"Heartful Boyfriend" uses pictures of real life pigeons set in animated backgrounds, making a caricature of pigeons. After playing the game for a while, the player loses the sense that the birds might have come from real life, and see them instead in terms of graphic icons. After removing the novelty of the realistic pigeons and injecting them with cuteness, the game is similar to any other dating simulation game. No, maybe better than most of them. The fact that it is compatible with both Mac and PC contributed to its being sold out after the first day of release.

I do not want to go into an analysis of the symbolism of birds, and how the game screen acts like a cage where the player controls the "helpless" or "meek". All I wanted to say is that given the circumstances, Heartful Boyfriend is a successful joke game.

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Written by micr0q, with research from Akiba Blog (http://blog.livedoor.jp/geek) and Earlbox (http://www.earlbox.com). No copyright infringement intended. 2011.

142. Destined to Fight the Destiny (Special)

2011-08-26T08:17:00.001-04:00

Attention, there are SPOILERS for the following series in this post:
Full Metal Alchemist (鋼の錬金術師)
20th Century Boys (20世紀少年)

I have recently finished reading all 108 chapters of Full Metal Alchemist, and finally satiated my hunger to know just what the heck is going on. FMA has long been one of the series that I hear much about but never actually get to delve into the details. Now that I've read it all, I feel I have the right to disassemble it and summarize.

I liked the ending, because there was a real sense of "end" in that Von Hohenheim and the homunculi are dead, and Al is restored back to his normal body. Edward kept a metal leg, perhaps to serve as a reminder of all the turmoil that they've gone through during their quest to restore order. The idea of "equivalent exchange" has been stressed so much in the series that by the end, the readers wonder what is left that Edward can give to get what he wants. Instead, the access to alchemy itself becomes a tradeable entity and used to save Al. Yay!

The fact that access to alchemy can be used to serve the same purpose as offering body parts is a bit confusing to me, since every person in FMA can potentially perform alchemy. Following that logic, it would be as if people who can ride a bicycle can donate their ability to ride to patients who need transplants. It does not make sense. Sure, alchemy is revered in the FMA manga, but its objectification is dumb.

What gave the Elric brothers their "magic" is their father, who just happened to be IMMORTAL and a LIVING CONTAINER OF SOULS -- the biggest surprise in the manga. The brothers are unknowingly involved in the turmoil before the "motivation" of their mother's death. Even if they do not enter the world of alchemy, the homunculi will find their father and them in order to force them to open the gate. In other words, it was their destiny to fight.

Similarly, in 20th Century Boys, Kenji and his friends are gradually involved with defying the cult of "Friend" and the elimination of human society. They discover that "Friend" is not just some stranger, but one of their classmates from elementary school. "Friend"'s prophecies are based on a sketchbook that they all made in their childhood. The plan to destroy the world, therefore, has been put into motion many years before any of them reacted. But since they know the sketchbook best, they are best equipped to fight against "Friend". It was their destiny.

There are parallel characters, symbols and motifs between Full Metal Alchemist and 20th Century Boys. The character Ocho is like Scar or Lin, a rogue who endures torture and hardships to overcome. The character Yoshitsune is comparable to Dr. Marcoh, who has a meek personality but strong will to "restore". The "Truth" in FMA is comparable to both what happened at the school science laboratory and the Bloody New Year's Eve incident in 20th Century Boys, where knowing the secret will guarantee persecution and potential death. In both stories, the antagonists have a grand scheme where a mass atrocity would occur. The protagonists must stand up and defend the Earth.

What is different about the two is that in 20th Century Boys, Kenji and his crew did not have to become involved in "Friend"'s scheme as early as they did; they chose to do it. In Full Metal Alchemist, the Elric brothers begin the story having suffered the loss of their mother and the failure of alchemy, and thus are involved in the grand scheme without choice. Lucky for them, their mission to save themselves coincided with the goal of the evil scheme, so that they are able to interfere. But what would happen if their personal quest was unrelated to the evil scheme?

The way I see it, 20th Century Boys offers more insight into true struggles against corruption and conspiracy in that the protagonist has a choice to enter the conversation as early as possible. In stories like these, before the start of the story, the villains have already started to act: The homunculi have been alive for centuries before Edward and Al's birth; "Friend" had already established his cult. If the buds of the villains were nipped before their conception, the protagonists will not even need to become involved in the stories.

So my point is that the protagonists in these "destined since to fight the destiny" stories contain villains and heroes born from the same big bang. Before their existence and their schemes and resistances, regular people had a chance to do something that could potentially nip their bud so that the actors of the drama would not even come to be. If the situation reaches a point where a grand scheme is put into motion and individual heroes arise, then the situation is already very dire.

We often wish for less villains in the world, but without villains, heroes would also cease to exist. Maybe the world is better without them.

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Written by micr0q. Copyright 2011. Full Metal Alchemist belongs to Studio Bones and Hiromu Arakawa; 20th Century Boys belongs to Naoki Urasawa. No copyright infringement intended.

141. Art in Practice

2011-08-18T23:01:00.003-04:00

EEL Gallery. The author's piece is on the left.

My summer studies have just ended. For a couple of art classes that I took, I handed in portfolios of drawings and exhibition reviews as the final projects of each class. As I placed the items on the pile of submissions on the table, I wondered if I was any good at all in my work. I looked over other students' works, and saw many that are better than mine in form and composition. I started to lose confidence in my choice to study art in university. This is a blog where I explore the reasons behind my choice.

Prior to university, I had almost zero contact with art. I had no training outside of the public school system, and the only drawings I did were crude sketches of pottery in archaeological exhibits. When I entered university, for reasons I cannot recall, I enrolled myself into the foundation courses for studio art studies. I think perhaps my thinking at the time was to keep my options open if there comes a day when I would need to transfer into another major. When second year began, I found myself again choosing 2 courses in studio arts, which put me on the path to graduate with an art major.

But why art? The answer may trace back to my love of writing.

I learned reading and writing at an early age in China, and was one of the better essay writers in my elementary school in Beijing. I recognized patterns in essay organization that received high grades, and used the knowledge to my advantage. My overall grades were not the best in the class, but my writing was always featured. I began to hold pride in my ability to write.

However, as I moved to new countries where English is the main form of communication, I had to spend a great deal of time adjusting to life and the English environment. My writing abilities stopped growing; I felt that way for many years. While I was getting better at expressing my thoughts and my organized essay forms in English, I was getting worse in Chinese. An ancient saying in China called "Learning to Walk in Handan" (邯郸学步) means that while learning something new, there is a possibility that one will fail both in learning the new and remembering the old. I lived in that fear.

So I translated books and novels from English to Chinese, and vice versa, in an attempt to stay afresh in both languages. I also began this blog to better my expression in English. I then began to study Japanese under the frame of mind that I was simply improving my overall abilities to express myself.

When I went to Japan, however, I had a great deal of paradigm shift. I realized that all languages are restrictive forms of expression. When the Japanese people say, "yoroshiku onegaishimasu", there are multiple meanings embedded. I rarely see the phrase in Japanese novels; I believe it is due to the ambiguity in interpretation that the Japanese writers avoid using it. Also, in terms of translation, it became clearer to me the problems involving loaded words and cultural references. A novel can never achieve the same impact when translated into another language, the restraints placed on the expression by the new language changes how local audiences view the work.

When Americans see the word, "Pirate", they think:

When Japanese people see the word, "海賊/kaizoku" (Pirate), they think:

So I sought alternative modes of expression, and decided that sometimes, I must express myself using painting and other visual clues. I wanted to create impact on the eyes. I liked the technical aspects of creating a visual art, since it involves disassembling parts of the world in the assembly of colors and forms, whether it is mixing paint, cutting wood, or molding mud. The practice itself is more concrete than any writing in any language. Also, while making art, I feel a sereneness similar to meditation. Using art, I could both express my newly-found worldviews and give myself time to reach a pragmatic approach to whatever crazy new theories I've stumbled upon.

Practices in the visual arts has a long tradition where art materials and art supplies have concrete rules. I know that if I were to paint, at some point or other, I would need to visit an art store or hardware store for supplies. The rigidness of the practice is a contrast to my essays, where I tend to explore general issues of societal structure and communication -- all very theoretical. I feel art grounds me, and keeps me in touch with a portion of the remnants of the pre-modern (pre-postmodern?) human society. In a practical sense, making art also provides me with decorations for the home.

My conclusion is that I am not using art for the prestige (hype) associated with the art world, nor do I wish to be a full-time artist or art teacher. I do not believe the saying, "a picture is worth 1000 words", but I think that sometimes, a picture generates a more uninterrupted meaning than a paragraph of finely crafted prose. After all, all symbols, spatial, pictorial or textual are only there to transmit meaning. Having experience in art practices adds one more weapon to my arsenal. I must take advantage of the presumed "boundless" perception of art to cross cultures and find a better derivative of my personal experiences, my thoughts and my expression within the current environment.

I think I've said most of what I wanted to say regarding the matter. I do not know how much is actually transmitted by my writing, and I apologize to Japanese readers who stumble into my blog to find pages cluttered with writing that has direct/passive voice disagreements.

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Written by micr0q. Copyright 2011. Images belong to their respective owners; no infringement intended.

140. Frustration in Japan

2011-08-10T00:22:00.006-04:00

On August 7th, 2011, a group of over 1000 gathered in front of Fuji Television Broadcasting Center to protest the amount of Korean pop content in the station's programming. It was also a direct response to the recent FNS Music Festival concert on August 6th, where Korean pop groups performed in succession. The group called for "no more Korean invasion of Japanese media". The protest is followed by a boycott of Fuji TV on August 8th. As bystanders, we cannot help but wonder: What triggered this sudden rally of people?

Footage from the 8.7.2011 protest.

From various comments made by people involved with the protests, we can see the sentiment is that many Japanese youth do not feel connected with K-pop at all, but on Fuji TV especially, there has been a continuous broadcast of Korean pop music and news reports analyzing the "Korean Boom" (韓流), a word which has been in use since the early 2000s. This "misrepresentation of Japanese interest in Korean culture" is what prompted the protest at Fuji TV, the owner of broadcasting rights to many Korean groups. The protesters claim that Fuji TV has singlehandedly crafted the illusion of a "Korean Boom" in order to destroy Japanese culture.

However, if we look at the performers list at FNS Music Festival, we will see that most of the performers are Japanese. The beef with the Korean line-up is that they are grouped into a special segment called, "History of K-Pop", hosted by KARA. It is understandable that K-pop would be separated from Japanese music because they are marketed as foreign and exotic. So why the hate? The more serious problem is the neo-nationalism at work behind scenes.

After the March 11th Earthquake hit, Japan was devastated psychologically. The government appeared to have solution to many issues, including the radiation of food in East Japan, and the public lost a lot of hope in the government. Japanese people left the country when they could. At Beijing airport, I saw two adults arriving with 6 children ages ranging from 7 to 16, who were not siblings, but were sent away from home with trusted chaperons. When I came back to Toronto, I also found an increase in the number of Japanese residents. The Japanese people may be a tough bunch, but they would still gladly leave their homeland for safety.

Video of press conference at Fukushima with Tokyo officials.

To many Japanese, the Earthquake experience has taught them to rely on themselves. The government of Japan did not pay for anyone's trip out of Japan. They had to fund their trip out of their own pockets. And so, eventually, when the money runs out, most of them would return to Japan. What do they find upon their return? Korean pop music on the Oricon charts and on TV.

I do not want to get into the historical rivalry between Japan and Korea, but I think it is safe to say that words like "cultural invasion" are quick to agitate either side. The 1000+ protesters were probably fueled by the bandwagon effect. When the Japanese yen is high in value and foreign investment is at an all-time low, the domestic market need stimulation. Even people with no economy background can figure that much at least. While it may seem trivial, boycotting Korean goods is one way people call for a refocus on Japanese culture.

But this leads us to the ultimate question: What is Japanese culture today? Prime Minister Kan's position is basically a shadow after a year of cabinet turmoil, and the CEO of Tokyo Electric Power Company (TEPCO) has resigned. People need a figurehead to believe in, and a figurehead to blame. Although quite a few Japanese bloggers have stated that the Fukushima problem should be shared by all of Japan because people accepted the building of the nuclear power plants in the first place, no one really wants to take it upon him/herself. The fundamental problem is the lack of resources (such as electricity), which both the government and the individual cannot fix. People are frustrated because there is no simple solution. They also hold too much pride in being a 1st nation country, so that inadequate solutions are criticized immediately. What happens is venting anger in any outlet possible, including at the entertainment industry.

I am not making an argument for the Korean pop stars, but the bottom line is that in May 2011, 200000+ copies of Korean singles were sold in one week, which really gives support to the case of "Korean Boom" in Japan. No matter what the reason is behind Fuji TV's promotion of Korean music (Money, maybe?), they are not fools in using their rhetoric. What is truly misrepresented is the neo-nationalism in protesting Korean TV content and criticizing the government, which currently goes unsupported by any centralized neo-nationalist leadership. Until the leadership problem is resolved, a new page in Japanese history will not be written.

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Written by micr0q. Video contents do not belong to me, no infringement intended. Copyright 2011.

139. Hokotate Logic

2011-08-01T13:55:00.004-04:00

There is a Japanese variety show called, Hoko-tate (ほこXたて) on Fuji TV. The premise of the show is to introduce "dilemmas" in dramatic fashion and end with a resolution to the dilemma. The name "Hoko-tate" comes from the origin of the word, "mujun" (矛盾), the word meaning "dilemma". The story goes that in ancient China, a weapons dealer claims that his spears are sharp enough to penetrate all shields, but at the same time, claims that his shields are strong enough to withstand all attacks. One of the buyers then asks him what will happen if his spear were to go against his shield, resulting in his becoming embarrassed, and thus, the "dilemma".

Of course, there really is no dilemma at all. The weapon seller is only exaggerating in order to sell his goods. The only thing holding him back is his desire to sell both spear and shield. If he claimed that one or the other is better, the other item will look bad in comparison and will not be sold. That is all. He could always pick a side.

In the two recent episodes of Hoko-tate, two different dilemmas are introduced. In the July 25th episode, a breast-enhancement-jelly company's CEO claims that breasts with her jelly will be indistinguishable from natural breasts; on the other hand, a plastic surgeon claims that he can distinguish all natural breasts from enhanced breasts without touching. The two go on to speak about their experience in their respective professions and why or why not they understand breasts. The surgeon says he has seen over 10,000 women patients, and therefore has total understanding of natural bodily proportions. The CEO says that they've perfected the technology and the material fits like a glove on female breasts. After about 15 minutes of build-up, the surgeon faces 5 girls in swimsuits, of which only 1 wears the breast-jelly. He calls them out one by one, saying they are natural. When there are only 2 left, both the CEO and the surgeon get a bit anxious. The surgeon eventually picks the wrong girl, leaving a happy and relieved CEO. The breast-jelly technology wins.

"Japan's #1 tomato-hating actor" - Mr.Nishioka

In the August 1st episode, the special guest, actor Tokuma Nishioka (西岡徳馬), who has starred in many dramas such as Tokyo Love Story, claims that he hates tomatoes and has never eaten tomatoes since his youth. He is labeled as "Japan's #1 Tomato-hating Actor". The challenger is Mr. Hirayama, a tomato farmer who has created a tomato that he claims to be taste-friendly to all tomato-haters. The show goes on to explain why Hirayama's tomatoes is non-traditional and how its innards are denser and sweeter. There is also time dedicated to Mr. Nishioka's 50-year-long hate for tomato, including a clip where he identified a box with tomatoes in it from 4 other empty boxes by smell alone. When the final battle comes, Hirayama presents Nishioka with sliced special tomatoes, and Nishioka decides that he likes the taste. Hirayama's tomatoes win.

"Just try my tomatoes!" - Mr. Hirayama

According to the traditional Japanese principle of pride, having a losing side on a TV show may seem like a bad idea, but there is definitely an overriding ideology at work in Hoko-tate. That ideology is: Marketing quantifiable goods under the disguise of moral advantage.

In the July 25th episode, although the plastic surgeon's pride and experience was on the line, he really had nothing to lose: he got to be on TV, he got to show off his skills at identifying women until the last moment of truth, and he looked cool throughout all the build-up scenes. The breast-jelly makers obviously were happy because the show gave promotion for their item for women to "appear natural". After the show, women would continue to go to the surgeon because "he was famous enough to get on TV", and women would continue to buy the breast-jelly because "it fools professionals". Nobody questioned the authenticity of the final judgment. It could all be staged.

I am not saying that Hoko-tate necessarily has to promote some sell-able item, but according to the two episodes I've seen, logically, there was NOTHING to be lost from siding with the person with quantifiable goods. In the August 1st episode, all that Tokuma Nishioka needed to say was, "Nope, I still hate tomatoes", and the episode would end on a note of defeat for Hirayama farms and the tomato industry. But WHO in their right mind would want to do that? "Eat your home-grown vegetables, my fellow Japanese!" was the message; it had to be delivered, even on this most transparent of methods.

"It was all right! [Seal of approval]"

It may be obvious that almost all variety shows in Japan have endorsements that they must promote in some form or other, but I just wanted to write about one instance of practical application of capitalist logic. Even when presented in a context of "dilemma", when it comes to spending money, there is actually no dilemma at all.

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Written by micr0q. Images belong to FujiTV, no infringement intended. Copyright 2011.

138. Ayame Goriki (剛力彩芽) (New Talent)

2011-07-22T10:59:00.006-04:00

To all of you Japanese drama fanatics out there!
There is a new star on the rise. Her name is Ayame Goriki (剛力彩芽). She will star in a new J-drama premiering this July on TV Tokyo called, "IS ~ A Gender Not Male Nor Female" (IS〜男でも女でもない性).

Basic Info:
Name: Ayame Goriki
Nicknames: Go-chan, Ayame-chan
Profession: Actress/Model
Birth Date: 1992.8.27
From: Yokohama, Kanagawa, Japan
Height: 162cm
Sizes: 77-58-84

I discovered Go-chan just a couple of days ago, on the TV Asahi variety show, "Torihada ~100 Secret Scoops Dictionary" Her youthfulness just radiated throughout the show. I could see that even without make-up, she is an eye-capturing beauty. You can see some clips of her in this video link, as she outshines the AKB48 girls.

Ayame Goriki. Circa 2007.

Starting out as a commercial and magazine model, Ayame Goriki has only acted in minor roles prior to her first main-role on TV Tokyo. Those dramas were not big hits, and as Go-chan was constantly in competition with another model called Emi Takei (武井咲), who is about the same age and of the same management company, her fame never extended beyond her photographs in Seventeen magazine. However, this all changed, when Go-chan underwent an image change.

She styled her hair short!!

The Legendary Momoe Yamaguchi

The brilliant move by her management had a surprising twist that they themselves had not predicted -- She now looks like the 1970s idol-sensation, Momoe Yamaguchi (山口百恵)! Some media in Japan (including 2ch) have called her the "Rebirth of Momoe". Her image became extremely memorable, and she stands out among all the Seventeen models.

Actually, before her image change, she looked like Airi Suzuki (鈴木愛里) of ℃-ute. She has a face that is innocent and slightly crossed eyes that make her add an exotic twist to the cute girl image. It is like Marshall Mcluhan said, those who look like everyone and who remind viewers of everyone are those who will succeed in television. Ayame Goriki has that face.

A young Go-chan again.

This is Airi Suzuki, but can you even tell the difference?

As for the drama IS ("ai-esu"), which is based on an LGBT manga which won the 2007 Shojo manga prize, it will definitely provide Ayame Goriki with a wider audience. Her cross-dressing scenes are cute and believable. Although she does not update her blog regularly, and her followers are still few in number, I believe she has what it takes to be a popular actress in the near future.

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Written by micr0q. Copyright 2011. Images and videos copyright of their respective owners, posted here simply for reference, and will be removed upon notice.

137. Life Lessons from Nichijou

2011-07-18T14:59:00.010-04:00

Episode 16 of the popular Kyoto Animation series, Nichijou, can be summarized with the word, "Awkward". The characters get themselves into wildly absurd situations due to their inability or embarrassment to reveal certain truths about themselves. Let's have a closer look:

Yuko, like me, obviously does not go to Starbucks often. Once she does, she is baffled by the Starbucks lingo. In the above picture, she mistakes "Tall" (To-ru) as the Japanese word for "clear" (透). She changes her mind and orders other items, but is even more confused than before.

What makes the situation worse is that the store clerk, who is a trainee (see: name tag), cannot explain what the lingo means either. She only presents more and more options for Yuko, who looks like she is talking with aliens.

Eventually, through gestures, Yuko orders a drink. It turns out to be a really awful-tasting thing in a tiny cup. The exact same situation happened to me at Starbucks, even though I had no problem with ordering the size of the drink I wanted. I ended up getting an orange-flavored tea that did not taste like anything except for orange seeds. I added honey and it tasted even worse.

Skip forward to the next big scene, we have Mio being approached by a police officer to check her bag, which she adamantly refuses. Actually, she does not even refuse at first, but instead presents the officer with a 1000yen bribe, and does a Dogeza out of the blue.

Once the viewers and Yuko understand the reason for Mio's rash behavior -- her drafts of the Yaoi hentai manga -- she flips out on all of them, literally.

After the dust settles, Mio walks away dejected. The embarrassing truth about her has been revealed. I can relate. During the making of one of my paintings, I made enlarged photocopies of male underwear models at a local copy shop. It was only after I had printed them that I remembered to care about what others in the shop thought about me. I stayed calm, and the clerks did not say anything.

Finally, we have Yuko at the Shinonome house. Like always, Nano is trying her hardest to avoid telling Yuko directly the fact that she is a robot, and tries to get Hakase to follow suit. Hakase does not care, and reveals Nano's hidden robot powers to Yuko. However, to Nano's surprise, Yuko takes it really well. Her curiosity about Nano's identity, once settled, was nothing more than a curiosity. It did not lead to discrimination of any kind and Nano comes to better terms with her identity. Many fans commented that Yuko's bonding moment with Nano is one of the most surprising moments in the series.

But what all of these things have in common is that fact that what a person finds embarrassing or ugly within themselves might not appear as so in the eyes of others. If Yuko and the store clerk had both admitted that they did not understand what the hell they were buying and selling and chose the drinks based on taste, then everything would have worked out. If Mio had told the police officer that what was in her bag was manga submissions for her circle (albeit a yaoi circle), he might have sympathized. The message of these scenes is, "chill the fuck out, because the world is actually a really simple place".

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A post by micr0q. Copyright 2011.

136. An Illusion of Motion

2011-07-17T18:02:00.010-04:00

Image copyright of Paramount Pictures, no infringement intended.

I got seriously drunk for the first time last night. At my Best friend's party, there was a freestyle rap battle. I joined in, and soon found out that I was choking on words. Instead of admitting my impotency of the English language, I fell under the hypnotism of the media. I kept on telling myself that "people seem to get better at things when they are looser (drunker)", much of which I had gathered from TV and books. I ended up drinking half a bottle of Vodka, making a lot of rhymes that embarrassed me but cheered others, and passing out on the floor until 6am.

I threw up after getting home, and slept more, waking up at 1pm. I then went out and took a 3-hour-long walk downtown, to reset my body. While walking in the searing sunshine, I sweated, which made me remember 2 weeks ago, when I had longer hair, and stood under the same sun watching the Gay Pride Parade. I had suffered from the heat with longer hair, and so I was glad that I had cut my hair the day after the parade, but also reminded myself that my hair has had another 2 weeks of growth. It does not matter if I am studying or freestyle rapping, my hair would continue to grow, just like my toenails.

Continuing along that line of thought, I questioned my perception of "action" and "inaction". Is there any truly motionless moment in my life at all? No, of course. We are taught the fact in elementary school, when we learned that the Earth is constantly rotating and revolving. Physically, nothing stays in place.

I questioned the moments in literature, when the surroundings "stay still", or when the room "falls into total silence". Those expressions trigger something in us, but what is it exactly about those imagery that appeals to us? Why do we find it special that the book would take its time to mention such a moment? Perhaps it has something to do with the universal knowledge that nothing is motionless.

Image copyright of Paramount Pictures, no infringement intended.

Humans like to trick themselves into believing that they can achieve motionlessness, where things at an idealized "prime state" do not degenerate. Ultimately, it is a search for immortality, for the creation of an emblematic monument of humanity. It is impossible, since everything is also in motion, and the lives of humans are always defined in relation to the faster or slower pace of the world around them. Even if you protest and sit there, the rest of society moves around you with even greater intensity. This is not to say that we must be constantly "at work" to stay en par with the world, because enjoying moments of relaxation sitting on grassy fields is significant, but closer examinations of this relationship signal to us how much fulfillment we feel with our lives.

What it comes down to in the end is how we assign our lives with meaning. But by seemingly "balancing" our "work" with "non-work", we are not really making any difference, since by essence, they are the same. Yet, humans continue to pursue this illusion of "motionlessness".

Anyway, while I was passed out on the floor at my friend's house, seemingly motionless, I was in fact moving, in the afterglow of the idiotic choice of freestyling (spending a ton of energy) under the influence of alcohol. Fuck the media. Next time I am doing it sober.

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A post by micr0q. Copyright 2011.

135. Trollno Trigger (Game Review)

2011-07-16T12:46:00.006-04:00

I am currently playing the Super Famicon/SNES classic RPG game, Chrono Trigger. It is a wonderful game with a lot of genre-defining gameplay... But it is turning out to be one of the biggest trolls I have ever seen.

How so? In the following points, I shall prove my point:

1. The Emoticons

At various points in Chrono Trigger, the character is forced to perform dances or express emotions via body language. The player must press L, R, or a combination of arrow buttons on cue. The "I am shocked"-look is the most ridiculous of them all. For the main character, it is as if someone just pulled a gun on him, and he spreads his arms and legs in an "X". These emoticons do achieve comical effects, but the lack of diversity in the moves makes them look like they were thrown in at the last minute. Dancing appears to be a running theme in the entire game, however, as a lot of NPC characters just dance and "trololol" around you.

2. The In-game Menu

When you pull up the in-game menu, you will see that the final tab is a "save/load" folder. However, unless you are standing on a save-point, you cannot use the tab. Some of the items like Shelter can only heal your characters when you use it on a save-point. Why does the game want to tease its players by having that tab following you during the entire game? Sometimes, when traveling through regions with tough monsters, the thing the players want to do the most is to save. But alas, the in-game menu would not allow it. The best option is simply to remove it and have the save-points be the only place to trigger the save-dialogue, just like the buying/selling dialogue in shops.

3. Random Enemies

On that note about the save-points... In later points in the game, objects that appear to be save-points can be deceitful.

4. Small Things Matter

One of the biggest surprises Chrono Trigger has in store for its players is the trial of Princess Nadia's kidnapping. The game recounts actions the players performed or had neglected to perform at the Millennium Fair, such as finding a little girl's cat, talking to the princess before retrieving her pendant, etc. The jury deliberates and you feel absolutely PLAYED. You didn't play the game, it was recording little moves you made just like that! For RPG fans who are attuned to explore every option before moving on (like me), I only realized that I should not have talked to the old man who wanted to buy the pendant at all until after the fact. Although in the end, you must still fight the dragon-machine and break out of the castle, having the interlude of a trial is such a troll-moment that you can only chuckle and curse at the game under your breath.

5. Never Gonna Give You Up

Little did people know, Chrono Trigger contains Rick Astley's popular single, "Never Gonna Give You Up". The intro of "Robo Theme" and "Never Gonna Give You Up" are almost exactly alike. Of course, I never played Chrono Trigger before Rick-Roll became an internet phenomenon, but for those who played it since the game's release, looking back, they could probably all laugh and say that the game has some serious troll-roots.

For the reasons above, I think it is fair to call Chrono Trigger one of the best trolls in videogame history.
However, for the same reasons, the player must be aware of the game's environment at all times, which makes these troll-like aspects of the game engaging. Looking back, these elements are what had truly made Chrono Trigger a memorable RPG classic.

Ratings: [8.9/10 (89%)]
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134. Rocky Horror - Subculture in the West

2011-07-02T15:38:00.005-04:00

When I was studying in Japan, I was heavily involved with the Japanese idol subculture. I went with other fans to gather at the idols' concerts to chant "YOU ARE SO CUTE!" at the girls on stage. It was a crazy experience; I competed against many old salary-men for tickets to the upcoming events.

I thought nothing similar of that nature existed in Toronto, but last weekend, after I attended the monthly live Rocky Horror Picture Show at the Bloor Cinema, I am reminded a great deal about Japanese idol concerts.

The Rocky Horror Picture Show is a live-action stage performance with a backdrop of the film, where stage actors from the Randolph Academy act along with the film footage. It may sound like a simple concept, but there is a great deal more that makes it a crazy experience.

When you line up in front of the Bloor, you will notice the crowds that gather may be wearing little to no clothing at all (to imitate scenes in the film). Many people also seem to have stuffed their bags with newspapers and bulky objects. There will be many teenagers hugging each other and laughing loudly. In fact, it is a very sociable atmosphere, given that you were already associated with a regular viewer crew.

As I enter the theatre, there is more shuffling around as people search for their friends. There is a woman on the stage recording names of "Rocky Virgins" -- first-time goers -- as well as quotes that the audience would like read aloud. There is a secret ritual with all "Rocky Virgins", which involves random strangers squirting the "virgins" with water pistols. The ritual is probably why online guides to Rocky Horror tells people to wear clothing that would not mind getting wet. If you go with friends for your first time, however, they will probably want to you to get involved with everything, so just relax and enjoy whatever comes your way.

Of course, there are many objects that could come your way. In the wedding scene, people throw rice. In a scene with rain, someone might hand you some newspaper to cover your head, as the characters on the screen are running for cover. At the same time, the viewers who brought water guns will squirt not just the virgins, but also everyone else exposed.

The Rocky Horror audience sometimes knows the script better than the live actors. In some of the dialogue in which a film character says, "it sure is rainy", some audience members know to shout, "No sh*t! now tell us something we don't know!" The film dialogue can sometimes be completely overwhelmed by the chants of the audience. I do not know the script well, but I laugh and enjoy the fact that people can become so passionately engaged with a film. That same level of passion is often found during Japanese idol concerts, where fans can interrupt idols talking about their day with their shouts of, "I LOVE YOU SO MUCH!"

However, I think the audience participation level of Rocky Horror exceeds that of Japanese idol shows, because no matter how loudly and in unison the fans chant, "You're such a cutie pie, Yukari-chan!!" and no matter how much idol card trading is happening right outside the theatre, the performers and fans are separate entities that do not actually communicate. The idols do not reply to the fans. In the Rocky Show, the actors off duty would often mingle with the viewers and chat casually. The two are both commercial events where tickets are sold, but in the case of Rocky Horror, it is a lot more about generating a specific social atmosphere where people of the same cult knowledge come to enjoy the presence of one another.

If you would like to experience this Western subculture for yourself, you can simply search around for Rocky buddies and head down to wherever there is a live show. Due to its random and loud nature, Rocky is not for everyone; but in my opinion, even if you do not make a monthly pilgrimage to see the show, it is still an eye-opening experience that is worth a try.

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Written by micr0q, copyright 2011.

133. Life of a Gamer

2011-06-21T07:15:00.005-04:00

Recently, I bought a Nintendo Wii, and proceeded to enter a gaming craze.

Every morning, the first thing I do after waking up is to turn on my TV, and load the file of the game I played the night before. Today, it is a game called, Lost in Shadows, a puzzle-adventure where you control the shadow of a boy which has been separated from its body via magical means. The game is innovative in that you walk on the shadows cast by 3-D objects in the game, as opposed to actually walking on the objects. Obviously, the lighting affects whether you are able to climb on top of certain shadows. The point of the game is to gradually climb up the sorcerer's tower and rescue the body. It is a cool gimmick.

After a few hours of playing, though, it gets extremely repetitive. It seems all you do is jump and press the B-button to activate levers. The 3-D objects in the foreground serve little purpose than to distract you, making the shadow hard to see. I usually would quit the game, and begin another one.

This time, it is a game called, Muramasa: The Demon Blade. I control a Japanese samurai girl who slashes her way through ancient Japan, killing various monsters and evil humans, and collecting rare swords. The sword combos are fluid, and the colors vibrant; It was how I first became interested in the game. After I load my save file, I realize that I am about to begin a boss fight. I enter the boss fight, and get absolutely destroyed. I rage-quit the game, remembering suffering the same fate the last time I played, and search for tips online on fighting the boss. I then return to the game, and grind my way to victory, and triumphantly save the game.

It is time to start the journey en route to the next level's boss, but again, personal problems strike. The map of the game is extremely extensive, and getting from boss area to boss areas take tens of minutes of running past rice fields and forests. The regular enemies offer little rewards; I dislike fighting them. Sometimes, I even lose my way for a couple of minutes, and must retrace my steps. This, too, is getting repetitive. I quit the game, and look at the clock: 12:45pm. I have wasted my entire morning on a few ladder-climbing levels and one boss fight.

It is only in the classic one vs. one fighting games such as Street Fighter, that I find contentment. Those games offer continuous "boss fights", where each "level" is all fighting, all action. I do not need to wait through long cut-scenes and wade through half of Japan before unleashing my wrath on the next worthy target. Most importantly, the knock-outs are exhilarating. I would begin the arcade mode, play for 30 minutes, become satisfied, and move on with my day in real life. Why can't the Role-Playing Games be more like that?

It is not just me. Many gamers are dissatisfied with the constant grind and repetition, not to mention the trend in videogames to only create subscribe-able games and sequels. At the recent Microsoft E3 conference, over 90% of the newly announced games are sequels or remakes of previously successful games. This statistic is worse than the Hollywood film industry.

To me, gaming as an excursion should be one that is flexible on its time-wasting. I should not have to sit through 20 minutes of flashback and 15 minutes more of running around before gaining the ability to fight, a.k.a. "interact with the game". Pressing a couple of buttons to "move rocks" or "create dialogue" is NOT interactive; I should not be doing them all day long. Heck, if I wanted dialogue in real life, I would simply open my mouth. If I need to press a button, it better give me something supernaturally cool.

Now to you who are reading this: How long is your preferred gaming time, and what is your genre of choice? Also, would you like to come over and fight me in Tatsunoko vs. Capcom?

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Written by micr0q, copyright 2011.

132. Where the Journey Ends

2011-06-07T23:32:00.006-04:00

On my Facebook news page, I constantly see friends posting links to new attractions and events in Tokyo, inviting each other to go. Some of those things look really interesting, but I cannot go with them. I have decided to cancel my exchange to Japan and return home. Thus, I find myself asking myself again and again, why was it that I came back to boring ol' Canada.

Experiencing a foreign nation first-hand is great for character-building, or so they say. I admit my experiences abroad has led to very positive results. I had lived for extended periods of time in Australia, China, the United States, and most recently, Japan. Each time that I arrive at a new location, I can sense the tiny changes around me. I've trained myself to adapt to the lifestyle, the language/dialect, and the pace of the new environment. At the end of my 8-months stay in Melbourne, I had become fluent in the Aussie tongue, and driving on the opposite side of the road no longer appeared strange to me. This familiarization became helpful when I went to Japan, which also utilizes the left-hand lane.

One of the most important things I learned abroad is the fact that people are the same, no matter where you go. You will most definitely meet those who are smarter than you, whom you learn from. You will also meet a lot of people not quite so fast, so you must grind your ideas across patiently, until you reach an understanding. Language really isn't an issue, although the longer you stay in a country, you tend to also get a better grasp of the language. I was in Japan for only 6 months and 5 days, and looking at my friends who remained, I am a bit fearful that their level of Japanese would soon overtake mine.

Aside from that fear, though, I do not regret my decision to leave Japan. I realized that after the Earthquake, when U of T had offered me a chance to return, that it was a good time to wrap up my exchange. I had joined a student organization, attended classes, and traveled within Japan. I would be doing approximately the same things in the rest of my time there, albeit in a more extensive form. Meanwhile, I am missing over 5.0 credits for my majors, and if I did not fill some of it during the summertime, I would go into fourth year with an unbearably heavy load on my shoulders. The decision to leave Japan was made simply because the pros outweighed the cons.

But was that really the case?

Traveling is great. For first-time travelers going out of their home country, the journey might become one that they would never forget. However, all such enlightening journeys must end some day. There is little chance that my future career combines the joy of city-hopping, and from my hurried departure from Japan, I concluded that traveling is a pain. I would much rather my job was grounded in a place with easy access of my house, the grocery store, and the hospital. To prepare for applying to such a job, I must end my traveling. After all, all this hopping around was not raising my GPA or giving me work experience. It was all a detour, an excursion.

I've noticed many people going abroad to study or work after even 2nd Year, and their enthusiasm seems kind of hollow to me now... However, I don't want to flat out state "traveling is overrated" because my friend who never once left Canada went on a 6-months exchange to Sweden, and it really brightened him up (personality-wise), so as his friends we felt the positive changes that could take place in a person during traveling. This is why traveling is not a bad thing.

I once took joy in planning where I would be going for the vacations. I prioritized it over preparing for exams or house-cleaning. The prospect of learning something "new" by seeing something "new" was extremely appealing. I took it too seriously. I no longer do. There is only so much character-building that traveling gives you, the rest comes from real life. For those people who are just fine having not once moved out of their country, or even their province/state, have they necessarily learned less than I, the traveler, have? If not, then what have they learned? I should probably learn it as well.

I once wrote an essay about being envious of my classmates who could go to the same high school, when I had to move away with my family for the umpteenth time. When I got older and formed deeper, lasting bonds with others, I discovered that distance is not a problem to friendship. But really, at some point in our lives, it is time to stop looking at that itinerary. When that point may be is up to you. For me, perhaps now is a good moment.

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Written by micr0q, copyright 2011.

131. Unisex Idols

2011-06-06T23:02:00.002-04:00

For a long time that I've been into AKB48 and other related Japanese idols, I've never considered why it is that they brought about the renaissance of idols in Japan. For almost two decades, idols have not dominated Japanese media as much as AKB48 does. Their latest single, "Everyday, Kachu-sha" has sold a historical record of 1.33 million copies in its first week of release!! That's a shitload of CDs, and also proves that it is not only the otakus and high school horny boys who purchase them. What is special about them that makes both men and women crazy and forces children to line up for hours to shake hands with the not-so-special girls? After some careful thinking, I am going to explain my top reasons for AKB48's popularity.

1. Pokemon style choice of girls

The simplest explanation lies in AKB48's sheer numbers. The main group in Akihabara, Tokyo has 48 official members, divided into 3 groups: A, K, and B. They perform regularly in rotation, and whenever an official member is sick or busy, those spots are filled by the "trainees" (研究生), whom number 29 as of June 6th, 2011. Now if we add the 48 + 9 from SKE48 in Nagoya, the 16 + 9 from NMB48 in Osaka, the 30+ SDN48 mature girls, and at least 20+ girls to come in the Kyushu HKT48 group, we have at least 209 girls in this "wholesale batch". The girls are picked for their talent and personality, so chances are, you will find your favorite one from them. Once the "oshimen" is chosen, the fans tend to stick to buying exclusive goods with that particular girl's image, and go to events featuring that girl. It creates competition amongst the idols and the fans, everyone feels involved. I call it the Pokemon effect, due to the fact that you pick one favorite from hundreds, much like you would in Pokemon.

2. Appeal to both sexes via creating a myth of unisex

Whenever my friends joked about me being a pervert because I "like to look at little girls", I used to tell them that there are two factions with idol-otakus: the "I want to make you my girlfriend"-type, and the "I want to watch you succeed and protect you from the horn-dogs"-type; and that I belonged to the latter. I realize now that it was an inadequate categorization, because many people want to do both of those things. Now, why is that? I suggest that it is because AKB48 has no gender.

There, I said it. I will now present my proof.

Every single AKB48 member is female, and yet their producer/lyricist is male. As such, they constantly sing in the shy-boy pronoun of "boku", instead of "watashi", generally used by females. There are advantages to using one less syllable in songwriting, but it really makes the group seem young because the people who say "boku" regularly with such a high-pitched voice are usually primary-school-age boys.

Many AKB48 songs are about the cliche after-school confessions of love, but there are quite a number of songs sang from the perspective of idol-otakus. In the song, "Long-distance poster (遠距離ポスター)", the first line goes, "On the right-side wall above my bed, you are always there. My bikini-wearing lover, smiling at me beautifully." It sounds fine coming from a girl's voice, but damn! That's actually the situation with many AKB48-fans: They have posters of AKB girls on their walls and stare at them before and after sleep!

One thing that the idol-otakus do at every AKB concert is to chant their usual, "Tiger, Fire, Cyber, Fiber, Biber, Diver, Jaja-", and in the song, "Golden Center (黄金センター)", they chant the exact same thing. It must have been strange for the idol-otakus to finally see that the girls both know the chant well and are parodying it right back at the fans' faces. This is a form of reading the meta-game. The idols temporarily become their own fans, and are self-reflective. The gaze that hits the side of the female body is not one-way.

AKB48 does many great things that break them free from the gender mold, creating an image for themselves that is both male and female. One of those things is their weekly show, AKBINGO. On the February 9th and 16th shows, like in 2010, some of the girls dressed up as men and acted in scenes of romance with other girls, all to generate "ooo"s and "aaa"s from the all-AKB48 girl audience. Of course, it is nice to picture your female sex-toys cosplaying as men so that you can get your kink on, but the TV audience was also unknowingly inducted into the rows of AKB48 girls who were watching the show. We become the subjects and enter the TV, instead of seeing the girls as objects on the TV.

3. The omni-presence of AKB48

This is self-explanatory. There are a LOT of places to watch, hear, and read about AKB48. In a simple one-day schedule, you would see this many items:

TV
・ 11:00 - 13:53　TBS
　ひるおび！
・23:15 - 24:15　テレ朝
　『ぷっ』すま
・ 25:25 - 25:55　メ～テレ
　ＢＯＭＢＥＲ？Ｅ
・ 25:25 - 25:55　TBS
　さしこのくせに

RADIO
・ 19:45 - 19:50　TFM
　RADIO DRAGON～前田敦子のHEART SONGS～
・ 23:30 - 24:00　ラジオニッポン
　佐藤亜美菜のこの世に小文字はいりません！
・ 24:45 - 25:00　KBCラジオ
　週刊プレイボーイpresents 「篠田麻里子と愉快な仲間たち」
・ 25:00 - 27:00　文化放送
　LISTEN？Live4Life
・ 25:00 - 26:00（25:25前後予定）　AIR-G'（FM北海道）
　AV Music Channel

MAGAZINE
・ホーム社　「Duet」
・日本スポーツ企画出版社　「週刊サッカーダイジェスト」
　松井咲子

When you listen to the radio, especially, you lose all the visuals of the girls, and are forced to accept their words. The image of AKB48 becomes less of an exploitable schoolgirl and more of a commanding teacher.

If you still do not believe me, just try to delve into the AKB48-culture, but I can assure you, the more you dig, the easier you will arrive at the same conclusions that I have.

Bad news is, since the group is now extremely successful, their only path in the future is going downhill. On top of that, their management company has just announced a stupid plot to expand the group to hold more members: The creation of Team 4. It goes to follow that there will also be a Team 8 in the future. I am speechless, as many other fans are. This will not end well.

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Written by micr0q, copyright 2011.

130. Everyday, カチューシャ (PV)

2011-05-04T15:32:00.006-04:00

Everyone should watch this video before it is released as a single. Then they should ask themselves how Japan is doing post-Earthquake. If you already know about AKB48 prior to seeing this video, test yourself: which other music videos did Everyday, Kachusha reference?

The first thing we must realize is that Japan is recovering from the March 11th Earthquake. At least, economically, the entertainment industry is still running as usual, if not better. The people are a resilient bunch.

The second thing we realize is the absolute dominance of AKB48. If we take a look at the upcoming schedule of events for the AKB48 girls, we see that they will be very busy:

＊New Releases:
5/25　AKB48 21st シングル「Everyday、カチューシャ」
6/8　AKB48 3rd アルバム「ここにいたこと」
6/10　AKB48 海外旅行日記2 WithSKE48
6/22　前田敦子 1st シングル「Flower」
6/29　ノースリーブス 7th シングル「唇、触れず…」
7/13　板野友美 2nd シングル「タイトル未定」

＊Live Events
5/24 - 6/12　AKB48 見逃した君たちへ東京ドームシティホール
6/9　AKB48・SKE48・NMB48 選抜総選挙開票
6/19　AKB48 20th シングル個別握手会
6/26　フレンチ・キス 3rd シングル購入者イベント
6/27　SKE48 全国ツアー Zepp Nagoya
7/2　AKB48 21st シングル個別握手会

If each new release were $15-20, and going to each of the live events costs $10 (transportation only) to $50, then we are looking at over $200 in AKB-related spending in approximately one month's time. It is not so easy being a hardcore idol fan, now, is it?

There are many references in the video to older AKB songs, such as:
-Ponytail to Shushu. The icecream lady and the bikini.
-Heavy Rotation. Oshima's keyhole icon.
-Yuuhi wo miteiru ka. Colors of the sunset on the mural.
-Keibetsu wo shiteita Aijou. Maeda standing in the high school corridor feeling lonely.
-BINGO! When the boat shows up and the members wave from the boat.
-Namida Surprise. Running down a hallway.
-Iiwake Maybe. Bicycles and crossing the finish line.
Of course, the image of Oshima, Shinoda, Maeda, Itano and Takahashi makes fans wonder whether one or a few of the 5 will leave the group in the upcoming year. What we know for sure now, is that Kashiwagi Yuki has just made the leap to #3 in the AKB48 ranking. Soon the overall ranking for the group will be announced. I am waiting for surprises.

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Posted by micr0q, 2011.

129. Japan - An Account of the Earthquake

2011-03-23T20:22:00.003-04:00

For Japan

Life is really a fascinating thing. How we dedicate our daily life is also a fascinating thing. The earthquake/tsunami/nuclear disaster in Japan is one of those things that change the lives of all who are affected. This is an account of the first-hand experience of an exchange student living in Japan during the disaster.

My spring vacation had been fairly straight-forward. I went to Kyoto and surrounding areas in early February, and went for the first time to a Japanese hot spring with my Japanese friends. I was in the process of booking hotels for one last trip to Kyushu Island and southern Japan, when I was told I had been accepted into a home-stay program in Sado Island in the Japan Sea. The earthquake happened while I was eating lunch in the port on the mainland, ready to depart for Sado. I was with a few friends, and as I said, "hey, could you stop shaking the table?" I realized that something was wrong. The television in the restaurant switched to breaking news about the earthquake, and a map of Japan is shown with the magnitude of earthquake detected in each prefecture. I found my current one at level 4, and saw that the eastern areas were at mag. 7. I emailed my friends in Tokyo immediately, since I knew there are no TVs at the dorm. All this time, everything at the restaurant was wobbling, as if the entire building was thrown into a boat and is now floating in the ocean. The quake lasted about 10 minutes, and seemed endless. I was becoming a bit dizzy. The television warned that we should stay away from windows, we followed suit. In Japan, earthquakes happen very often, so we thought we would simply have to tough through it. Another customer at the restaurant, an old Japanese man, didn't even put down his soup while the earthquake went on. We did later gather at the television, like the rest of Japan where a magnitude 4 earthquake was felt.

However, half an hour after the earthquake stopped, the news started to broadcast the horrors that had taken place in the Pacific coastal areas. A tsunami-warning map is placed over every channel on TV, and the areas that would most likely receive a beating were highlighted in violet, followed by areas of red. At this point, I don't think even the TV announcers knew the seriousness of the disaster. Soon, the wall of sea water came, and the rest is what the media all over the world had broadcast. My cultural exchange to a host-family in Sado was emotionally ruined by the 24/7 television news broadcasts, with zero advertisements.

To those people directly hit by the tsunami, their life already ended. To the people who live in the areas close to those areas, the blackouts and crippled transportation made them unable to leave. Hundreds of meetings and gatherings for two weeks after the earthquake were canceled or rescheduled. All this time, the businessmen in Tokyo were rushing to catch subway trains and trying hard not to be late for work. Tokyo soon implemented electricity conservation measures with the daily scheduled blackouts, but to those fervently working people of Tokyo, life was basically the same.

And then came the nuclear scare. In Japan, it was broadcasted in the style of immunization shots for rabies, injected multiple times in intervals of days. The news channels hired a couple of University of Tokyo professors, who wore mustaches and waxed faces that did not show any particular emotion. When asked to explain the diagrams of the inner parts of the nuclear reactors that god knows were accurate or not, they used words like, "um, at this time, no one is sure of what this sign means" or "although the outer walls are on fire, the inner tanks are in relative safety" or "although small amounts of radioactive material is discovered in the air, they are probably not dense enough to affect the human body" When we hear those words repeated over and over, we gradually came to the realization that no one knew the solution. The situation was getting worse, and I thought it could only get worse before getting better in the future. Our friends from overseas started to send in emails and calls telling us to leave the country. As I write this article, non-Japanese people in Japan are beginning to seriously considering an "escape". The international student dormitory at Waseda is almost empty.

Of course, the righteous, courageous thing to do is to stay here and make a stand with my Japanese friends, but I cannot do that. The Japanese people aren't panicking like the rest of the world, and if I were working every day, I'd also be dedicated to my post, but during spring vacation, the doubts and rumors get to you.

But even if the Japanese people became super-aware of the radiation danger in east Japan, they won't leave the country and escape overseas. Where on earth can they escape to? They are already in their home --- Japan. To the Japanese people, being of a culture different from the perceived main culture of a nationality is forever strange. Japanese culture and the Japanese people stay on the island called Japan, forever. It is sad, but it is one of the unchanging facts of life in Japan. The Japanese government has denied the U.S.'s assessment of the spreading of the radiation, and at the time of writing this article, continued to enforce the 30km radius self-quarantine measures. I made my move.

March 14th, the day I was returning Tokyo from Sado island, I found out on the ferry back to the mainland that my highway bus has been cancelled and that there will not be another bus until the next day. I could not afford to spend a night in Niigata, so I bought a bullet train ticket ($125) and got back to Tokyo quickly. I called a close family friend in Central Japan near Kyoto, telling her due to all the difficulties with transportations and my own doubts of the nuclear situation, that I was thinking of moving to Kyoto for a few days. She agreed, and after getting back to Tokyo, I immediately bought tickets for a night bus to Kyoto. I expected the outbound trains and buses in Tokyo to be crowded, but to my surprise, they were running with normal capacity. The people in Tokyo had not really considered the idea of distancing themselves from East Japan yet. I felt a bit silly holding many bags, when the rest of the people at Tokyo station looked like they were just going to the convenience store. It was, however, my decision.

I am currently taking a temporary lodging in Hong Kong, and will continue to stay out of Japan for the rest of the spring vacation. I received news that the new semester would be pushed back one month to May, so before then, I can decide whether or not I want to go back. I am happy that I had made concrete decisions and acted quickly and accordingly, because if there comes a day when even the Japanese government declares a unspeakable danger, every single person in Japan would want out, making it impossible for anyone to get out. What I learned is that far more important than any media sources during times of confusion is to trust your instincts.

In terms of my studies, I am doing what I can to prevent losing an entire semester. Perhaps I will end my exchange program and return to Canada, but that just seems… weak. I sincerely hope that life goes back to normal for Japan, that normal life can return for most of the country, and that I can return and finish my studies in Tokyo and actually have a conclusion to my trip to the Far East. This is definitely not the way any exchange student envisioned leaving a country.

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Written by micr0q, first draft March 18th, posted on March 24th, 2011.

AKB Top 20 Ranking (Updated Weekly)

2011-03-18T12:30:00.017-04:00

It is no secret that I am a big fan of AKB48 and all related idols produced by Yasushi Akimoto. When I was in Japan I went to their concerts, and shook hands (including high-fives) with them. Now, since returning to Toronto, I am searching for their information online weekly, and trying to stay in the loop. So far, it has done good for me in motivating me to watch more Japanese TV shows and speaking in Japanese. From afar, I will continue to monitor the progress of Japan's hottest idols of 2010.

On this page, which I will update weekly, is a list of 20 AKB-related idols whom I have found to be the most interesting, at least for the week of the update. I have some favorites who will most likely stay on the list forever, but there will be additions and deletion of girls, based on my personal judgments of a girl's like-ability according to TV shows, radio shows, and personal blog posts of the week. I will provide a brief description and justification for my choice of each girl ranked, and for the Top 10 there will also be a picture provided.

Please remember that this is only a personal ranking of AKB girls, and I have tried my hardest to be objective in my viewing. Now that that's said, let's go!

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- micr0q's AKB Group Top 20 Ranking -

December 29th, 2011

☆Kumi Yagami (矢神久美) - Team S

Kumi has been one of my favorites for over a year. She is the well-known "baka" of SKE48, but she has a balanced personality. She knows when to be responsible, and when to join in the fooling around. She can dance hiphop and is incredibly cute in person.

☆Mayu Watanabe (渡辺麻友) - Team B

Like many people, I used to like Mayu more than all others. And honestly, she's most idol-like girl out of all of AKB Group. People may dislike her but they do not doubt her impact. Whenever there's a program with her guesting, the ratings go up.

☆Yuki Kashiwagi (柏木由紀) - Team B

Yuki came into AKB at the same time as Mayu Watanabe, but only recently became popular, reaching 3rd place in AKB's 3rd General Election. She is very well-mannered, and her "reactions" on variety shows are now considered AKB classics.

☆Miyuki Watanabe (渡辺美優紀) - Team N

Miyuki got her spotlight with NMB48's new single, Zetsumetsu Kurokami Shoujo (絶滅黒髪少女), where she was featured writing calligraphy and looking good. Her smile is very contagious.

☆Sae Miyazawa (宮澤佐江) - Team K

Sae has a great relationship with Yuki Kashiwagi, and they are often seen hugging each other or bugging each other. Backstage videos of them together are funny and adorable. On her own, Sae is also evolving out of her "tom-boy" look, although her bright personality remains.

☆Rina Ikoma (生駒里奈) - Nogizaka46

Ikoma has been on my watch-list since Nogizaka46's debut in October. Although on the surface she seems like a country-bumpkin, she is a malleable idol who can transform into a very metro cosplay-idol. A potential stock.

☆Rena Matsui (松井玲奈) - Team S

Rena is THE quiet, nice girl of perhaps the ENTIRE AKB groups. She recently had her 20th birthday, when she dunked her face into a cake. Pretty cool stuff.

☆Haruna Kojima (小嶋陽菜) - Team A

Kojiharu was what I call a "classic idol-like idol", who never made it to my list before because her ears stick out too much. In the 2nd Janken Tournament, however, she kept her promise to Sexy-sensei and did her sexy poses on stage.

☆Minami Minegishi (峯岸みなみ) - Team K

Miichan is very smart, and because her birthday coincides with mine, she is on the list.

Rina Kawaei (川栄李奈) - Team 研

The 10th spot in my Top 10 is reserved for AKB Trainees. Rina's smile is cute, and her chibi stature is also adorable, but OMG, watch this video: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=gfqjeMzlj6A

Yuria Kizaki (木崎ゆりあ) (S)
She's great at talking in groups and complimenting other members. She's good friends with Kumi Yagami and... almost everyone else on SKE48.

Kanon Kimoto (木本花音) (E)
I first saw Kanon in the DVD of "AKB Live in Macau", and I thought she worked very hard, even though she was only a trainee at the time. She had a short role in Majisuka Gakuen 2 (マジすか学園2), where she stabbed Rena Matsui. So evil! So young! (13 years old) She's SKE's pet..

Minami Takahashi (高橋みなみ) (A)
I have met Minami in person at NHK Hall. Like her 148cm listed height implies, she is TIIIIIIINY, but so strong and so good at dance and talking. The new year episodes where she was tricked into crying tugged at my heartstrings.

Akane Takayanagi (高柳明音) (KII)
As the leader of Team KII, Akane is known for her maturity. She also was famous for shouting "Please give us a concert series!" to producer Akimoto. From Aug. 29th to Sep. 2nd, she hosted SKE48's radio program "1+1wa 2Jyanai yo" by herself. Impressive.

Juri Takahashi (高橋朱里) (研)
In the Aug. 11th Episode of Ariyoshi AKB, Juri-chan won the comedy contest by dressing up as an office lady! Her death-eyes are so charming!

Natsumi Hirajima (平嶋夏海) (B)
Nacchan was one of the first AKB members who I shook hands with. I still remember how out of the 5 members of Watarirouka Hashiritai, she smiled the most. She's got that girl-next-door feel.

Shiori Ogiso (小木曽汐莉) (K2)
Cute little Goma-tan, seeing her is always a blast. She is also good friends with Yuria and has a great memory.

Nanami Hashimoto (橋本奈々未) (nog46)
In a recent episode of Nogizaka tte Doko? Hashimoto did a great job reporting a gourmet dish by saying, "Masaka... masaka~!!"

Haruka Nakagawa (仲川晴香) (A)
Haruka Nakagawa is athletic and knows about the birds and the bees. On AKBINGO's Danso episodes, especially, she always had something to say.

Tomomi Kasai (河西智美) (B)
Kasai is just a place holder for until I decide who the last person is. :)

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A Casual ranking by micr0q. Please do not take this page seriously.

128. Re-cycle (Music)

2011-03-01T07:07:00.002-05:00

I have been in a slump for Japanese music. Since I am already living in Japan, discovering new Japanese music seems too easy, and the result is that I do not actively look for anything new anymore. Like most Japanese people I settle for popular bands like Ikimonogakari or Pornograffiti and call it a day. But this does not mean I have given up my search of a taste that defines who I am.

A couple of weeks ago, I left the radio on Nippon-Station AM1242 while I went to sleep. When I woke up a few hours later, at around 7:53am, the radio was playing a soothing female vocalist's song. I felt refreshed by her gentle timbre and cheerful melody, and I researched the song's name. It was "Gift~Anata wa Madonna" by Asako Toki (GIFT〜あなたはマドンナ　by土岐麻子). The song was released on Jan. 11th, 2011, and is being used in a Shiseido (cosmetics company) commercial. Since the song's release it has not been ranked high in the Oricon charts, and at the time I first found the video, it only had about 8000 views. Here is the video:

As many people have commented underneath the video, the song deserves more popularity. It is a very cozy winter-feeling song. I wondered if the singer, Asako Toki, is a newcomer and thus unknown by many. After searching wikipedia, I was surprised that she had been around since the 1990s and was the background vocal for Quruli's "Sayonara Regret" (さよならレグレット　by くるり) in 2007. I really liked the song 2 years ago, but never researched who sang the child-like background vocals. And now I know why upon hearing Ms. Toki's voice, I felt very close to it.

Another artist who released a new song under Toy Factory is Salyu, who like Asako Toki, is not new to the pop music scene. Her music video is what drew my eye, and the distinct style of the song, full of creative vocal effects but never losing the tone quality is what kept me listening to the end. It was weird as heck, but in a good way.
Here is the video:

And you can probably guess what I am going to say next: I found her as another contributor to one of my favorite songs in the past few years, as her name came up with Bank Band (Mr. Children)'s song, "To U". Salyu sang a duet with Mr. Sakurai for the song, and the ballad can only be described by listening to it in this video:

Salyu appears around 3:25. Her voice has that distinct vibration, in the studio live version her mouth-shape is a bit strange to say the least, but that's also what makes her one of the more respected solo female artists who can still manage to innovate in the uniform pop music industry.

It seemed to me to be a coincidence that I found two "obscure" artists who were already a part of my past, but it really isn't a coincidence. The fact that they are still releasing music goes to show that good things become re-cycled. They are special enough to deserve having a spotlight in the AKB48-dominated music scene of 2011. No matter how weak their light is, they are never turned off.

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Written by micr0q, 2011.

P.S. I favorited this video in 2009, before I thought about coming to Japan. 2 Weeks ago I went to Nara and fed the deers in person, and remembered about this funny little cartoon clip. Enjoy!

127. We Just Don't Get It (Japan)

2011-02-11T06:21:00.004-05:00

A scene from The Social Network (Japanese sub), no copyright infringement intended.

Today I'll be commenting on some small aspects of Japanese culture.

I went to see The Social Network at the WALD9 Theatre in Shinjuku a few days ago. It was in English with Japanese subtitles. The movie was only released in Japan on January 15th, so it was still being shown across Japan. Even so, it was pretty late in the screening schedule, so there were only about 40 viewers including me.

Can you imagine what the movie would be like watched with Japanese subtitles? Much of the speed-talking and geek-dialogue of the English language are omitted for cleaner, one-lined written sentences that do not necessarily carry the same tone or the same emotion (however little actual emotion there was in the original script). If you didn't know a decent level of English, The Social Network would simply be a gruesome 2 hours of blahblahblah and dialogue that do not connect logically. During the most promoted scene when Sean Parker (Justin Timberlake) was saying to the random girl he slept with, "Nice to meet you. I invented Napster" the audience did not even chuckle. Granted, none of the movie was supposed to be extra funny, but the Japanese audience wouldn't have understood it anyway.

Finally, we arrive at the ending of the movie, when the epilogue-like words flash on the screen and the credits start to roll. To my surprise, no one stood up to leave. The lights did not go on. It was designated seating so I was trapped in the center of my row. I didn't want to look like the only person (loser) leaving and I didn't want the others in my row to lift their legs a bit (but not really) and watch me pass. It was the stupidest 3 minutes of my life.

From my experiences with Hollywood films, I knew that if a movie does not have enough of a anti-climax, and if its genre isn't comedy (or related bullshit like The Bounty Hunter), there most likely isn't going to be extra movie footage after the credits. The Japanese do not know that because they didn't understand the movie nor its genre in the first place. Plus, anyone can argue that because the lights didn't go on, the movie technically was not yet finished. I talked to some Japanese friends later about when is it generally accepted to leave the theatre and they said it depends on the movie. Bullshit, for The Social Network, whether the viewers left the theatre depended on if the technicians turned lights on.

From a Japanese blog titled "hirayamann星人", I excerpted these comments about the movie (Posted Jan. 29th, 2011):
"FACEBOOKの中身とかぜんぜん興味ねー人向け
学園裏切り裁判金ドラマ　
主役すげー早口
ザッカーバーグ本人はパーマをかけたサバンナ高橋のほーが似てる
ほとんど嫌なやつしか登場しないと思いきや
結局和解するんで宣伝映画だのね"

Translation:
"Although I have no interest in Facebook,
Campus life betrayal-lawsuit Drama
Protagonist speaks REALLY fast
Zuckerberg in real life looks like Takahashi from the comedy troupe Savanna with a perm.
I thought all the characters that came up were unlikable
The ending had a resolution so it was a promotion film after all."

So here's my point: Sometimes, when something American is brought into Japan, people swallow it whole without using their taste-buds. The result is not only a misunderstanding of the "genre", but vital information is lost. We all know that The Social Network raised the question of, "what is our world evolving into?" or "where does true power lie in today's society?" But did the Japanese viewers understand it the same way? To a society that is already super-connected with each other through mixi, cellphone-mail and BBS, Facebook was not groundbreaking. That, and the fast, American teenage-friendly dialogue, have put the movie into a blender, where all that remains, is a plain taste and a "Hollywood film" tag.

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A review by micr0q. 2011.

126. Nani Genai (Japan)

2011-02-07T22:00:00.003-05:00

The Japanese phrase, "Nani genai" means doing something absent-mindedly. You use it in such a way as, "On a lazy Saturday afternoon, I went to the bookstore while nani genai". You go to the bookstore, but you didn't plan for it beforehand, and you wonder while you arrive there what made you go there. Kind of like that.

Of course, I didn't go to the bookstore. For the past 2 months I've been going to Japanese game-centres (ゲーセン) when I felt there was nothing better to do. What do I play at the game-centre? I could have been practicing my arcade skills and earn ranking towards such popular games as Street Fighter IV or BlazeBlue, but I didn't. Instead, I became addicted to UFO Catchers and related "prize-machines". You pay to try to win goods, instead of virtual ranking. It is also the section of the game-centre that does not have smokers, so it feels more hospitable.

The joy of a successful prize-win after 2 tries.

Of course, the objective is to be so good at the prize-machines that you win on the first try, but no matter how good you are at the game, you still need to spend at least one 100yen coin per go. I've seen people who spent over 3000yen on a single toy, so obviously, most of the times, you LOSE.

So why play them? Is it not enough that I have a row of Hello Kittys and One Piece figurines? The answer is that the feeling of "win" is just so goddamn hard to find nowadays, here in Japan. You think posting youtube videos can generate popularity? Trust me when I say that every time you even leave a comment that is slightly critical on anything "official" (i.e. official music videos, recorded tv shows), your comment will be flagged as spam and Japanese users lash at you with the harshest words that you don't even find in dictionaries. If you want to get praises, DO NOT post videos of yourself or your actions until it has gained recognition by something "official".

Of course, the irony is that in order to gain recognition by something official, your stuff have to be seen by the masses first. But with such a critical mass (pun intended) audience, it is very rare that anyone can go far. The majority of us will become buried under an avalanche of verbal insults.

If you do manage to become popular, you may be made into a caricature, just like the recent Japanese phenomenon of Tanoshingo (not a coincidence that he is already gay, thus already somewhat of a caricature in Japanese media):

Please note the "dodosu dosu dosu dosu... LOVE CHU NYU!" catch phrase @ 0:53

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micr0q, 2011

125. In Japan Part 01 (Life)

2010-09-14T04:34:00.006-04:00

We talk about it, we dream about it, and we buy things made in it.
Japan, one of the most fascinating countries in Asia.

People around the world read manga, watch anime, eat sushi, talk about cars (often mentioning Toyota), etc etc. Japanese culture has touched upon many peoples' lives. I am no exception. Manga is a great passion of mine. As it is yours, too, if you ever liked them. To many anime fans around the world, going to Akihabara's many ani-goods shops is equivalent to visiting Jerusalem or Atlantis. Well, here I am.

I am studying at Waseda University for a year, living in the urban Shinjuku-ku, in Tokyo. I haven't gone to any manga-cafes or ani-goods shops yet. Now, before you guys start complaining and telling me I shouldn't waste my time not abusing the privilege that I have being in Japan, I'd like to bring up a few things.

We grow up liking many things, rocks, stamps, rabbits, astronomy, treasure, make-up, and girls, but how many of those things stayed with you to this day? How many of them have you actually "discovered"? Think hard. The answer might be disappointing, but every time that you ask yourself where those things that meant something to you have gone, you find out a bit more about yourself.

I first became fascinated by Japan as a whole (not just fragments of its culture like manga or bonsai) 4 years ago. Actually, my fascination more or less coincided with my desire to record something in writing, hence the creation of this blog. I originally wrote about generic anime because I wanted to belong to a community of Japan-media-discoverers, those who live in the West (mostly) but have a certain degree of knowledge about Japan, mainly through TV and the internet. Some of us bloggers were fantastic writers, and some were fantastic observers, and some just wanted to be the herald, always talking about the freshest, newest things.

I was one of them, more or less. I deviated about 2 years ago, however, into a more analytical blogger. I wrote down how Japanese thinking in our media influenced how we perceive the world. I was heavily into Japanese music and talked about CDs instead of anime. I gradually realized that writing with pieces from my "real life" is more interesting than writing in the third person, in my "virtual life". I tried hard to be a grand, professional otaku who knows everything about anime, but I did not like it.

And now, voila. It is my life. I am living in Japan, communicating with the Japanese, and basically continuing my fascination to its ultimate end: Understanding Japan. Maybe by then I wouldn't be merely fascinated by Japan from a distance. Maybe by then I'd have a better grasp of myself.

To those people who had dreamed of coming to Japan. Where are you now? Are you still on your way? Is it still a way you are pursuing?

Think hard.
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Written by micr0q. Copyright 2010.

124. The Neg-Arrogance (Special)

2010-04-22T13:20:00.000-04:00

どんな希望を持っていますか？(donna kibou o motte imasuka?)
What kind of aspirations do you have?

大人になったら、何がなりたい？ (otona ni nattara, nani ga naritai?)
What will you become when you grow up?

Those are two questions many Japanese children (and children all over the world) hear at some point in their childhood. They may reply with something generic, such as: "doctor", "nurse", "dancer", "lawyer", or "scientist". As they grow up, however, they soon realize their limitations and personality traits which makes some professions, such as "college professor", a very tough career for them. Another factor is their educational path, which may sometimes terminate before they reach a level high enough to attain a career such as "lawyer".

At some point in our lives, especially in the present-day, we will no doubt all question our aspirations, and make compromises, mostly to an "inferior" level so that we maintain an optimistic, happy attitude towards life. Someone who realizes that his GPA will not get him into Yale Graduate School will settle for University of Arizona, et cetera et cetera. It doesn't make them a socially inferior person, but their pride might have taken a blow from the reality.

What we get out of this present-day situation is a host of children growing up, seeing countless examples of success -- of those who achieved MORE than their former aspirations either by chance or by a skillful combination of opportunities -- and examples of mediocrity. A pessimist would generalize that most people today would fall under the label "mediocre". An optimist would say that the simplest way to achieve happiness in life is to aim a bit lower than what is physically and mentally capable. Of course, if no further opportunities arise for the "low-aimers", we get a sense of frustration of under-achievement.

To combat this, we have a new mentality formed: something that I'd like to call, "Neg-arrogance". This is used by countless teens on a daily basis as a frame of conversation and social relationships. I will elaborate with the following examples:

1) Two young men are at a videogame store. They see a popular title on a prominent shelf, and get into a heated debate to the artistic choice of theme music and graphic details by the director. They end the debate with the purchase of the game, and both return home to research online about the said director, coming to the conclusion that he is indeed a great game director and that they should just both shut up.

2) Two young women discuss relationships and giving each other tips on having success in a relationship. Both act as if they are knowledgeable about men, but neither of them has a partner at the moment.

3) Three young men look at books in a bookstore, they dismiss each other's choice of books based on the fact that the author is lame and end with a discussion on how books are overpriced. This happens during the economic recession.

From the three examples above, we could simply categorize them as ignorance, arrogance, and generally things that immature people do ALL THE TIME, right? The fact that they happen "all the time" is the issue here. How do we know that 50 years ago, if any of these things happen at all? Of course, there were no videogames, there were less popular authors and browsing bookstores even, and women's private life was a much more secretive issue. From these seemingly daily events of today, I conclude the following:

In the information-overflow age of present-day, people are turning their ignorance and respective knowledge of each other's mutual helplessness into a mode of rhetorical weaponry, so that they verbally abuse each other while feeling a feigned sense of optimism and satisfaction. The fundamental statements of the "neg-arrogance" are statements such as,

"I understand that we both know very little on the subject matter."
"I understand better than you about how infinitesimally small the ratio is between me and the world."
"I understand better than you about how infinitesimally small our actions affect the world."
"I understand better than you about how little we understand ourselves."
"I understand better than you about myself."

It is with these fundamental thoughts in mind that millions of teenagers communicate with their peers, their superiors, and themselves in their daily life. Think about it. If any of the above quotes reminded you of something within yourself, note it down, and ask yourself if this is truly the norm, the way of our psyches to bring about an eventual positive change to our present-day society.

I am a believer of change, and I hope that, for good or for bad, the neg-arrogance would either change itself, or change our society.
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Written by micr0q (Q), text copyright 2010. No directly copied text whatsoever. Image retrived from Google archives.

123. The Kousaten Dilemma (Special)

2010-03-24T22:35:00.006-04:00

This blog was inspired by a real-life situation I witnessed earlier this week.

I was walking home, and I had to cross the street once. I was standing on the northeast corner of an intersection (kousaten), and waiting for cars to pass.

There were three cars that also stopped at the intersection, but at different places. One car is facing North, flashing a "turn-left" sign. One car is facing East, flashing no light. One car is facing South, also flashing no lights. The intersection does not have stoplights, so the order of movement is up to the drivers.

Some more things of note: There was a bicycle also coming from the West, and facing East, ready to cross. I was the only pedestrian at the intersection.

...

I will now give you some time to picture the scene in your head.

...

...

Okay, now that you have the picture...
Here is the question:
What is the order of crossing each of the vehicles and persons?

Let us pretend that they all arrived at the intersection at the same time, so no one is in more of a rush than anyone else. Everyone is also equally patient. Let us also pretend that the usual rule of "turning cars wait until others pass" does not apply.

Would you have said that the car moving North and flashing turn-left light would move first? followed by the car and bicycle on the West? Finally, the car from North would cross and the intersection is car-free and safe for me to finally cross?

Sounds very logical, right? Since the car flashing the light is following correct traffic rules, the other cars and bicycles should respect it and wait for it to do its business first.

The reality is different.

...

Another good guess would be that: The cars would wait while the bicycle crosses, since it is unpredictable whether the bicycle would turn to another direction while crossing. Afterwards, the cars would move in the order of North-car, South-car, then finally, the West-car and me crossing, all crossings are parallel to each other, so there shouldn't be any problems.

But this is also not the real answer.

...

...

...

...

...

The reality:

The North-car moved first, crossing to the Southside while the rest of the objects and persons waited. Briefly after it crossed, the West-car crossed, and the bicycle tagged along behind. Finally, the light-flashing South-car turned left, and I crossed the street and went home.

A bit redundant, perhaps, but this is exactly what had me thinking: WHY did the only light-flashing car wait until the two no-light cars crossed? Keep in mind that at this intersection with no stoplights and no police, any turning could have happened. Is flashing a light bound to hold you back from crossing?

...

Maybe I am being a bit paranoid. To me flashing a turning light signaled "purpose", "direction", "determination". I thought that when others see this determination, they would follow it, let it have the priority.

When I witnessed the movements, I realized something (other than the fact that the order can be anything people choose it to be). I realized that often in life, it is those people and things that do not flash any lights, warnings, statement of purpose, etc... But THEY are often the ones that get the priority to act. It is the unexpectedness, the anticipation for a sign of stability, that gives the "unstable" an edge over those that have a set rule to follow. Perhaps spontaneity wins over organization.

I did not plan to get good marks in college this year, but two months ago, after a couple of good friends (exchange students) moved back to Japan, I also wanted to go. One month ago, I was accepted into an exchange program to a private university in Tokyo, and my life, from that time on, had a "flashing light". The light has since given me a sense of purpose, and I now work harder to improve my GPA.

From time to time, we have these flashing lights, but are they always harbingers of good? I am excited, of course, and counting down the days before departure every day. Is this a good thing?

I am not having second thoughts about studying in Japan. I know it will be a wonderfully educational experience. I am just not sure that light that I decided to flash a month ago will give me a sharper edge than pursuing other things in my future.

...

This post will be updated with graphics soon. I will also give updates to my preparations before going to Japan. Stay tuned!
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A blog by micr0q, 2010.

122. スボーツ/SPORTS (CD Preview)

2010-02-23T19:00:00.006-05:00

First radio single: 勝ち戦 (Kachi ikusa "Battle Won")

CD Title: スボーツ/SPORTS
Band: 東京事変 (Tokyo Jihen/Tokyo Incident)
Release Date: 2.24.2010 (Hey! That's today!)
Album Length: 46min

You know what disappointed me? Tokyo Jihen's 2007 Album, 娯楽/VARIETY, which had some very strange mixing and kind of hurt my ears. I thought EMI always did well on their mixing, but boy was I wrong. Tokyo Jihen also doesn't seem to use much individual recording and post-recording mixing, which is definitely good but not so much when the song sounds like cats clawing a blackboard. This is true to lead singer and songwriter Shiina Ringo's innovative style -- always pushing the Shibuya-rock scene forward with her fashion inspired techno-pop rock and ballad-style singing. However, songs like OSCA, one of two singles on that album, was lacking. Shiina pushed her voice too far into the child-screech, and the musicality was destroyed.

You know what didn't disappoint me? The album released TODAY in Japan, which I am previewing -- SPORTS. At first glance, the seemingly random titles give a general sense of Life-Death and related spiritual feelings. The first track is titled, 生きる(Ikiru/To live), and the final track is titled, 極まる(kimaru/to end). Well, no duh. Titles aside, a general feel of the album is one with more public-appeal, one that you can listen to many times over, unlike Variety, which is not for the faint of heart.

The first track is probably the one with the most digital mixing, with the first 2:30 minutes of the song being all vocals sang in minor and augmented scales. Shiina jumps in minor thirds up and resolves with a major chord. Strange, and the male chorus singing in the back was digitally chopped at times. Stranger, but the song gives a very cool first impression, something the first tracks of her previous albums lacked. What I didn't understand was why the master volume of the song was turned down gradually, and the rest of the album never reached the loudness of the vocal portion of Track 01.

Some tracks such as 雨天決行(utenkekkou/Playing in the rain) and スイードスボット(Sweet Spot) have a slow, feel-good groove, something I wished more of Jihen's previous songs. Some are general pop-rock-imitative such as シーズンサヨナラ(Shi-zon sayonara/Season Goodbye) and 閃光少女(Senkou Shoujo/Shining Girl). The rest can only be labeled as a laid-back, Shiina Ringo style.

Anyway, the whole album might be a more selling-out, as it has less innovative elements and more of a random, playful nature, appealing to the stupid general public, but it works. I am one of the stupid general public! If you have the means to purchase the CD, please do it, because you like to listen to funky new songs by Tokyo Jihen, not because I said so. If you want really innovative music that can only be called sound-art, or experimental music... then you are better off checking out people like Ryoji Ikeda, click on this link to a video.

Until next time, this is your lovely J-music junkie signing off.
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A review by micr0q, copyright 2010. No directly copied text whatsoever. Video imbedded will be removed upon request by copyright holders. No copyright infringement intended.

121. Barcodes and Creativity... or, What We Learned (Special Blog)

2010-01-21T14:34:00.008-05:00

Do you know what this is? (Answer at the end)

Recently I've been learning a lot about the interconnectedness between people, between areas of study, and between countries. The newspapers around where I live have just started to employ the Japanese cellphone QR Codes (QR Codes on Wikipedia) for business people to view the contents of the issue on their phones (iPhones especially, since they have a big screen). It is a technological evolution that connects print media with electronic/communicative media.

This seems very funny to me, since I've known Japanese websites to have used the QR codes for quite a few years. (The first time I saw them was in 2005, and I went "WTF" like the rest of you did). If you surf Japanese websites now, 100% of them should have QR codes on the main page or "about us" pages. The technology is simple: take a picture with your cellphone's camera, and presto! You can retrieve information from the internet. America and Canada had camera cellphones for many years, why has this technology taken so long to be adapted in North America?

There are a few factors at work. However, we will divert our attention to how the Japanese people have used QR Codes originally. The codes are mainly source codes of the main page of websites, transformed into 2-D barcodes, where by scanning with your cellphone, you gain access to the webpage as well as seeing links on that page, leading you to more webpages. The purpose of this is mainly to bring people to use non-internet media, since most of the world is outside, on-the-go. The thinking behind it is probably that the internet is still something very formal, and like a reference library, storing a LOT of information somewhere NON-human, so when people access it, it shouldn't be from a place where they are isolated from society (the home), but through something "social", such as the cellphone, the "social link" that is usually used to bring people together.

That was all very theoretical, wasn't it? If you understood that, I thank you. For those of you still confused, I will explain in a different way:

Japan:
1)Internet is introduced; people see that it stores a lot of information.
2)Cellphone is introduced; people see that it can connect people.
3)People realize that computers can also connect people.
4)Cellphones are out of date with information, but people like it more.
5)QR Codes are invented so people access the internet with cellphones.
6)The internet gets mad, and there is a bloodbath.

Number 6 obviously doesn't belong there. Does it? The media industries are competing every hour of every day. This is why phone applications are created often in compliance with internet phenomenons such as... and I hate to say it, "T-Pain and Autotune". In Japan, the balance between different industries is very important, when internet culture becomes too strong, something on TV or on the cellphone would come out to grab the excess audience. Through all of this, non-electronic media is relatively unaffected. Business people on the trains in Japan still carry newspapers and mangas with them. Here's where the difference between cultures comes in. Let's take a look at what is happening to North America:

North America:
1)Internet is introduced; people see that it stores a lot of information.
2)Cellphone is introduced; people see that it can connect people.
3)People realize that computers can also connect people.
4)Cellphones are out of date, until huge advancements copying the Japanese bring new light to using them.
5)Both the internet and cellphones team together to attack other media industries like the newspaper and magazine businesses.
6)Newspapers forced to connect to the only-using-cellphone audience with QR Codes.
7)Death of the newspaper.

As you can see, steps 1)-4) are same or quite similar. However, North America has staggered leaps in cellphone technology due to there not being a keitai-culture here in the early 2000s, but only started 4-5 years later. Also, electronic media such as the internet and TV completely took over the printing industry. There are no shows on TV now (not even on cable) in North America where the host reads from a physical copy of a newspaper, and shows scans of the headlines, and makes political or social analysis. NONE. This continues in Japan and China, because somehow, SOMEHOW, those countries have seperated the electronic from the manual/physical.

He r bizi txtin

What I'm trying to say here, from such an insignificant part of our lives --- the QR Code --- is that in the North American culture, there is also a subconscious respect for printed newspapers and magazines, that they contain information you can FEEL. However, a blind following of "progress" in the electronic media is really destroying all manual industries. That's why you get complaining publishers, and dying newspapers. We need to create, we need to seperate, if we want a balance. Otherwise, many jobs will be lost, and people become unhappy, while some jobs will become hot, too hot, like the traditional doctor or lawyer, and burn out.

Be selective, but take control of what you learn from the Japanese. And don't move in huge leaps.

(Answer to the QR Code: Wikipedia English main page)

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A blog by micr0q, Copyright 2010. All text are original with research from Google and Wikipedia. No infringement intended.

120. R.I.P./Merry Christmas (Single)

2009-12-01T07:55:00.004-05:00

This past week I've gotten back to BUMP OF CHICKEN. I had not noticed that they released their double-sided single EP: R.I.P./Merry Christmas (released by TOYFACTORY on Nov. 25th, 2009) until last weekend. I miss BUMP OF CHICKEN's ballad type of songs. These two songs have just the right amount of winter-ness to make people listen on, especially in the face of cold winter winds.

If you've never heard of BUMP OF CHICKEN before, they are a famous Japanese band much like QURULI(くるり) who debuted in the 1990s, and have broken through the indie music scene to have large followings. Their style is a mix between country jazz and punk rock. They are the predecessor to many of the newer bands such as RADWIMPS, flumpool, and Remioromen(レミオロメン), the vocals are generally soft, but gradually builts into an emotional ballad. The chorus is nice to repeat, thus making many good sing-along tracks.

BUMP OF CHICKEN - R.I.P.
Uploaded by coquine138

My thoughts on the two singles is that Merry Christmas has a better P.V. but is weaker overall as a featured single. Although I do believe that they had no choice but to put "Merry Christmas" as a title of a single because WHO would put it as a bonus track on a EP released near Christmas season? (as well it probably generates more money if it is titled that way).

R.I.P. reminds me of WHY doing ballad songs actually work, even today. As long as your lyrics are not corny, and you have some kind of originality to your rhythm and way of presenting it. It is often very SWEET and DURABLE as a song that listeners can put on repeat. The song doesn't actually say Rest in Peace until the end, when it chants the phrase in the outro jam. The song is about friends dying. Lost things, broken things. The chorus goes like this, "そこに君が　いなかったこと、そこに僕が　いなかったこと、こんな当然を思うだけで　いまこれ程"(sokonikimiga inakattakoto sokoni bokuga inakattakoto, konna touzen o omoudakede imakore hodo) Which translates approximately into: Now that you are gone, and I am gone, of course I am in thought, about this journey.

Recommend: R.I.P.
Rating: (92%)
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A blog by micr0q, 2009.

119. An Otherwisely Unromantic Life (Special)

2009-11-19T17:01:00.004-05:00

Totally irelevant image. F. T. W.

Some things that I've encountered today:

I spent the morning surfing YouTube, trying to find inspiration for my new art project which involves me using a (preferably a pickaxe) weapon to BREAK OPEN a hole in an apparently opaque ball, revealing the light within. A simple concept really, but also a fun one to think about, and I ended up finding no predecessors to this and called it my own. I had to talk to my professor about it before I get the green light to making the piece of disaster.

It was gloomy, a chilly gloom, cloudy, and I imagine a little gusty, outside, as I step, step, carefully over cracks, hop, to the bicycle lane and overtake, damn slow walkers. Okay. 20 minutes later I arrive at the professor's office doors, it starts to rain. I state my case, and my professor likes it. I realized, at the same time, that the concept sounds much more idealized and fun in the imaginations of NOT JUST ME, but a lot of people. However, it dawned on me that it won't be an easy feat to do.

Eventually I get out of the office, and started down the street toward a few hardware stores to get supplies. On the way I imagine the people on the 2nd floor flats, peeking out their windows, seeing me walking with haste down a rainy street. I imagine them doing cocaine, and laughing, and wondering what the rush was about. I imagine them not looking at me, but at all the people around me, everyone except for me. I saw a boarded-up house just then, and wondered if someone was secretly growing hemp inside the building. Oh, wait, maybe not, as it was somewhat of a major street, and the police wouldn't overlook it.

Every time it rains, I discover that in this city with no mountain, no river, and no sea, there are many beautiful things to look at. Two girls walk toward me, parallel to my direction, but not IN my direction, holding hands, one wearing a raincoat, the other not, but has a funny hat on. How sweet, I thought, and found it just as charming as seeing children playing hopscotch for the first time. I found my store, which had a street entrance of stairs leading to the second floor, where no doubt many murderers and serial rapists must camp, waiting for the best chance to hunt down geeks and nerds. And I remembered a comic book store with a lot of cats and weed and not really any rapists. So I should be fine. I went in, step on the "Gong Hee Fa Choi" mat, shake my coat of rain, walk up the stairs, now if this were Home Alone I would be worried.

As I browsed through rows among rows of on-off switches, light bulbs, and speaker wires, I realized something: These are the building blocks of our society! In a mechanical, crude sense, they are what we live in, on, with, every day of our lives. We hide them, of course, my friend's new 5th generation iPod Nano illustrates that point fairly well. However, for something as simple as installing a light bulb in a dark room, we must resort back to the basics: the input and output, the AC or the DC, the socket, the wires, the circuitry.

And WOW how little of these things have I learned! I was such an amateur, such a fool, but I keep my cool. In the past few days I've noticed my chin getting sharper, and my facial bones more visible to others. I clenched my teeth a bit, and felt the left side facial muscles clench, and possibly popping out, creating a sinister, hardcore airport-security type of asshole attitude. SO WHAT if I never went to a mechanical college and got training, I AM THE MAN!!!

I ended up spending $32 on simple tools, and took the bus back to campus. I think about Tomorrow, as I ACTUALLY do work, and a tingly feeling, almost like the word "purpose", climbed up my spine. A hooded person of a shorter height walked by me just then, and tipped the head up just a little for both of us to see each other's face. It was for less than half a second, but I remember the pair of round eyes, blue, with spirals and rings, sparkly, looking just a little off from my face, into the distance. Walking on. I instinctively read my watch, 4:29pm. I smiled. Somehow, if I knew just that little bit more information about a person, such as a possible time when they might show up at a certain place (notice only the place is certain), it makes me happy.

I will never see 4:29pm, or 8:58am, or 12:35pm in the near future, but I will always have those numbers in my mind.
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A post by micr0q, copyright 2009. No infringement intended to any of the names, icons, or logos said in the article.

118. Cave Story and PSP Go (Game)

2009-11-10T13:10:00.000-05:00

It's the year 2009! How can you not know anything about the PSP?!
A parallel can be made to that statement:
It's the year 2009! How can you not know anything about Cave Story?!
(wag finger at you, you little console game loving gamer-wannabe you)

Cave Story is a freeware game on the PC, one of the underground adventure platformers much like that of ... I dunno, um, huh.... let's see, underground + action + awesome... Kinda like Iji, but not really, because this is less complex and has a far better gameplay satisfaction to it. Cave Story has save points, and differnt weapons on 1 main character, different routes to take, and 4 different endings. For a game created in the hands of ONE PERSON, that sounds like a pretty solid game already.

Of course, those of you who have played Cave Story will know its quirkiness, its charm, and its challenge all too well. CS is quirky when it gives you dialogue such as "Oh no, Toroko has been kidnapped? That means the only girl left in town is Sue..." "Chivalry is dead" "I will have you know that I'm a very valuable, valuable mushroom!" It is charming when it has characters like a magical puppy that you can wear on your head while running, or when you fight lovable characters like Balrog, or when you avenge King's death by using his sword and seeing his ghost come out of the sword. CS is a challenge when it suddenly increases its difficulty in boss fights and obstacles (darn you spikes! and sand crocadiles...) but laughs at you for keep trying because you have that save point to keep you going. And I havent even tried the last cave (Sacred Ground) but I've seen people play it and it seems like a super pain to beat.

But eventually, no matter which ending you get (unless it is the first, crappy ending), you feel nice that you spent time on this original little game. Cave Story has been remade into a Wiiware game!!!! YAYYYYY Hurrah! Happy Nintendo! Super Potatoes!

Now let's talk about the PSP Go! It was released less than 2 weeks ago on November 1st, 2009. The design has been analyzed by various websites, the comparisons have been made, and people have made up their minds about. What do I think? YAYYYYY! Hurrah! Happy Sony! Super Tomatos! I think it looks like a handheld game console I would carry in my bag and actually play on the bus and trains. Looks snazzy, don't it.

This blog has no other intention than to express my YAYYYYYs towards Cave Story and the PSP's recent remakse and updates. Now that that's done... CIAO.
-micr0q

117. Cheburashka Arere (Anime)

2009-10-17T12:06:00.003-04:00

Cheburashka and Gena at the Zoo.

I have a new favorite anime of 2009. It is the Japanese Cheburashka Arere?! which started airing on Terebi TV Tokyo this past Wednesday morning. As a part of the "Orisuta 100%" series and a 7:30am broadcast of two episodes of 3 minutes each, this show is no doubtedly aimed at very young (3-6yr old) children. However, many aspects of the animation makes me feel that it achieves the purpose of many animes aimed at a seinen audience.

Cheburashka has had a long legacy in Russia as a mascot cute creature. The original Russian version is of crude pen drawings on paper, which later became better known as animated clay models much like Wallace and Gromit. The main story is of Cheburashka, a little creature with big ears that is neither a monkey nor a dog, but cute nonetheless, and his friend, the tall crocadile, Gena. Gena acts as the parent figure in the show, often giving directions to Cheburashka about the ways of life, as well as singing at times to entertain his surroundings.

The 2001 series of Cheburashka in Japanese.

In the Japanese anime, Cheburashka Arere?, the animation style is very different. There is a distint, "illustration" look to it all. The characters are 2-D, with broken contours, such as in american cartoons such as Ed, Edd, and Eddy. The ground is of a very serene, sandy, texture and layered with shadows, which the 2-D forms could not create, but the audience is made to believe in them as well, since it makes it look like looking at a flip-up picture book. Cute does not even begin to describe the looks of Gena and Cheburashka, as their movements are so fluid that you could imagine what they felt like as living dolls. Uhh... let's branch away from the topic of living dolls.

Cheburashka and Gena juggling apples.

In the first 2 episodes shown on Oct. 7th and 14th, Cheburashka was introduced just as the original Russian version is told, when Gena orders a crate of oranges and finds Cheburashka inside. Cheburashka doesn't know what he is, and Gena gives him the name Cheburashka. In the 2nd episode, Gena takes Cheburashka to the zoo and tells him that's his job working as a crocadile. They end the story juggling apples in front of other animals and people. I told you the episodes were short (almost the same length as the credits)!!

Cheburashka was created in the Soviet era in Russia, but is still loved today. Lovely things are never destroyed by social and political forces@@!
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A blog by micr0q (Q), copyright 2009. Cheburashka and names belong to their respective creators. No infringement intended.

116. Don't Take Love for Granted (Special)

2009-09-20T18:09:00.001-04:00

Tony after he got punched, Skins Season 1

Love is sometimes a piece of random crap on the ground, and you never know when people are going to step on it. Okay, that was a terrible analogy. Here's a new blurb on what I've seen in the media interpretation of love.

In the recent weeks prior to my current semester, I watched and read many series of romance and/or action comedy from Korea and China. There were some similarities. In the Chinese martial arts novel The Deer and the Cauldron (Lu Ding Ji) by Chinese author Jin Yong, there was one recurring side character who was the interferance to the protagonist's constant love battle to win a girl's heart. He was Zheng Gongzi, a rich son of the family of Zheng. He thought he had the girl Xiaobao in the bag, and later used her as a property in exchange for his own life (It was also at that moment that she stopped loving him and started loving the protagonist). Yes, the theme I am talking to you today is about taken-for-granted love.

There are very charismatic, cool, suave, and smart people in this world. Those people have others drawn to them like moths to flame. They are sometimes very, very nice people, but when they turn to the evil side, they become the antagonist in the story, immediately.

Korean drama time! In Witch Yoohee (2007), there was a really cool, M.D. certificate holding "Senpai" in the show that always gets the attention of the protagonist (a girl this time). She wanted to marry him, blah blah blah, in the end, the guy turned out to be using her and was a sorry asshole. She ends up leaving him and caused him to self-destruct and crash his car. It seemed in this series that every word the Senpai said was taken very seriously by both the protagonist girl and the audience, because the script for him was written so that simple sentences were very significant. However, he undervalued his taken-for-granted love and was brought down.

In Full House (2004, hey I talked about this a couple of posts ago!), there was a slutty childhood friend girl who loved Rain's friend but also knew Rain loved her. When she couldnt get that friend, she dangled herself in front of Rain, thinking that since he loved her before, she could easily get him in the end. Is that the case? Again, no, Rain's character falls in love with the writer girl, and they live happily ever after. However, in this drama, the slutty childhood friend also gets married in the end, although to someone else.

But of course, it's finally time to pay attention to Japanese animes. In Tengen Toppa Gurren Lagann, Simon thought his relationship with Yoko would only get intimate due to their struggles for survival on the road. When he learned that Yoko loved Kamina, Simon was crushed. Quote: "What was all [our time together, our adventures] for?!! How can this be?!" He overlooked his main competition -- his brother, Kamina.

Finally, we have a British drama also with the same theme. In Skins (2007 season 1), Tony's character was revealed to be manipulative and deceiving near the end of the season, and his friends all left him. He thought his girlfriend, Michelle, would come back to him, but she never did until Tony broke down and realized how ass-holy (may the friend who first used this word R.I.P.) he was. Just goes to show you cannot think you are the bigshot and lower the standards of respect you should be paying to the people around you.

This is a blog with many examples... now that they are used up, peace out my friends.
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A blog by micr0q (Q), copyright 2009.

115. Kamui Gaiden カムイ外伝 (New Movie Review)

2009-09-19T21:30:00.004-04:00

Hello, fellow Japanese movie fans. I have recently watched the new Kamui Gaiden film at the Toronto International Film Festival, and here are my thoughts on the film. As many movie-info websites can tell you, this was a big, $18million USD budget ninja fiction film based on a 1960s manga called Kamui. I actually knew about the manga before the film, because I stumbled onto some rare 1980s translated English Kamui manga just a few days before I saw the poster advertisement for Kamui Gaiden the film. I wanted to see action on the big screen, so I went.

... Want the ending and all the summaries fast? Here we go: (SPOILERS ALERT)

I liked the film for its physical aspects. The character's costumes were designed to be very believable 13th century Japan. We often get some crude shots of the sumo-type cloth underwears on male characters, and it gives a nice, down-to-earth feel to the movie. It also gave a very realistic take on what ninjas looked like, and did not cover any ninja's faces with black cowls.

The action scenes were great. There were two major battle scenes in the movie, in the beginning when Kamui was running from ninjas in the forest and managed to kill all of them; and near the end when ninjas attacked Kamui jumping from sandpits on the beach. Both showed off Kamui's ninja skills very well, and gave impressions to the audience that he had what it took to be the protagonist, physically, at least.
The adrenaline rush when people's hands, legs, and heads get cut off is very entertaining, but there were a few random inserts of "action" that did not get my approval. From that point on, I focused more on the negative aspects of the film.

The biggest failure of the film was the director's inability to translate Kamui's background as "outcaste". Two brief flashbacks were used to show how villagers mistreated Kamui and his friends because they were the "hinin", a kind of very low peasant. It is a taboo topic to talk about with Japanese people in the last 150 years since the Meiji Restoration, which officially gave the "hinin" regular citizen status. However, much of the general public still see them as lowly people they would never marry, do business, or have any close relations with. Kamui's character is from that kind of a background, but (although I realize this is a showing in Toronto, not Tokyo) the director assumes the audience automatically sympathizes with Kamui and understand how wonderful Kamui would feel once he was "accepted" into a family (happens in the movie). Instead, we as the audience see an expressionless Kamui and a housewife who could not forget Kamui was her enemy and tried to kill him twice. Finally, Kamui shows his emotional side and cries after the family has been killed by ninjas hunting him. There was just not enough background for the audience to fully engage.

Secondly, related to the first negative (-1), is the development of secondary characters. There are basically five side characters in the film: the lord of the land, Hanbei the fisherman, Hanbei's wife Oshika (former ninja), Hanbei's daughter Sayaka who loves Kamui, and the pirate ninja (final boss battle guy). Out of these, Oshika and Hanbei were given a lot of screen time in the beginning half of the film and were seen as skillful, independent and unique. Hanbei especially, since he cut off the lord's horse's leg in order to make fishing baits (floaters) with the hooves. He almost did not escape the lord's troops, but he did. This act of defiance took up 15min of screen time and later we see the baits in action and there was a bonding scene between Hanbei and Kamui. Suddenly, Hanbei was taken away by troops and order to be shot to death. Kamui and Oshika save him, but he did not even get 2 seconds of screen time afterwards. WHAT HAPPENED TO THE CHARACTER WHO HAD THE BIGGEST DEFIANT ACT IN THE FILM?! When we next see Hanbei, he's already dead in his home, killed by random ninjas. Oshika, too, after showing her skills in killing 4 ninjas at the beginning of the film, was dead without a fight scene at the end of the film. Did the director run out of time?

Hanbei's daughter Sayaka loved Kamui. That's the romance part of the film. It was a one sided love, however, as Kamui just goes on with his own business and never really engages in deep conversations with Sayaka. Suddenly, we see a development: Sayaka brings Kamui to the seaside and gives him a "sun shell" while she keeps a "moon shell" symbolizing they will always be side by side and joined at the heart. How sweet! Where was the build up to this moment? Kamui NEVER showed any sign of affection for Sayaka prior to that scene. Sayaka soon dies afterwards the same manner Hanbei had died -- we as the audience do not see -- and Kamui cries. Where was all this emotion coming from??? This film fails at incorporating romance.

Thirdly, and this is one flaw in the movie that would most trouble Westerners, the introduction voice-over: "Kamui has done battles with many enemies, but his biggest enemy is himself. His heart does not trust anyone around him... and still he runs" Okay, stop. This is the line that should set the "moral" or "tone" of the film, right? This is when we as the audience think, so this is like also a spiritual journey of Kamui to find the path to opening his heart, right? Wrong. How does the movie end? Let me give you another quote: "Kamui keeps on running". Throughout this movie, we do not see Kamui truely trusting ANYONE, and in the end, it was his distrust that saved him from drinking the poisoned water the traitor ninja gave. So the point of the movie was that when you are a dangerous fugitive, you cannot trust anyone? In that case, what the hell was the introduction narration about?? Was it even necessary?

There are a few more things that weren't very right with the film, mainly due to the fact that the director, Yoichi Sai, is a Korean-Japanese who is only reconstructing an image of the Shinobi, the Ninja from his mind and from media influences (including possibly animes such as Naruto). His image of how the ninjas fight is still generic and predictable. However, I must remember the film was set to release in Japan, so the producers must know audience expectations of the ninja. If I knew more about the original manga portrayal of this outcaste, fugitive ninja named Kamui, I would be in a better shape to speak about the adaptation differences.

On a final, cheerful note: Kamui is definitely a movie that looks better on the big theatre screen, its action sequences and colors, scenery and costumes were all A+ material. It is released in Japan today, and I hope you all enjoy it.

Rating: [7.9/10 (79%)]
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A Review by micr0q (Q), no directly copied text whatsoever. Copyright 2009.

Update: Going to see new Kamui (2009) film at TIFF!

2009-09-16T14:19:00.002-04:00

ya I'm going tonight, will write a review about it later this week. 18million dollar budget! What will it be like ... ?

114. Yamato Nadeshiko (Retro Drama Review)

2009-08-31T17:54:00.005-04:00

Nanako Matsushima 松嶋菜々子

Today I watched a few romantic comedies from Korea and China. They made me think about the only J-drama series I watched over the summer (although if I had the time I would have watched Mr. Brain) --- Yamato Nadeshiko (lit. Japan Perfect Woman). If you've never watched this show where 27 years old (yikes!) is considered youthful, and still think romantic comedies are stories of 15-20 years olds of today, you should get yourself educated. This is one of the MOST FAMOUS J-dramas in recent years.

Yamato Nadeshiko was aired in 2000, before 9.11 and therefore, in the shots of N.Y.C. the two towers were still standing. A bittersweet memoir. It was a financial and social success, getting over 30% of ALL OF JAPAN to watch its final episodes. In 2000, Japan had about 100mil people, which meant about 35 million people watched the finale. WTF.

The show was very feel-good, good writing, good concepts, good characters. The main guy and girl are both from poor backgrounds, but the guy accepts his fate and doesn't try to become successful, and the girl is always searching for a richer family to marry into. They meet in a lie where the girl thought the guy was a billionaire, but soon they came out of that lie with the girl stubbornly holding onto her beliefs that money is everything in life. Eventually, they fall in love, and the girl pushes the guy to become a math professor in the U.S. So in the end, the gold-digger girl did not marry a rich guy, but married an average guy that she loves. Aww, what a nice ending. でしょう・・・？？(right?)

NO! Here's the big trend in a LOT of these dramas, and I believe they are possibly devastating to humanity (reproduction-wise, and therefore, humanity). If we dissect an East Asian drama to be male/female, then Yamato Nadeshiko, like Korean Dramas Coffee Prince (커피프린스 1호점), Full House (풀하우스), and other Japanese dramas like Innocent Love (イノセント・ラヴ), the girl is poor or has family problems or has some kind of trouble that makes her rely on the guy for at least a period of time. It is in that time, that love blossoms between them. Why is that? Why are these mature, independent girls subjected under a less mature but more financially stable male? Does this imply anything?

One other theme that is sometimes overplayed in dramas is the company of GOOD friends. This means great friends, best friends, friends you can go to the bathroom together and chat on the toilet. Male AND female. Two things happen in this: at least 1 couple is made from the guys and girls, they will be intimate, some random thing will happen, they break up, but still remain friends but trying to forget the awkwardness. See North American examples such as How I Met Your Mother, where the guy LIVED with the girl and later broke up but they still live together. WTF is with this kind of writing? Why did the script writers do this? The earlier example would be Friends, where people like Joey would constantly pop into the main gathering room --- Monica and Chandler's suite. In Yamato Nadeshiko, the house of doctor Sakuma is the gathering ground for the "gang". I don't mind that the story can HAPPEN some place concrete, like a character's home, but I do mind the overly casual gestures each character keep giving one another. At least, the timing of these neck-grabs and headbutts are so that the audience least expect them to happen.

Maybe it's just me. Romantic comedies are hard to do, because as the marrying age of males and females in our contemporary society get older and older, the amount of pressure and the word "f4il" appear in their minds too often for dramas to hit the spot. If drama relationships fail too, then people in the real world will console themselves with the thought that their idols also cannot hope to fall into a wonderful relationship until the age of 35. There is nothing wrong with marrying or even first getting into a romantic relationship at 35, it's just that, if 100% of the Earth population marry at 35, the pace of society will be very, very messed up.

Think about it.
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I loved Yamato Nadeshiko nonetheless, and I highly recommend it. And because I am in the spirit of announcing re-makes and comebacks such as Inuyasha Part II anime. The starlette of Yamato Nadeshiko, Nanako Matsushima (松嶋菜々子), has come back to TV in new episodes of Emergency Room 24Hours (J-drama) so you can catch a glimpse of her there.

micr0q

113. Deeply Felt Things... (Special + Movie)

2009-08-26T00:33:00.002-04:00

Zooey Deschanel on the cover of NYLON magazine.

I am not a huge fan of the movie, (500) Days of Summer. However, I am a big fan of Zooey Deschanel. Ever since I saw her in Yes Man alongside Jim Carrey, I started to pay attention to the film works of this girl with the crystal blue eyes and smiles with budding lower eyelids. Haters compare her to Katy Perry, but in her eyes, you see a cleverness that gives you way more personality than Perry's do. Okay, enough rant about how charming Zooey is, getting onto the point of today's story.

(500) Days of Summer is the story of the time period in which the protagonist guy is infactuated with Summer, the girl played by Zooey Deschanel. It goes through the phases of their relationship from their first talks to "Truly Madly Deeply" scenes at the park to finally their breakup. All in all 500 days. At the end of the movie, SPOILER: Thomas finally learns to move on in life and asks another girl out. The movie wasn't the conventional romantic comedy genre in that the ending was not completely "happy" and everyone marries everyone else. My biggest problems with the film was that the main characters' personalities and their bonding was not fully shown to the audience. We are immersed in clever small dialogues, but when we look back at anything significant they might have said, we find not much.

My other problem was that I was a single male walking into a theatre full of teenagers and/or old maids, and as I looked around me, I saw no males. Maybe I saw the movie too late, and that's why there were less than 40 people in attendance, but the fact still remains that these pseudo-romance films are only targeted at women. Who am I kidding, the script might as well have been written by an all-women team. The male protagonist's character was seen as indecisive, although smart, business-woman like. I wasn't phazed at the thought of myself watching a "girl-film", but I did wonder how I made the women at the theatre feel; because I did sat right in the centre of the rows.

And here comes the point of this story: There is no definitive versions of your "other self", people need to embrace life, and catch all the chances flying by you.
What a piece of crap, if I really wanted to embrace life, I wouldn't be stuck in a small theatre with 39 hormonally oppressed women. I don't think I need a movie to tell me a moral like that.

It made me think about whether animes and myself in my daily speech have used too much morals and "big summary" to make everything seem a bit easier than they are. The ending of Suzumiya Haruhi was "enjoy your life as it is, and savor every moment". The ending of Zero no Tsukaima was that "sometimes it is good to live in fantasy". However, those statements cannot be said to be 100% True. People will disagree. Why? Because the statements are overly simplified.

So I said to myself: I should also stop using so much analogies that lead to nowhere, or try to find meaning in a band's popularity. It can also save me some time in researching them, so I guess ultimately, it is a lazy move on my part! Yay me.
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micr0q

Summer Update: Crap! Someone Beat Me 2 It!! (News)

2009-08-24T18:11:00.002-04:00

Photo from akibanana.com

The last time I updated this blog was in... June? NO! It was in April! I skipped a whole 4 months? Must be because I've been losing hope in my future in the anime industry. =_=;; Here's the truth: For about 3 years I've been planning my life so that I can get a job as a professional anime editor/DVD importor, but this summer, it all came crashing down on me: I'm just not a good business person or a person who could be forever in love with anime. UGGH! Oh how that crushing sense of time wasted felt... but I gotta look at it more optimistically.

Firstly, shouldn't anime be a pastime only? (For most of the population, anyway) It wouldn't have mattered that much if I worked as a human resources manager (which I won't be) and also watch anime.

Secondly, there's tons of quality anime out there. The ones that you can watch over and over again, like Sayonara Zetsubou Sensei and True Tears, and the ones where you would watch because of their huge following in order to be able to talk to the fans of the series like Full Metal Alchemist or Death Note. By the way, cosplaying can be fun, but I cannot dress as Zetsubou Sensei anymore due to someone else beating me to the idea (As seen above), which makes me sad but also a bit happy in that I don't have to spend time designing a costume anymore.

Thirdly, every time you watch ANYTHING on tv or online, you carry with you a marker for the time, place and state of mind. For example, if your cat just died when you watched Sailor Moon for the first time, you might remember Sailor Moon along with your cat. You might even associate Luna (the cat from SM) with your own cat. I remember when I watched Samurai Shamploo at a friend's house, how it seemed so amazing and un-corny at 3am. This is why, (ANNOUNCEMENT TIME) when Inuyasha II series come out in October, many adults will watch it mainly because in their teenage years, they read and watched Inuyasha I series. I wish Ranma 1/2 or Yu Yu Hakusho would come out with extra series or even shorts, because I'd watch them for the memories.

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There, that made me feel better. I never forgot about this blog, but I didn't know what to write about for a period of time. I am planning to take a different direction from random blogs about Akiba otaku culture and J-music, and instead talk about deeper connections between Japanese culture and the rest of the world. I will also sneak in lessons of Japanese that I recently learned. Let's go!!!

p.s. If you are interested in Japan, and are not a Japanese person yourself, PLEASE consider taking Japanese classes and/or read books by Japanese authors NOT named Murakami. In the last two months, I've taken a verbal Japanese class where I saw that some anime fangirls were not learning to the extent they could be learning due to their constant reference to animes and obscure dramas.

In conclusion: Don't let anime get to your head.

micr0q

112. The Girl Who Leapt Through Time (Movie)

2009-04-05T23:40:00.002-04:00

Info:
Movie Title: The Girl Who Leapt Through Time (toki wo kakeru shoujou 時をかける少女)
Year: 2006
Runtime: 98 Minutes
Animation Team: MADHOUSE

The Girl Who Leapt Through Time won the Japanese Academy Award for Best Animation in 2006, the year of such great animations as Blood+, Suzumiya Haruhi no Yuutsu, and the end of year surprise of Code Geass. At first glance, "Time Leap" does not seem to be all that well-animated. The character's faces are rather blank, and their slender build do not add any "realism" if anime could generate them. The sometimes random comical facial expressions of the protagonista (Makoto) makes it look too playful to be taken seriously as a feature film. The animation team makes up for that in the simplicity of repetition in the story telling, as well as in adding a butt-ful of 3-D CG in the transition sequences.

Summary: (WARNING: THIS MEANS THE FOLLOWING PARAGRAPH OR SO HAS SPOILERS)

Mokoto is your average, immature, fun-loving high school girl. She rides a bike everyday to school, but because of her clumsiness and childish demeanor she is late for class, fails quiz, burns herself, gets hit by a thrown person, and finally crash into a train and die. Except on this very unlucky day, she acquired the ability to "Time Leap", so she didn't die. She decides to abuse this power and spends 40minutes of the movie revising her very unlucky day by getting to class on time, aces quiz, burns someone else, get someone else hit by a thrown person, and sings karaoke for free. Sounds awesome. Here's the big problem: There is love involved. Makoto's friend, Chiaki, finally gathered the courage to ask her out. She was not prepared for this new relationship with what she thought was a "hang-out" guy buddy. She panicked and leapt in time to change it. In doing so, she almost killed a nervous student (the scapegoat of the burning), tried to hook her other good friend up with a younger girl (the victim of the thrown person), and finally, after using up all her leaps for unimportant things, watches as her good friend and the hurt girl ride her broken (and crash-prone) bicycle toward the railway tracks. She realizes she cannot simply revise her life and make others take her responsibility, and she feels very guilty and cries and falls down a lot. And then time stopped. The tragedy that would have befallen her friend did not happen. Why? The boy who had feelings for her, Chiaki, also could Time Leap, and stopped time temporarily. He explains to Makoto that he cannot go back to his own time, but he really enjoys being around her. Makoto realizes how important Chiaki is to her, and desperately wishes for him to stay. He couldn't, and vanishes. Makoto discovers that she could leap one extra time, and resets the events back to her first day Time Leap-ing. She lets all things resolve naturally, and walks home with Chiaki, explaining to him all that she knew. He says that because she knows, he could not stay, and again goes away to the Future. Before he goes, he tells Makoto he would wait for her. It's a bittersweet ending, kind of. The point of the movie is that she learns to take responsibility for things happening in her life, and to not dismiss a confession of love.

Screencaps:

Feels like Zetsubou Sensei doesn't it?She cries three times in this movie, very annoying moments, but also feels REAL, so it's not bad. This is the 3-D nuts and bolts animation used in Time Leap scenes, gets a bit boring in the end. Can you spot the subtle camera angle change between the last two pictures? That is the best applied CG in the whole film and trunces Kyoto-Ani's work in that year. Okay, remember in the article I said they sometimes use a butt-ful of CG? In the first Time Leap scene, images of running horse and buildings ran through the screen. WTF. So the question is, was the movie good enough to deserve the Japan Academy Award? It depends greatly on the timing of the movie. That year was kind of a void in Japanese animation. 0 Miyazaki-sweeper film, 2 pure-fantasy films, 1 animal film, and 1 detective conan film were the competition. I've seen the animal film, Arashi no Yoru Ni, a film about a goat and a wolf's friendship and betrayal. A kind of a same-sex Romeo&Juliet story, touching, but overly CUTE-fied, so it could not win. Detective Conan gets nominated every year for its content and SOLID CONSISTENT animation, so if it won, it would be like "its best year" or something. The two fantasy stories conflict. All that is left is this semi-real story that is a combination of the teenage love part of Detective Conan and the adventure part of Earthsea. Also, none of the other films used enough fancy CG work to out-perform Leaping-girl, so it works out.

Personally, I liked two things in the film: The first is the feeling of nalstalgia it creates in the beginning and middle of the film. The second is the piano music played in very quirky, awkward scenes. I thought the development of love between Chiaki and Makoto specifically could be hinted at earlier in the movie, instead of showing too much of the three friends together. I felt a bit resigned knowing the conflict has not been fully resolved in the end. However, the movie is not silly, and given the fantasy elements, there is nothing out of place. I enjoyed most of it, so I recommend at least a rental watch.

General Watchability Rating: [8.6/10]
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A review by micr0q, copyright 2009. No directly copied text whatsoever. All images belong to MADHOUSE and their creators. Research from AnimeNewsNetwork, imDB, and Wikipedia. No infringement intended.

111. My Sketchbook (Special)

2009-03-18T11:34:00.003-04:00

Because I am taking visual arts for fun in university, and because it earns me no money whatsoever, here are some Japan-related things from my sketchbook. The references are up to you.

I will update this in the future for more interesting thingies I find on the web.
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-All images copyright 2009 by Q-kun.

110. Mujinto ~Uninhabited Island~ Short Short (Animation)

2009-02-17T16:07:00.002-05:00

Animation - Uninhabited Island Short. (Art-Animation)

Today I'm taking a break, and taking the easy-way-out in getting inspiration for a blog entry. I browsed through Youtube's "promoted videos" links and saw this adorably strange animation clip called "Mujinto" (or, Uninhabited Island). This video is promoted by the ART-ANIMATION School in Japan as it will be one of the entries in the Laputa Animation Festival from March to April 2009. The style of animation is very simple, using paper cut-outs, and watercolors. The result is something very subtle that I enjoy because it calms me down. It is very short and self-explanatory, but just in case you did not view the video because you think it could be viral, let me explain what happens in the video.

The protagonist, or in this case, the setting, is introduced -- the uninhabited island -- with a gross underrepresented size for an island, floating amidst a sea of blue. The sky is lighter blue.

First story concerning the islet: A woman arrives on it, and farts, thinking there is NO ONE THERE (無人 mujin), however, the island turns into a nose, and a white hand is extended from below the sea's surface to squeeze the nostrils, a voice is heard, "stinky" (臭い kusai). The woman looks surprised.

In between stories, the screen is a white slate with the title of the story on it. That's all there is.

The second story concerning the islet: A cat is stranded on the islet, and an angry-looking person stands on a boat in the background, holding the skeletal remains of a fish. This probably means the cat committed a bad act by eating the "owner"'s fish. The cat also fears water, and as the waves hit the islet from left and right, the cat dodges so as not to get wet. It is careless, and so its tail is dipped into the sea, and the cat cries.

The third story is about tourism on the Uninhabited island. A ship arrives carrying four tourists and a guide. Before they get onto the islet, the guide tells them, "Island!" so they take a photograph. Once they get onto the islet, the guide tells them, "the Sea! the Ship! the Sky! the Birds!" Everything they should have seen on the way there but didn't. Then the tourists stare at her, waiting for more directions. The guide does a pose and says, "Me! Me! Me!" and the tourists all take photos of her. The clip ends.

There are two things of interest in the short animation clip that I'd like to bring to light. The first one is the allusion to the ancient East Asian proverb of a fox who is very clever and gets away from the hunter all the time, but in the end falls into a trap for wild boars. The cat is obviously the "fox" in that it becomes careless when it dodges left and right and forgets about its behind. The second thing is that the tourist story is very critical of tours that bring people to these "uninhabited" destinations, or, more commonly, "culture-lacking" destinations in which the sponsor for the travel destination must be the people of that uninhabited place to boost their economy. The tourists are led like blind mice and all fall into the trap. Half of the tour is spent looking at the outside world from ON THE ISLAND. This is how bad those things can be.

Through these subtleties, the animators created this simple, strange, yet fun little clip that entertains us. Now, if we go into the postmodern custom of credential checking, we'd probably find that ART-ANIMATION school isn't the top animation school in Japan, nor is the Laputa Animation Festival something big to cry about.

My credit card got declined yesterday, so I guess someone else is already doing a credential checking around here. Wish me luck in clearing my name!

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Review by micr0q, no directly copied text whatsoever, copyright 2009. Video embed hosted on Youtube.com and contents belongs to Youtube and ART-ANIMATION school respectively. No copyright infringement intended.

109. Postmodernism and Aya-chan pt.2 (Special)

2009-02-08T22:41:00.000-05:00

Is he breakdancing or did he just fall down???

Am I special? I ask myself this question now and then. Like many people, when I happen to feel confident at that very moment, I can easily locate the strengths I seem to have. However, in our post-modern society, simply being "good" isn't enough, because of the limited jobs going around, only the VERY distinguished can be successful. So what defines me? Like many people, I somes become a bit dejected when I compare myself with the many others who are my age but doing much better than I am. Am I not so special after all? Am I just "mediocre"? (see part 1 for the mentioning of mediocrity)

People want to succeed; people want to feel special. Since the beginning of society, people want to be the top half of the hierachy. Some reach it, most do not. The lessons in persistence teach us that those who are at the top did so by countless hours of work done. In an RPG game, it would be as if they have trained to the highest levels in a certain skill, and therefore have a specialty that put them above others. Even people bribing their way to the top are Level-100 in bribery (which is not an encouraged skill). Is ambition the key to our success? Not quite. Let's look at it from another perspective:

In LianYL's post on RIUVA in March 2008, he commented on the same idea of ambition vs. contentment. The post was analyzing the main themes and symbolisms of True Tears, and was about 15 pages long. Being a True Tears fan, I naturally read all of it. I understood LianYL's idea about how each person has a seperate "sketchbook" of his/her life, and that sometimes other people are drawn to them --- Popularity. There was much frustration with the protagonist, because Shinichirou's want to "read" the girl he likes' sketchbook, but always keeps it closed. He becomes a bit disillusioned and thinks highly of himself as someone with ambition and "talent". He submits drawings to publish. He fails. In the end, he learns that he isn't all that special, but if he keeps on focusing on mediocre desires and be content with the status quo, he will still live a full life and get the girl he likes in the end. It's actually quite a wimpy idea, full of discouragement of the "upwardly mobile". That post made me a bit sad, as I cannot write 15 pages of anything without enough substance and STILL make it sound really articulate. I guess I will need to learn how to stretch ideas.

No this is NOT True Tears, but a scene from HBO's True Blood. Fooled you.

So here is a stretch. How about if you combine the two? If you keep on doing something that even you yourself do not fully find enjoyable (no contentment), would you still succeed in the end? We shall take a look at the Youtube phenomenon that is known to Japan's online community as Magibon.

Magibon Mu(nothingness)#11, this is Magibon's most popular video with over 4.5 million views.

Just a note here, I DO NOT hate on Magibon in anyway, but aside from the conspiracy motivations she may have behind all this VLogging, I really think there's a subtle cleverness to it all. I checked my handy "Discover Japan Vol.02" book for the article on "Mu", or Nothingness. Mu is the Zen Buddhist ideal of the answer to everything. To exist, to not exist, to be known, to be unknown, all sum up in Mu -- it doesn't matter anymore/anyway. This is a very Eastern philosophy that is almost opposite to the Western ideals of individual accomplishment and "being". Magibon is an example of it. However, her fan following is the most direct cause of her VLogging her daily "Mu" moments. It is the fact that she made so many of "Mu" clips that it start to distinguish her from the millions other Youtube users.

Each time Magibon shows a Mu-moment, she wears different clothing or changes her location in the room, making each one subtly unique. IF we project this "project" of hers for another 10 years, we will live to see "Mu#300". This would basically chronologize her life like a diary, almost. It reminds me of a conceptual postmodern artist by the name of On Kawara (河原温), who made paintings of numbers of the date on the calendar of the day he paints. These paintings look like computer-printed, but are all done manually. He does not do one every day of the year, because sometimes the numbers are very complicated so he could not finish on that given day. The next day a new painting is started, and the old one is discarded. On Kawara's life is broken into these little bits of visual information, and ART IS MADE. If Magibon can do this for 30+ years as On Kawara has, then she will truely have left a legacy.

On Kawara's painting - October 31st, 1978.

Both of these things --- Vlog yourself staring at the camera OR painting date numbers --- can be very tedious and boring, at ANYTIME during their respective projects. This is where post-modernism kicks in. When you repeatedly do something for a long time, other people will notice and question your MOTIVATION, your ORIGIN, and your FUTURE. If they cannot condemn you for a crime, you have now become positively famous with a good following. So maybe these acts of "Mu" actually help people create a living in our post-modern world. Maybe skepticism can help you get a job!!

I like this idea. I like where I ended up. I am going to stop. For now.
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A review by Q-kun, no directly copied text whatsoever. Copyright 2009. Images from Google Image search engine, and belong to their respective artists. Youtube video embed will be removed upon request. Thanks for reading.

108. Nausicaa of the Valley of the Wind (Retro Movie)

2009-02-08T15:33:00.001-05:00

Nausicaa poster render. Google Image search. Hayao Miyazaki, no infringement intended.

*Note there are major movie spoilers here*

Hayao Miyazaki (宮崎駿) is possibly the most widely known and influential Japanese director today. His film, Spirited Away (千と千尋の神隠し sen to chihiro no kamikakushi) won the Academy Awards for Best Animated Feature in 2003. Miyazaki's films are famous for their careful combination of different genres such as fantasy, religion, and drama, as well as featuring prominent female leads. Nausicaa of the Valley of the Wind (風の谷のナウシカ kaze no toni no naushika), as the first film released by Miyazaki's Studio Ghibli in 1984, was no exception. From the start of the film, we see Princess Nausicaa as a very independent, strong-willed woman, until at the end of the film when she becomes a Christ Figure/Saint-hood. This movie is a classic. Even this week's ORICON anime DVD ranking (January 11th) contains Nausicaa at the 18th place. This review hopes to justify that popularity.

Nausicaa, as an anime feature film, was ahead of its time in animation standards. It incorporates much of the stylistic wind-gusts as early 1990 TV animes such as Dragon Ball-Z had. There is also great tempo control in the storyboard, as the speed of the actions of the characters can speed up according to the situation. The audience should not feel the characters aren't running fast enough (like in 28 Days Later). The Oomus also have computer rendering and 3-D elements, as it is very much a copy of the trilobite of the Cambrian era, having many scales. Most non-human organisms in the film are based on Cambrian organisms. The depth of research that goes on behind this film is amazing. This film, from its start, distinguishes the "human world" and the "wild primordial world".

The plot is simple: In a post-apocalyptic Earth, humans are living in the borders of toxic wastes and defending themselves against Nature. They need a "savior", as a prophecy in the film revealed. There is great emphasis on flying machines and insects, further marking the "mobile" and the "immobile", helpless humans. Insects control most of the lands. However, different countries are still at war, trying to gain the most resources out of what scarcity was left.

Pause right here. This seems very post-WWII to me, and possibly to many other viewers. Indeed, Japan's film and art circles have been representing their hate for war and destruction since WWII. The theme of war in this film is therefore, most certainly, discouraged. The main character, Princess Nausicaa, is a symbol for non-violence. At the beginning of the film, she calms a giant insect down by using charms instead of attacking/provoking it. Near the end of the film, she also rescues an insect by forcing the kidnappers to land their flying machine instead of killing them and taking control. An interesting point here is that Miyazaki shows to everyone Nausicaa's fighting abilities when her father passed away and she is filled with anger, stabbing 4 enemy soldiers to the ground. She seems to possess no weaknesses, the IDEAL hero character.

Back to the film synopsis (for those that haven't watched it): Nausicaa was taken as prisoner by an invading army. Her father, the king, was killed. The invaders wanted to make the Valley of the Wind, where Nausicaa lived, a base to destroy the toxic forest. This is a bad plan as the fungal forest regrows faster. Another country is trying to destroy all other countries by luring thousands of insects into the Valley and destroying 2 birds with one stone. Their plans were found out by Nausicaa, and she escapes back home and rescued the people from the insect stampede. She was badly hurt and almost died, but the insects found her to be a friend and cured her with their "natural" powers. Nausicaa was revealed to be the prophetic savior who links the insects and humans together and everyone live in peace. However, the movie ends here without further showing much of the future of the Earth. (unlike in Wall-E)

There were quite a few things they did well.

MUSIC: The symphonic music was very effective in creating the desolate, lonely atmosphere. The children's chorus was effective in making people recall an "earlier" time of simplicity and agricultural society. The battles had good rhythms that just intensifies the atmosphere to a suitable degree but not over-doing it.
ENVIRONMENTAL: It is very obvious that Nausicaa of the Valley of the Wind was designed to provoke an environmental awareness, even if the viewers do not notice the "presented by the World Wide Fund for Nature" sign. The viewers are made to sympathize with the powerful insects. The viewers are made to be aware of the limited resources such as clean water in the film. The viewers are also made to realize the destruction of semi-nuclear weapons as exhibited in the invading army's giant warrior's energy blast.
SPIRITUALITY: The movie was very well-paced, and I will say it again. The movie makes the viewers take time to look around at the fantasy world it has created, and to better absorb the individual characters' personalities. Whenever there is action, the speed of the movie goes up significantly, so the viewers should not be bored in those parts. Other than that... well, let's get to the Christ-Figure thing right now.

Nausicaa as a crucifix. Screen capture. No infringement intended.

A Christ-Figure, especially in such a fantasy, apocalyptic film, almost ALWAYS arises. The most obvious Christ-Figure is Nausicaa herself. She remains very solitary for most of the film. Everyone knows her, but she always acts alone and seems to be very very independent. She also possesses "powers" such as her fighting skills and familiarity with herbs and insects. This is what most Christ-Figures have in common. She also has followers (Jesus's disciples) such as the invading army's princess and the pilot boy who shows up in the middle of the film. And throughout the movie, she sacrifices herself to prevent evil or destruction on EVERYTHING (Romans and Jews). This is very typical of a Christ-Figure. Ultimately, she is reborn from the dead as the insects resurrect her. Bingo, there you have it. For more information on Christ-Figures, please visit the wikipedia page for Christ-Figure.

Nausicaa again as crucifix. No infringement intended.

This film is VERY powerful in that the viewers are drawn into the fantasy Earth and the characters are immediately relatable. Although the fact that it being Miyazaki's first big-budget film is what drives the popularity of Nausicaa, it is definitely watchable, especially when you are looking for an alternative world-view or just feeling reflective. I forget what I was feeling the day I watched it, but it certainly calmed me down and help me rethink about what I was doing that week. Everyone probably has their own feelings about a film like this.

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A review by micr0q, no directly copied text whatsoever. Copyright 2009. Video embeds found on Youtube.com and will be removed upon request. Images copyright Hayao Miyazaki, Studio Ghibli.

107. Postmodernism and Aya-chan pt.1 (Special)

2009-01-11T19:30:00.003-05:00

Nothing is what it seems. This is fundamental principle of postmodernism. According to the Merriam-Webster Dictionary Online clause b, it is "of, relating to, or being a theory that involves a radical reappraisal of modern assumptions about culture, identity, history, or language". Well, great, we have to look at everything in our society with doubt. Coincidentally, I've recently watched Doubt the film version, and I find it a most definite case of a salad bowl of perspectives, which is signature to all postmodern films.

Official movie poster. This links to a simple review of the movie by me.

HAPPY NEW YEAR! What drove me to write this 2-part post is my recent infactuation with old videos of interviews with Aya Hirano (平野綾), the famous voice actress (seiyuu 声優) for Suzumiya Haruhi. Like many people, I find her infinitely similar to Lucky Star's Konata, in that her mouth forms a :3 shape much like Konata's :3 does. Her bubbly personality seems to be really "moldable", which is why people call her super-moe (just in case you want to know how to type super-moe, 萌ええええええ).The connection to Doubt is that we must doubt her credentials, as well as her talents. Maybe we should just ask the equation: [aya.talent =? aya.fame] She's just like any other young girls put into training for a future in showbiz since early in her life. She has acted since 9, and voice acted since 14, so she's like a Johnny's product. What makes her so special?

This video is an 3-minute interview from HEY!HEY!HEY!MUSIC CHAMP in 2006. Aya-chan had black hair then. The thing to watch out for in this clip is her voice can change from the soft anime-type to the mature woman. She says the anime voice is more natural to her. She also gives nicknames to Masatoshi Hamada and Hitoshi Matsumoto , the hosts. The names are both military positions (2nd Liutenant Hamadesu and Colonel Matsumoteinu). She has this down-to-earth innocence about her, I don't think she faked it.

Aya Hirano's popularity came from the success of Haruhi as a crazy, fun, independent anime idol. She has since capitalized (kind of) on her success in releasing 7 music singles and being an idol-type of a personality. Many people's first critiques of Aya Hirano spring from there. On Ramblings of DarkMirage, already in 2006 there was a post saying Aya can't sing, and that her fame will fade as people forget about Haruhi. On RIUVA, in early 2008, there was a post saying, Aya is the seiyuu Britney Spears and that audiences should root for seiyuus that have great performances under their belts. Hmm, well, I got something to say.

(2008.06.02) Top Runner Interview - Aya Hirano part 1
Note: This is a 18min TV segment interviewing Aya in 2008. The show's name is Top Runner. Aya has changed her image in that she put on more mature makeup and changed her hairstyle. They go through some works Aya has done in the past, as well as looking at Ranpo Edogawa's Niju Mensou no Musume (二十面相の娘), a live script reading session from Aya. She didn't stumble once.

Being famous is not easy. In this postmodern world we live in, where everyone can target their hate and misjudgment on anyone else through the internet, credibility is very hard to achieve. If Suzumiya Haruhi's voice should not sound the way Aya Hirano made it to be, then so be it. I personally think it was a great choice. Similarly, I do not doubt that Aya-chan's signature vocal timbre/tonal range goes from Konata's nasally teddy-bear type to a Suzumiya Haruhi-upgrade, the shouting street peddler type. Sure, her voice is limited, but that doesn't mean she shouldn't be famous. I'll use myself as an example of this.

Children in East Asia are raised in families with Confucian values that highlight the "educated" and the "talented". This is why many primary school children are sent to juku (塾), or private training classes, to learn subjects such as English, Painting, Calligraphy, or Advanced Mathematics. I was sent to a Watercolor Painting class in kindergarten (I think the best work that came out of my 5 year old brain was half a chicken), thankfully, I did not go to anymore juku's after that, but there was one event I was a part of: an English essay contest. I was in the 3rd grade, and had lived in Australia for 8 months, and so I was better in English than most other school kids. When I cooked up my 2 page (badly written) essay on the city's environment and presented it to a judge panel. I made it past the first round cut, but was cut in the second round due to the presence of higher quality essays. Of course there were: In the waiting room of the big downtown building the event was hosted at, there were no less than 10 kids with experiences such as going abroad for 5 years in Sweden or living in England for 4 years. Compared to my paltry 8 months, I was completely destroyed (not to mention I was there for only half-hour, there should be more than 20 of those smaller sessions). That event made me realize the endless springs of "talent" there are in the world around me. I was simply "mediocre". Many students of juku participated in competitions relating to their area of study as well, and since there is only 1 champion of each event, thousands and thousands of kids do not make it.

This is perhaps why, in our society where we can trace everyone's records to see how they are raised, what their education background is, and what work they have done, it is ULTRA hard for anyone to be super famous just based on talent alone. However, even if people such as Britney Spears and Justin Timberlake (examples of "handpicked by Disney, etc") do not have talent, their chanced experiences can make them stay in the showbiz for years to come. This is why dissing Aya Hirano is useless, as well as dissing Britney Spears. We need that little bit of LUCK in our lives to push us to newer places and newer opportunities. Even if Aya Hirano is "mediocre", she can at least read scripts fairly well and do 2 different female voices in animes! If she uses those limited, mediocre skills well, she will REMAIN famous and popular.

(2008.06.02) Top Runner Interview - Aya Hirano part 2
In this second segment of Top Runner, Aya is asked what foods she considers to be healthy foods and what dreams does she want to accomplish. There is also a look at Aya's youth in the middle portion of this 18min clip. Although she's more media-genic and mature, I don't think deep-down in her heart Aya Hirano is as corrupted as many other young females. Keep up the good work Aya-chan!

So make your own judgment about what is mediocre and what isn't, but like my father's friend who's working as a government ambassador, he started his career majoring in archaeology, which shows that if you work at something for a period of time, you will be good at it, even if you did not have previous talent. In the next segment, I will talk more about Youtube/Niconico videos and their impact.
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A post written by micr0q. Doubt movie poster design belongs to Scott Rudin Productions. No directly copied text whatsoever. Copyright 2009.

Doubt (American Film Review)

2009-01-02T16:00:00.000-05:00

Doubt plays many things well. The first of which is the many symbolism used in the film. The wind blowing fallen leaves against the windowsill and against the characters symbolize the forces of judgement/misjudgement at work. When it blows against Sister James' window, it probably symbolizes her fear of wronging the priest. When it blows on Sister Aloysius, it probably symbolizes the harshness of her heart against the world. The lightbulb in the principal's room is another symbolism, due to its shorting out multiple times in the film; although the exact parallel cannot be drawn.

The second great thing about Doubt is the themes of humanity explored by the acting. Sister Aloysius is adamant about her beliefs of the evilness in the priest's character, and Priest Flynn makes almost everyone believe that he is actually innocent and protecting the life of a delinquent student. Sister James is the innocent, simple form of life who tries to avoid suspicion and doubt on the people in her life. It is expected that the climatic confrontation between Aloysius and Flynn would happen during James' leave of absence.

The third great thing Doubt has to offer is the balance of humor and drama, especially at the beginning quarter of the film. The contrast of atmosphere between the priests' dinner table and the nuns' dinner table, for example, is a great diversion from the suspense and claustrophobia that surrounds this "limited world" of church and school. It almost raises the theme of male vs. female, which is in fact not a primary topic of the movie.

What holds everything together, and gets the viewers' minds working, is the great acting done by Phillip Seymour Hoffman, Meryl Streep, and Amy Adams. There is great re-watch value. I highly recommend this film.

A simple review by Q-kun. Copyright 2009.

106. flumpool (Preview)

2008-12-04T19:20:00.003-05:00

Not to be a hater or anything, but I just found out about the band flumpool about 20 minutes ago, and after listening to all their songs once, I've already gotten bored. This isn't to say, that this band does not have potential to make it in Japan. Let's take a look at where they come from.
The band is made up of Ryuuta Yamamura (山村隆太), Kazuki Sakai (阪井一生), Genki Amakawa (尼川元気), and Seiji Ogura (小倉誠司). All about 23-24 yrs of age as of this year. Not as young as they could be, but look at their first big money getter. The Vocalist Yamamura has some nice front teeth that makes him look as adorable as alvin the chipmunk or various pixar film characters. To Japanese girls, this equals Uber cuteness. Another thing about Yamamura is that he has pleading eyes similar to that of girls. This, to many Japanese girls, signal that he is strong and yet gentle. ("yasashii hitodane") ahem* I'll stop talking about his face.

The band uses violins and violas as additional sounds in their music. I find the hooks and the intros made with violins very effective, because they coincide with the genre of TV drama music the band is currently in. flumpool just got popular for being featured on Fuji TV's drama "Bloody Monday". (Here's a side story, which isn't that pretty: A few weeks ago, a friend suggested that I watch Bloody Monday. That was a Monday. I failed my art test that day. It was really a "Bloody Monday". So I never watched the show. However, I will not let my prejudice ruin the drama for me, as I am downloading it at this very moment.) flumpool sings "Over the Rain~Hikari no Hashi~" for its theme song.

Now that I've listed the two things that make them popular this year, I will list more reasons that they will be more popular in the next year. 1. Fuji TV will hire them back for another drama. 2. The vocalist will still have his baby-face. 3. Their label hasn't switched to a major one (like EMI or Sony) yet.

What really gets on my nerves is the direction of the PVs. For seriously, WHY does the director allow Yamamura to cover the screen with his face 50% of the time? His face is like a freaking rollercoaster, with his squinting pleading-eyes and his chipmunk teeth showing. Gah, too much emotions conveyed. (or maybe, too few) If their PVs can improve, I don't see why they won't hit the top 10 in the ORICON charts. Hell, I'd buy Nezumi Senpai just for his hair. Buying this band for his teeth doesn't seem that far-fetched.
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Preview by silentMic (Q), copyright 2008, no directly copied text whatsoever. Thanks to Youtube.com for hosting the video. 12.4.08

105. KissXsis (Manga + Anime Predictions)

2008-11-22T23:27:00.002-05:00

Raw image taken from official KissXsis website, Kodansha, no infringement intended.

The main explanation for the lack of Casshern Sins anime updates is that I've been busy with school work (and that I cannot race the pace of other bloggers always or make my post interesting enough for people not to wait for the quickly subbed episodes, I'm so sad. Like the song. Which reminds me, here's the song.)

So instead, I'm going to hold off anymore posts about Casshern until the anime is finished. In my spare time, I've found more time reading random mangas. KissXsis is one such example.

The plot of the manga (not for children under 16!) is that in a remarried family, the father has a male child (Keita) from a previous relationship, the mother brought in twin daughters (Aka and Rika) from a previous relationship, and the children grew up loving each other. It is borderline incest hentai mixed with some twisted kind of school romance. I've read 14 chapters of it, and from the way things have been going, I don't think "school" actually matters at all in this manga. Who cares if Keita is trying hard to ace his high school entrance exam? Who cares if their teacher is mean to him? The only question teenagers ask while reading is, "so um, does he get laid in THIS chapter or not...?"

In the first chapter we are introduced to Keita being kissed by his sisters one by one, because for some strange reason, they love their younger brother so very much. Okay, no blood relations at all, but the fact that they've been raised up together (at least since very young ages) until the time of the story (middle school graduation) is enough to put the twisted "love" on the incest level. The sisters lure Keita, and his natural response has always been, "oh, my, sister, I'd love to do [insert obcene thing], but I can't really choose between you two because I love you both." WTF is this shit? It gets better.

It turns out that Aka and Rika are competing with each other to see who will get Keita in the end. So it doesn't matter that he's two-timing both of them in front of them and everyone else. Their parents actually approve of their "thing" when the mother said, "see, I told you he would pick [insert twin's name]!" at various places in the manga.

The twins are not drawn very sexily, nor are they the typical "huge-boobs" hentai type characters. They look more like Sakura from Naruto than Nami from One Piece... or, more like the original Kyou no Go no Ni OVA episodes. Their nakedness are NEVER actually shown in the manga, which makes it okay to be shown to teens not at the age of 18, yet.

The racy actions the characters perform are what "drives" the manga forward. In the valentine's day episode, Aka makes a lipstick out of home-made chocolate (symbolizing "homeliness", "maturity", and "seduction" in one! How clever!) but Rika uses it to "get with" Keita. In another scene, Keita slips and falls with his sister in the bathroom before taking a bath.

Yup, the summary of the manga is, give fan-service and stupid teases WHENEVER and BY ANY MEANS possible. At least the faces don't distort during "those" scenes... please kill me now. I hope the anime actually does this manga some justice by either sucking REALLY hard or by being a SMASH hit because of its creative-ness and refreshing music/animation combo. I doubt it.
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Review by micr0q, no directly copied text whatsoever, copyright 2008.

104. Casshern Sins Episode 05 (Anime)

2008-10-30T22:47:00.001-04:00

Another really quick summary.

Casshern was minding his own business, when Lyuze show up again. Casshern seems to have trouble deciding with himself whether he is human or robot. Lyuze recounts her sister (neesan)'s death due to Casshern's killing of Luna and bringing down the Great Destruction. Casshern's like yes, I have sinned, please kill me. Lyuze slashes Casshern across the chest. He tells her to finish the job, but she hesitates. Casshern's body automatically heals and surprises Lyuze. She's like, omg, you're a monster. Casshern's like I know it's true. His body gets provoked to a point where his eyes flash torquois and he goes berserk. Lyuze hides under a tower-thing. Casshern jumps up and dives down, destroying the tower-thing and the ground. Lyuze was saved by the dog, Frienda. First part of the story ends.
The next part of the story continues with Ringo (the cute robot girl introduced in episode 01). She's got a new outfit now and a cute little hat. She tries to cheer some people up, when robots show up wanting to crush her. Casshern shows up magically, and Ringo shouts, "Casshern!" This gets the attention of all the robots and they all want to kill Casshern. Casshern destroys them, naturally. He almost kills Ringo too during True-Kill mode, but Ringo was able to snap him out of it. Ringo's father/machenic talk for a bit, and a voice tells Casshern, "because you are Casshern!" Casshern looks up at a similarly dressed humanoid robot guy with a purple cape. Casshern seems to recognize him. Episode 05 ends.

I was right in predicting episode 05 to continue the main plot between Casshern, Lyuze, and Ringo, who are the main characters. I thought Casshern's emotional development is still very slow. However, the prospect of fighting a "boss" figure is intriguing. (This is probably more like the battle between Red and Green in Pokemon) I hope the action scenes are not blurred too much.

-silentMic (Q), 9.30.2008

103. Casshern Sins Episodes 03-04 (Side Characters)

2008-10-22T23:18:00.000-04:00

Raw image by Tatsuo Yoshida, MADHOUSE, no infringement intended.

Summary/Review:
Where were we when we left off at Episode 02? When Casshern just destroyed all robots in that refugee camp place and feeling very guilty about everything. He walks away from the ruins and the guard dog stays there. He walks into the desert, and meets this human man who's looking for a travelling companion. The man is very rugged , but the colors used on him are mainly beige-brown, plain looking. He admires Casshern's shiny appearance at first, questioning if Casshern is a Shinigami (see Death Note). Casshern brushes him away at first, but soon (especially after learning the man was human) began to accept the man. The man shows off his survival skills and talks about how he relies on his medicine bottle too much. He then throws the bottle into a canyon (bad decision). Casshern sees how the man tries to catch a desert lizard and helps him. Then the dog, Friend-ah comes to them and challenges Casshern. Casshern's like, "shit, do what you want with me, I'm the guilty one". The dog bit him but didn't continue ripping him apart. They become friends. The man is surprised by all of this. He wishes Casshern good luck, reassures Casshern he's NOT a shinigami, and disappears. It turns out he just wanted to die in a ditch somewhere, but Casshern and the dog didn't know and walk away on their journey.

Raw image by Tatsuo Yoshida, MADHOUSE, no infringement intended.

The preview for Episode 04 says, "Horobi no Tenshi", and shows the magenta haired girl with a sword. Indeed it is the title of episode 04, the "Angel of destruction". This destruction angel character Sophie was SO ANNOYING. I counted a minimum of twenty-five "Tatakai" (Fight) in her speech in this one episode. Bottom line, she loved to fight. She took an interest in Casshern when he arrived on her terf. Casshern's like, "oh no I can't fight anymore, I'm a good guy now" She's like "but I like you therefore I must fight you" and stuff. Some robots were in the area too, led by a bigger robot. Somehow they all want to kill this humanoid angel of destruction, but she just slices them to bits using her long sword. Finally the big robot attacked her and got her down to the ground. Casshern appears and saves her by blocking a sword slash with her arm (pretty cool in a Final Fantasy kind of way). I forget what happened to the robot, but Casshern now stands ready to face Sophie. She's like, attack attack, he's like, "stop it" and punches her away into the pond-like things. Everything comes to a halt when Sophie suddenly thrusts her long sword through Casshern's body. Casshern did not die, but just pulled the sword out and looked faint. Sophie hugged him, seemingly understanding what "love" is now. (Apparently she thought "destroy" is the synonym for "love") She's "like well, thanks Casshern for teaching me how I cannot kill you, I'm gonna go now." And jumped away.

Raw image by Tatsuo Yoshida, MADHOUSE, no infringement intended.

The plot of these two episodes can be almost completely neglected, and the story would still function. They serve mainly to introduce side characters in Casshern's journey to self-actualization. The self-sacrificial man and the crazy fighting-is-my-life girl. They are interesting characters, although a bit one-dimensional, they become cushions to our understanding of Casshern. For example, if you see a person juggle ten balls at once, you might be amazed, but if you see them juggle twenty balls, then ten balls, then fifty balls, then twenty balls, you're like, oh, I've seen that already. Casshern is like that, at this point in the story.

Raw image by Tatsuo Yoshida, MADHOUSE, no infringement intended.

CASSHERN Sins Episode 03-04 Ratings: [8.1/10]

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Summary by silentMic (Q), no directly copied text whatsoever. Copyright 2008.

102. Casshern Sins Episode 02 (Anime)

2008-10-09T23:45:00.001-04:00

Raw image by Tatsuo Yoshida, MADHOUSE, no infringement intended.

This is going to be another very fast summary just a little bit late because I had some volunteer work to do for 5 hours. In Episode 02 we see the same intro scene as Casshern says, "Luna, I will kill you" and then the episode opens where 01 left off, when Lyuze and Casshern were facing each other. Lyuze again criticizes Casshern for destroying Luna and the world. Her metal arm seems also to be deteriorating. Casshern still has no memory of the past, which makes Lyuze angry and she runs off. Casshern travels to an encampment in the middle of the desert. There is a robot couple here, who are suddenly surrounded by giant robots ready to kill them. Their robot dog shows very aggressive attacks to defend them, but the three giant robots are too strong. Casshern shows up and goes into hyper-mode, killing all three robots by puncturing their stomaches as usual.

Casshern absorbing an energy attack, so badass! no infringement intended.

The main man of the encampment is a dwarf robot doctor guy voiced by a rather deep male voice. He meets Casshern, and shows him disturbing images of rotting robots (much reminds me of injured WWII soldiers). Casshern goes into deep thought. After some time (maybe a few hours, maybe days) the giant robot who was with Braiking Boss shows up and asks where Casshern is. He grabs a few different robots in the encampment, but they aren't Casshern. He decides to destroy all of them. Casshern shows up after he rips off the "husband"-bot's arm, and says he is Casshern. All the robots in the encampment now enemize Casshern. Casshern kills the giant robot with ease (splitting it into two halves), and the husband-bot comes up to "protect him" from the circle of injured robots who want to destroy Casshern, Casshern was grateful, until the husban-bot reveals he was faking it by stabbing Casshern's ribs with a shard of metal/crystal. Casshern goes berserk after that. I call it...

Kill-mode Casshern, no infringement intended.

I call it, True-kill mode. His eyes turn red and he absolutely destroys everything in his path. He kills the doctor-bot in the process, and fights with his last bit of consciousness and says he's not evil. In the end, he is all alone again. He questions what himself is. In the preview we see the robot dog (the only surviver after the massacre) alive and well, plus the introduction of a new character. Who could that guy be?

This episode gave me a better sense of what Casshern Sins had to offer. The action sequences are quite well-done, the IMPACT timing and sound effects are very effective. Casshern's second transformation give us a bit more depth into his character. The colors are still very dark, but I liked the hazy screens near the end of the episode that highlighted the wife-bot's face and gave Casshern an air of Loneliness like the end of The Godfather. I will watch with more enthusiasm next week.

-silentMic(Q) 10.09.08

101. Mouryo no Hako episode 01 (Preview)

2008-10-08T20:03:00.004-04:00

Raw image by Natsuhiko Kyogoku, MADHOUSE, no infringement intended.

This is going to be a fast summary, because I'm rushing to get to a volleyball game. Mouryo no Hako is like "Ghouls in a Box" (translated in to English).

The story is about a group of adolescents dealing with spirits and voodooism. In the first episode, the old guy is shown with a box holding the head of a girl inside. His face becomes grim. We then get a story of two young girls, one admires the other one like "Jisatsu Circle"'s cult following. She goes out at night secretly meeting this other girl. The scenery always look so nice with the animation of flower petals dancing around and the soft moonlight.

Anyway, the story kinda grows to a point where the other girl strangles the first girl and they STILL like each other after that. Then they go out for a walk, they see a traintrack, and the other girl commits suicide by jumping in front of the train. ON the train is the older man at the beginning of the episode, who sees hands of blood and dying WWII soldiers swarm the train from the outside.

Bloody hands on a train, no infringement intended.

It all turned out to be an illusion, but the other girl is badly wounded and sent away on a cart. Her mouth curls into a smile as the episode ends. This is all just so creepy, but full of awesomness. The atmosphere is darkened even more (not in a positive way) by that fantastic band that ruined Death Note: Nightmare. Both the opening and the ending are Nightmare songs. At first glance, Mouryo no Hako is a thriller title with very crisp animation and awesome flowery patterns and scenery design.

Ending theme freakiness with naked girls, MADHOUSE, no infringement intended.

If only I had time to watch it...

Prediction of Success: [8.8/10]

-silentMic(Q) 10.8.08

100. CASSHERN Sins Episode 01 (Anime)

2008-10-02T17:40:00.002-04:00

Raw image by Tatsuo Yoshida, MADHOUSE, no infringement intended.

Information:
Anime Title: CASSHERN Sins
Original Broadcast: October 3rd, 2008 @ TV Aichi & TV Saitama

Summary/Review:
CASSHERN Sins starts its first episode off with Casshern saying, "Luna, I will kill you". The opening that follows is very dark and mellow, where some of the main characters are just posing and moving sideways. Lyuze, Casshern, and Ringo are more prominent. It turns out that the big boss guy's name is BRAIKING and not "BREAKING", and he appears right after the opening sequence stops. He gins from under a hood saying, "The destruction will never stop after Casshern killed Luna" and then sends his minions (robots/biorobots) at him. Casshern is seen fighting a giant scorpion-like robot and crushing it to bits. Lyuze shows up teasing him saying, "A person without a will becomes weak?" and then disappear. Casshern becomes sentimental and gets a mental breakdown and disappear as well. We are cut to Ringo and her father in a van, driving away. It is still night time. The Braiking Boss says "The destruction has already started, it won't end by [the robots] eating Casshern". He then says to Ringo's father (doesnt seem like it anymore), who's van is parked nearby, "Casshern is awake, your business might boom as a result."

Now we see Ringo running near a dimly lit (I guess its daytime) lake, where Casshern sits, lost in thought. She exclaims, "beautiful" at Casshern's face. She asks if he is a human, he asks what humans are, she replies she has never seen one, but if he were one, they must be beautiful. She says her name, and Casshern seems to hesitate when saying his own name. Ringo plays with seashells in a very comicized animation. Casshern looks over her. Casshern asks if she's a robot, she says yes, and that because of the Destruction, she'll rust if its not for Ouji (I guess its a father-turned-mechanic). She asks what "destruction" is, and again praises how shiny Casshern is. Casshern says she's not rusty or ugly. Ringo hugs him and runs away. There's a flashback where Casshern sees Luna. He suddenly becomes afraid for Ringo.

Just as Casshern predicted, a giant robot catches Ringo, and tries to crush her. Casshern arrives when Ringo's metal head was being cracked open. He tells the robot to let go, the robot realizes its Casshern. The robot says he doesn't believe the rumor that eating Casshern can stop the Mass Destruction (yeah gotta give it some name), but is still very jealous of Casshern's body. Casshern's eyes flash a blue color, and his mask appears on his face, and he assaults the giant robot with agility and a haunting demeanor (like a ghoul in a fantasy RPG game), eventually making a hole in the robot's body, taking out all the electrical chords (organs) and destroying it. Ringo says, "don't" while all of it is happening, and becomes scared of Casshern. Casshern snaps out of his special combat phase and was confused. Ouji appears and picks up Ringo. Lyuze shows up again and comments on Casshern's bloody killing technique. Casshern asks if she knows about his past. She tells him he's just a killing machine, that because he killed the Lunar (Luna) sun, the Mass Destruction started. She says the world has died, and flashes out a weapon-like thing with her left arm. They seem to be at a stand-off, when the ending theme starts.

Raw image by Tatsuo Yoshida, MADHOUSE, no infringement intended.

The ending song is a slideshow of a bunch of flowers and Ringo's hand catching pedals. The song is composed by H∧L and called "reason". Very simple, overall. Episode 02's preview is Casshern's voiceover some more decaying robot faces. The after taste of the episode is that it's fairly generic with the plot of "redemption" or "world destruction". However, the way MADHOUSE animated the swaggering movements of Casshern is very artistic. I find that it creates a very claustrophobic atmosphere. It is not very watchable for a first episode, because almost every scene is a downer, but we'll just have to see what happens next.

CASSHERN Sins Episode 01 Ratings: [7/10 (not very watchable)]

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Review by silentMic (Q), no directly copied text whatsoever. Copyright 2008.

99. CASSHERN Sins Preview (Preview)

2008-09-30T23:19:00.006-04:00

Here is a short story before we begin.
I was walking home today at around 8:21 when I realized there's no cooked food on the table when I get there. I decided to walk to the nearest McDonald's restaurant instead and ordered a Big Mac value meal. I sat down and ate all the fries and even drank all the pop, all while watching the Lucky Star OVA on my iPod, before I started again back home. It was around 9:13, I had taken almost an hour to eat a Value Meal. As I contemplate on whether the hour mattered in my schedule of "homework-doing", I walked by a coffee shop. Through the window, my peripheral vision showed me two of my schoolmates. I paused and pressed my hands on the window, they didn't notice. I tapped the window with my right hand, Y saw me and was surprised, while J laughed at his funny expression. I raised my left thumb asking, "だいじょうぶ？" then gave them a peace sign and walked away. I wasn't going to stop and chat anyway.

So what's the point of that story? Sometimes, we need to utilize our procrastination for the entertainment of other people. And anyway, that experience filled me with a content feeling that my time at McDonald's wasn't wasted. If I hadn't come home that late, would I still see those two? Hmm... Now onto anime. From the story above, I think you might gather that I don't have a whole lot of time to watch anime these days... and most of it is done on the iPod. So this autumn anime season, even though there's about 35 shows premiering, even though there's about 10 remakes in them, even though there's Stitch (from Lilo and Stitch) the anime coming, even though more than half the shows are about "School life", and even though there's no Suzumiya Haruhi, I can only pick one show to write about.

[CASSHERN Sins]

This show is from MADHOUSE. An early speculatory search led me nowhere. A further search taught me that this was a remake of an early 1990s science fiction anime with approximately the same characters. This story is about the destruction of the world and has mecha.

The description of the story on the official website goes: A human-made robot named Lunar appears. Some overlord thing called "BREAKER" fears for her power and orders CASSHERN to kill her. A few hundred years have passed, and something is about to happen from the ruins of the past. Casshern appears, with no memory, this is how the story starts... Like omg, it could be another Gurren Lagann! No it probably won't. But based on the artwork in the miniclips I've seen, this show has potential to be one of the cooler action animes.

One more thing of interest, CASSHERN Sins seems to incorporate the use of brush-stroke hiragana similar to those used in Seto no Hanayome and Tengen Toppa Gurren Lagann. Since the previous two shows were both hits in the anime community, this one might also become one! Hurrah. CASSHERN Sins starts on October 3rd. I will try to blog weekly about updates. I have NO idea what the original was like, so I'll be blogging from a 1st-timer's point of view. Here's the trailer for the anime, released in August.

Casshern Sins Trailer 2008
Video sent by Fenounette

-silentMic (Q), 9.30.2008

98. Ranma 1/2 (Retro Series Thoughts)

2008-09-17T19:35:00.006-04:00

Raw image by Rumiko Takahashi, Shounen Sunday, no infringement intended.

Summary:
Ranma Saotome trained in China with his father Genma, and both fell in a cursed spring that turned Ranma into a 1/2 girl and Genma into a 1/2 Panda. They come back to Japan and meet up with the Tendou family and Ranma is engaged to Akane Tendou. They didn't like each other at first but later it is shown they both enjoy each other's company very much. Then comes a bunch of other characters from China, Japan, and god-knows-where to break them up by seducing either one of them away from the other. Or by force. The dragon fist guy took a long time to die, and the battles get tougher. SPOILER: In the end, they almost get married. So close. NO ONE remembers Ranma for the bad ending, but for the comical situations the characters are placed in.

Review:
Ranma 1/2, along with Yu Yu Hakusho, Doraemon, and Detective Conan, was one of my first mangas. After I started reading Inuyasha in 2002, I found out about the many subtle similarities in the humor and the character design (both created by Rumiko Takahashi sensei). It was a fun, long manga that took "forever" to end. But now that Inuyasha has ended as well, I have re-watched some episodes of the classic Ranma as well as re-read many chapters of the manga. This is what I thought as I watched/read.

Ranma's initial distinguishing quality is that it has young people doing martial arts in their everyday life, and that a few of the young people can transform when splashed with water. The most radical transformation is Ranma, changing gender. While this may be a common theme in many stories: "guy-in-a-girl's-body or girl-in-a-guy's-body" (or in the mind of a parent or child, alien, etc) The main thing that I learn from it is that no matter what appearances people have, they are still a wholesome person inside. Also, it is advantageous sometimes to be a girl/guy (whichever is NOT your current gender), which in a way, is Takahashi sensei breaking the gender roles of society. Her action packed side-plots may get people's minds off of that.

We see many grimacing faces while the characters fight, and the kicking moves and impact vector lines are quite similar to those used in Inuyasha, a later work. Ranma 1/2's style of disposable NPC character faces are similar to those used in Urusei Yatsura and Maison Ikkoku, Takahashi sensei's earlier work. Some pespective errors and wobbly lines show a lack of studio technology and lower level of manga drawing. This makes Ranma 1/2 the "Java man" in the Rumik World. When I watched the anime again, I kept thinking about how the scene lengths could be changed to better fit the flow of the manga, or in the case of Inuyasha, a sense of suspense. Of course, Ranma 1/2's anime version ran in the early 1990s, so the colors in the DVD version are just not as bright as current standards. Also, the lack of depth and focus really give it that retro-feel.

It's hard to find Ranma manga online, so please buy/rent/borrow them if you can. In my honest opinion, it is a much better-knit together story than the anime version. Just to give you a sense of how slow the anime version is, it is only in episode 7 that Ryouga first appears. In the manga, Ryouga's story is completely explained in book 2. Another reason why the manga is better is that in the animation, Ranma's hair changes color from black to red, giving the sometimes unnoticeable gender change a "howthehellcanyounottell" absurdity. Takahashi sensei's emphasis is NOT on Ranma's boobs.

Ranma 1/2's original broadcast date was very interesting. The first episode premiered in April 1989, a few weeks before the student protests in Tian'anmen Sq. The portrayal of the Chinese as either very communist (One of Ranma's most famous Chinese outfits is the green military uniform) or labor-oriented strike a bell with the democratic movement in China in 1989. We do not want to stray and talk too much about it, but in a way, Ranma 1/2 (in a minor way) was a strand of connection between the reconstruction of Japan after WWII and the capitalist ventures China started after 1980. The fact that half the characters have something to do with China also gives this series a strong Chinese following.

Image from WikiPedia, Nabiki Tendou is portrayed as the Devil on the character wheel.

I loved the character Nabiki Tendou. She seemed the most active in her emotions and was the most observative out of the three Tendou sisters. She jokingly told Ranma that "if Akane cannot fill the role as your girlfriend, I would be a candidate" at one point... some point in the anime. She was the most clever in conning various characters (to either give her money, or to turn the tides in a strange situation). She was also given the third most screen time (after Akane and Shampoo). She was the only person to have a short haircut from the get-go, and those breas... Anyway, I really thought Takahashi sensei designed her well and she fit into the character spectrum. I was very glad indeed, when I found an old Ranma 1/2 Music video featuring Nabiki and (my own presumed) her sense of longing. Here, at the end of this entry, is the video uploaded. Please enjoy your last day of summer 2008.

DOCO-05 - Endless Summer Break
Video sent by SilentMic

-SS Ratings: [84.7 - 86.4/100 (85.5%)]
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Review by micr0q, research with help from AnimeNewsNetwork (ANN), AniDB, WikiPedia, Baka-Updates, A4E. No directly copied text whatsoever. Copyright 2008.