The Japan Trip - Day 01-02

The first (and second) day of the rest of my life.

I have to first make it clear that I do not have notes for days one and two of this travelogue, so I am forced to remember all that I can based on photos I have.

As I recall there is not much to be said about Day 1. We got on the plane with the usual farewells and my parents worrying like the worriers they are, and that was it. We had a quick meal at the local Burger King, and I remember I watched Wall-E again on the flight to Hong Kong, which neither Xi Min nor JX had watched before. I still don't understand why they'd rather watch my screen instead of plugging in themselves, but that's one of the mysteries of human nature I'm never going to find out.

I wanted to wander around Hong Kong International a bit but our transfer time was short and it was three am in the morning anyway and nothing much was open. We managed to find the connecting flight gate, thankfully. HKI has a very interesting system, where each gate is both an arrival and departure gate, split onto two floors (arrival ramps on first floor and departure ramps on second). It's quite confusing at first, but we managed.

I slept a lot on the second flight.

A lot of people don't like in-flight food. I don't understand why. I don't think it could be called five-star gourmet, but it's hot and at the very least it's edible and you can't spend fifteen minutes worrying over the menu when there's only two choices. The only thing I don't like about eating a few kilometres in the air is the fact that there's not enough space to use your utensils properly. But that said, Cathay Pacific has really nice food, and I was happy with the free ice cream too, that's always a nice touch.

Day 2 was equally uneventful, for the most part. We got our rail passes and got on our train (I kept the seat tickets for souvenirs) and basically trundled along all the way to Hiroshima. I remember lamenting the fact that I never got to sit next to any cute Japanese girls, and as I wandered along the carriages, I noticed that the train-riding demographic doesn't cater to the cute Japanese female (at least, not at the times we took the trains). There's retirees travelling on holiday or visiting other cities, and a lot of businessmen travelling for work; an odd foreigner scattered here and there, but a distinct absence of cute girl.

I have to say one thing about the Japan inter-city rail though: it's fast, and efficient, and a joy to ride. (Okay, three things.) Like I told Xi Min at the end of the trip, I much prefer trains to planes, because of all the space, which, granted, doesn't not come cheap on an airline. And, I dunno, but there's something just intrinsically romantic about trains. What I didn't get to see was a diner car, and I really wanted to see one because I've read about it before and what could be cooler than a restaurant on rails? Snacks on a Train? (-rimshot-)

The only way to travel.

We did manage to buy a bento box at our first stop though, and it was delicious even though it's basically good Japanese food left to cool. I promised myself I would eat everything on my plate in Japan, since it would be impolite and waste not to, so I ate everything, even the small plum-like thing which I couldn't identify (it was yellow, and not the normal sour plum that I've come to know).

We met up with Bryan at Hiroshima about half an hour before we were supposed to meet our host family, the Hikidas. Bryan was hovering outside McDonalds wearing his Captain America shirt and a vague grin which said, "I'm loitering outside here for free coffee." And he was.

We manage to bump into Yumiko-san and Aki-san at the south exit, I think it was. I remember that it was really awkward because I didn't know what to say, especially in Japanese because that's what they spoke best. Yumiko-san has the best English, not amazing but good enough to communicate, and I was walking with Aki-san and I remember him asking me if I liked or watched anime. We walked mostly in silence to their car, which was a huge SUV and I remember thinking, wow, that's a huge car for a priest.

They drove us to the temple and made small talk, which I remember involved asking us if we drank, and about how we liked it in Japan so far, and plans for the next day. I remember Xi Min talking the most because he had the most Japanese, and could translate for us. They were very impressed with Xi Min's level of Japanese.

My first thought when we pulled up at the temple was, wow, that's a huge temple for a priest.

It's almost as big as a monastery.

And then they showed us to our rooms, which was actually a guest house situated a litte way behind the temple, opposite the cemetery and next to the gardener's work area and tool sheds. It was guarded by an adorable dog who they named Benny (or Benni), which I never understood because as far as I knew, she was a bit- a female.

Benni! Soooo adorable.

The rooms were decorated in the style of a mild, not really there yet, just-got-up-the-ladder-and-put-his-legs-on-the-slide One Piece otaku, and I think they just used those because it's one of the biggest anime is Japan, and probably the world. It was homely, though, and had an attached dining room and kitchen.

Towels.

Floor mats.

Pillow cases.

Seat cushions.

Banners.

I remember they hooked up a Playstation 2 (and again, that's a huge gaming platform for a priest) and a couple of games, one of which was some soccer game and the other was this hack-and-slash called Fist of the North Star, with violent kung-fu action and gratituous clothing damage.

Wow, they have everything!

They let us settle in, then brought us to a small family restaurant which I assume they patronise frequently, seeing as they seemed to know the owners personally and kept laughing and joking with them. On that first night, they basically piled on the food, introducing us to almost all of Japanese cuisine, including, but not limited to: sandwiches, sashimi, Japanese curry, salad, oysters, natto (fermented soy beans), sour plum, non-alcoholic beer, and of course a lot of alcohol. They were very hospitable, and it seemed to us that they really pulled out all the stops to make us feel welcome. We would later chalk this up to Asian hospitality, but still it was very culture-shocking to a few of them (Xi Min and JX in particular).

From left to right: Yumiko-san, Kenta-san, Aki-san, Ren-san, Bryan Xi Min Jian Xiang Me, Aiko-san

Aki-san and Ren-san, the two brothers, later brought us to the nearby convenience store (combini, in local parlance) and offered to pay for anything we wanted. Of course, we didn't want to impose, so we decided to get some small items and come back the next day by ourselves if necessary. There wasn't much else that day besides some planning and chatting, and then we all went to bed.

*All pictures in this post courtesy of Bryan.

Steins;Gate

I find I'm saying the same things over and over again with awesome anime. Brilliant plot, loveable characters, emotional heartstring-pulling, etc. It's the same over and over again. I just don't know what to say anymore. I mean it's a wonderful show and all, but I don't know how to comment on it in an original and non-clichéd way.

Maybe I should start over.

Steins;Gate was extremely good. It had an excellent, well-crafted storyline with streamlined pacing and wonderful plot twists. It kept me on the edge of my seat, it did, and each well-placed cliffhanger (at the end of the episode, where else?) always left me craving for the next one. I salute the writers, for it is difficult to work with a time-travel story (just ask comic book writers) and make it work: to be layered and complex but without the usual confusion inherent in the nature of time-travel.

I liked the characterization. Each character was crafted to be unique and easily identified, and with enough humanity to be endearing. Okabe was hilarious, but it was interesting to see his deconstruction as time (haha) went by. Kurisu... well as female lead she's obviously very attractive, and it was funny to throw in a bit of closet-otaku character. Daru... Boey in ten years. Enough said. Mayushii was drop-dead adorable, but she's more of the sister-type I guess. Suzuha was cute too; I liked her a lot. Feyris was hilarious and adorable and a bit creepy at the same time; I mean, who goes around saying nyan all the time? Moeka was creepy - that's all. Even Mister Braun was hilarious and mindblowing.

I've seen a few time-travel stories in my ti- in my life, and I do believe none of them plays out the Butterfly Effect to its true potential. I mean, changing one decision you made in the past should radically alter the world in completely unimaginable ways, not make a similar world with one significant difference. Though of course, there won't be much of a story to tell after that. Most of the physics in the world works out though (as far as I can tell; I'm not an expert), so that's nice.

I guess you're wondering why the slew of anime recently; I'm finishing up some homework so that the Japan Trip experience won't be so alien to me. Comima, here I come.

Tu-tu-ruu~!
The Edna Man

Do You Believe In Love At First Sight?

Okay so I was thinking about the original "Do You Believe In Love At First Sight?" idea I had some time ago, and I thinking how I really want to make it a short movie, and how one should go about doing it; like where you should film, who should be in it, etc. Then I had this idea: what if random other people were wearing "No" shirts throughout the film? (The original just had the main character wandering around with people as per nomal.) And then: How would you get a few hundred people to wear "No" shirts for the shot? This is what I came up with:

You'll need to find a community with a semi-closed system. In other words, the people in the area should be there almost every day and will likely not travel too far out of the area. A university or school would do nicely. You'd need to print maybe 200 odd shirts and sell them to the people in this area. Hopefully with the college demographic and a plausible story about a charity or a movement, you'd sell all the shirts. Coupled with this sale is the invite to this Facebook event where everybody would wear the "No" shirt for a day. The density of "No"s would depend on your success rate.

Then you'd need to get your girlfriend's best friend to persuade her to wear the only "Yes" shirt you printed beforehand, on the day of the "No" event. (Oh, this should have come first: you need to get a girlfriend.) Then get someone with a video camera and wander around school, getting as much footage as you can while your girlfriend's best friend steers her away from you. Until the climatic end of the day when you finally meet "unexpectedly" in a moment of joy and wonder and romance with an awesome soundtrack playing in the background.

Siiiigh.
The Edna Man

Infinite Stratos

Infinite Stratos was okay. It was basically harem fanservice with awesome mecha fight scenes. That's it in a nutshell.

That said, I did love the fight scenes. It's like the spent 80% of their budget on the fight scenes alone. Some of the bullet sprays looked almost Touhou-ish. I do wish that they had elaborated more about the weapon systems and the Infinite Stratos battlesuit itself. There was so much potential in that, but they had to go waste it on the extremely unpractical combat uniforms and and unlikely international harem fanservice. Sigh.

Infinitely,
The Edna Man

The Birthday Troll

My friends are awesome.

I just got massively trolled by a whole mob of my friends tonight, who all came down for an enormous surprise birthday party: MINE. This was my first ever surprise birthday party, and I completely did not expect it AT ALL. XM was the mastermind, and I have to say he played the con extremely convincingly. And I now realise that today when I told him I was mindgaming him at badminton, he told me "Who's mindgaming whom?" and it was a CLUE and I completely missed it. (Well, I wasn't even looking for it.) I have to say that as a fellow con artist, this elaborate setup was dasterdly brilliant, with perfect misdirection and excellent secrecy. Best lesson of the night: tell as much of the truth as possible. Brilliant.

The dinner was held in Pepperoni's huge function room, and over pizza we played Pictionary all night. It was a hilarious blast, and I'll never forget it.

A big shout-out to everyone who came down: Sheu Zhi, Shaun Ong, Jonas, JX, Kuang, Lou Ee, Jc, Kyle, Levin, Hui Jun, Ernest, Seng Wei, Bryan Ong, Jonny, Darrell, Herrick and Xi Min. Also thanks to Shaun Lee, Zhang, Kwong and Juzzie for the present =D

But greatest thanks of all go to my mom and dad, who apparently first proposed the idea and contacted XM to mastermind it.

Best Twenty-First Ever,
The Edna Man

Kanon at the End of the Dream

I finished watching Kanon yesterday. Key, the animation studio, has this fascinating and well-executed way of blending the funny and the sorrow into a bittersweet smoothie of an anime. I laughed at all the running jokes: Akiko-san's special jam, Nayuki's sleepwalking and attraction to cat allergies, and Kitagawa's complete randomness. And I was moved when Makoto disappeared, Shiori ran off, Nayuki got emo and Ayu... well the ending was so bittersweet I didn't know how to react.

That is not to say that Kanon doesn't have its flaws. I'm pretty sure Yuuichi shouldn't be able to repress his memories that well, especially the one of Ayu, which is definitely traumatizing and should have affected his psyche to a significant extent. Also it was kind of awkward that he shared a kiss with Ayu when Shiori just kissed him the night before, but I rationalised it in the sense that Shiori looked to him as an older brother, and not a boyfriend.

Nevertheless, the art was exquisite, with beautifully-drawn backdrops and scenery which is such a delight to witness, even when you are close to tears. I favour the 2006 art to the previous version greatly, though I do think that though Yuuichi looks normal-ish, the girls' faces all look quite squashed. Piro is adorable, but I say that about every cat, so yeah.

I'm still in wonder at how the anime genre has been so successful and influencing my emotions. Maybe it's because I'm in the appropriate age category. Maybe it's because of the universal themes of love and separation, of life. I don't know. All I know is, it's good.

Yume,
The Edna Man

The Procrastinator's Dilemma

So it's happened to me multiples times and I want to throw out this paradox to you. I don't know whether this is an existing paradox (phrased differently), but here it is anyway.

This dilemma requires you to have to two things which are equally important. For the purposes of illustration, let's assume that you're at home, and that a) a very close friend is coming over sometime this afternoon BUT DID NOT SPECIFY EXACTLY WHAT TIME, and b) you need to go out to buy food for dinner OR ELSE THERE WILL BE NOTHING TO COOK AND YOU WILL STARVE.

Let's assume that you cannot buy food while your friend is over (because online delivery doesn't exist or something). Let's also assume that you can't bring your friend to buy dinner with you (because he/she is over from some exotic overseas location and isn't willing to spend time with groceries). While we're at it, let's also assume the absence of cloning, time travel, multiple universe theories, and handphones.

The dilemma goes like this: it's 3pm in the afternoon. Your friend has not arrived yet. You also have not bought dinner yet. You need to go buy dinner or you'll starve. But you need to be here to receive your friend. If you go, then you might keep your friend waiting for hours while you select the most exquisite piece of gourmet lamb shank. But if you wait for your friend, then your stomach acids slowly devour yourself from the inside.

So, here's the question: what is the best course of action here?

One will always wonder,
The Edna Man

ZI MOOOOOO

Another successful mahjong party at Ernest's house this Chinese New Year. I love how I zi mò on the gàng draw tile TWICE (which is also known as a gàng-shàng-zì-mō). So many Koizumi references. It was so much fun, I can't wait till I'm out and free and can do this all day.

PUUUUUNNNNGGGGG
The Edna Man

Best of 2011

Another year, another round of awesomeness that is 2011.

1. MAHJONG PARTY! (Written 12th February, 2011)
Awesome fun with awesome friends with an awesome game and you get a completely awesome time. Throw in a couple of references to The Legend of Koizumi and it doesn't get any better than this.

2. Anime of the Year: Toradora!, Angel Beats!, Puella Magi Modoka Magica, Toaru Majutsu no Index and Toaru Kagaku no Railgun (Written 30th December, 2011)
Toradora! was a nice show, with Taiga being adorable and all. Angel Beats! was clearly the heart-breaking anime of the year, and it came with great music to boot. Puella Magi Modoka Magica was the mind-blowing anime of the year, with a completely crazy ending that made it legendary. Index and Railgun sold me with the great character designs and enormous amounts of cute girls (Himegami!), hilarious side characters (Kuroko LOL) and a kickass universe which combined magic and science.

3. Anime Festival Asia 2011 (Written 30th December, 2011)
I am slowing seeping into the world of anime. My first AFA was a blast. From authentic cosplays to amazing artwork and awesome interviews with seiyuus and MIRAI SUENAGA AND HER ORANGENESS to THE NYAN-NYAN PERCENT OCCUPYING AFA and awesome concerts with LiSA. Best weekend ever.

4. Singapore Toys, Games and Comics Convention 2011 (Written 30th December, 2011)
Still not worthy of ComiCon; nevertheless I had a great time and an awesome discount on Civil War trade paperbacks. I also got an autograph from Steve Ditko, CEO of DC Comics, while wearing an Iron Man shirt. Most awkward moment EVER. And also photo with a Black Cat cosplayer, that was priceless.

5. World Building (Written 30th December, 2011)
So Hui Jun and Xi Min thought it would be a good idea to create a world together. Needless to say, it was. I loved using information and ideas across all my areas of knowledge, to contribute to everything from history to politics, magic particles to illusioned golems. The world-building is definitely going to continue, and we'll see where our imaginations take us.

6. Selling my Soul to 9Gag (Written 30th December, 2011)
9Gag is possibly one of the most unobtrusive websites that slowly gained popularity over the year, and I am proud to admit that I was suckered into it from (near) the beginning. I now proudly boast a wide range of knowledge about almost every Internet meme alive, which probably contributes to my Forever Alone status. (Look it up!)

7. The Extremely Dumb News Agency (Written 30th December, 2011)
I started writing spoof articles about current evens a la the Onion this year, and I even started a Facebook page on which to publish them from. It's mostly died down now, since I'm getting pretty lazy (and I haven't been having many good ideas), but there was a bunch of good satire there. Archives, archives; where'd I put the archives?

8. The Genius of Terry Pratchett (Written 30th December, 2011)
So I borrowed a bunch of Pratchett's books from Juzzie this year, and I tore through them (not literally) and I found that HE IS HILARIOUS. I read one of them long ago (The Fifth Elephant, if I remember correctly) when I was sixteen, and I didn't get it. But now I do! And it's hilarious! And witty! And an accurate satire of human nature and the world around us! Very, very well done, Mr. Pratchett, my hat's off to you.

9. The Team Fortress 2 Experience (Written 30th December, 2011)
This is definitely the Game of the Year. I was amazed when it was released Free to Play sometime in July, and I was amazed that it could run on my computer. Since then I've spent a few hundred hours firing oversized rocket launchers and dragon-tipped flamethrowers. It's a really fun game, with no steep learning curve and a bunch of fun game modes; just watch out for spies.

10. GEP Christmas/New Year Gathering (Written 30th December, 2011)
This was a nice time where most of us got together for what might have been the last time in our lives. It was nice to see people who have been friends for the past six years, some even more, come together for a large gathering, barbequeing food and having the most typical gift exchange ever. Hopefully there'll be more of these gatherings in the future!

The Year in Entertainment

Anime: Toradora!; Angel Beats!; Needless; Puella Magi Modoka Magica, Toaru Majutsu no Index and Toaru Kagaku no Railgun; Children Who Chase Lost Voices from Deep Below

For most of the anime, see #2 above. Needless was okay, mostly a fanservice show, but there was one HILARIOUSLY AWESOME part somewhere in ep. 18 or 19, where Adam Blade shouts that HE IS ALREADY IN PARADISE. That was seriously the best part of the whole show. Children Who Chase Lost Voices from Deep Below was made by the same guy who made 5 centimetres per second, and it's freaking sad too, and also really creepy, in a way.

Movies: Pirates of the Caribbean: On Stranger Tides; Inception; Captain America: The First Avenger; Thor; 3 Idiots (DVD), Sherlock Holmes: A Game of Shadows

Pirates was awesome, as always. A movie with Johnny Depp as Jack Sparrow cannot go wrong. Inception was mind-blowing. Captain America was good, but it looked too much like a designed prequel for The Avengers (I STILL CANNOT WAIT). Thor was okay, but a bit awkward when I realised that Valhalla was actually multiracial. Loki was quite well-portrayed, though. 3 Idiots is a Bollywood movie, and it was great. I wouldn't mind watching it again, but I know all the plot twists already. This is a must-recommended. Sherlock Holmes was awesome; I didn't watch the first one but I really love how they portrayed his logical thought and deductive reasoning in the slow-motion shots; it really shows off the Sherlock Holmes' playing-a-few-steps-into-the-future characteristic.

Books: Philip Pullman's His Dark Materials trilogy; Terry Pratchett's Equal Rites, Reaper Man, Soul Music, Witches Abroad, Interesting Times, Men At Arms, Mort, Guards! Guards, Moving Pictures; Marvel's Civil War series; Philip Reeve's Fever Crumb trilogy: Fever Crumb, A Web of Air, Scrivener's Moon

I re-read His Dark Materials this year and it was as good as ever; maybe even better. I picked up a lot more from the second reading, more of the allusions and symbolism. The ending still broke my heart though. Terry Pratchett re-introduced me to his fantastic and satirical Discworld, which is brilliant in every way imaginable (and in some unimaginable ways as well). I got a few more Civil War books this year too, and the whole crossover event was very well executed around the whole Marvel universe. I picked up Scrivener's Moon only a few weeks ago and loved it. Reeve sure knows how to put a universe together. It also surprised me that he revealed his main character to have homosexual leanings, which was unthinkable for a book aimed at British teenagers, but it was very well-executed.

Music: Sam Tsui; Christina Grimmie; Owl City; Girls Dead Monster (and by extension LiSA); fripSide (specifically the Toaru Kagaku no Railgun openings, only my railgun and Level 5 -Judgement-)

No big shakes in the music department; Sam Tsui is a great singer who has the charisma to make it big in the American music industry. And because of his duet with Christine Grimmie (Just a Dream), I was introduced to her as well, and she's really cute and has a nice voice. I also discovered the awesomeness that is Owl City's Adam Young: the way he plays with words in his lyrics are amazing. Take a look at the bridge of Plant Life and you'll see what I mean. And the Railgun openings are stuck in my head. That is all.

Games: Team Fortess 2; War Metal: Tyrant; Dragon Nest; Borderlands; Poxnora; Portal; Portal 2

Tyrant is quite fun; I've been following it with Juzzie for a while. I like how they manage to make a simple concept of cards fighting cards so complicated on so many levels. Dragon Nest was my MMORPG for this year, and I found it great, a very well-done action MMO; but ultimately I found that I don't really like chasing quest chains and waiting for parties. Borderlands I got from Boey; it's quite fun with the mix of FPS and RPG elements. Poxnora is a turn-based strategy game that JX intro-ed me some time back but couldn't run properly on my computer then. It works now, and I find it very intriguing. Portal was released for free for a short period of time this year and I managed to get it, and Kyle gave me Portal 2 in December, which was great. We're almost done with the co-op mode; just the advanced levels left. Wheatley is HILARIOUS.

That's it for 2011. Apocalypse year 2012, here we come!

The end, one way or another,
The Edna Man

The Word

The disciples shuffled silently into the sacred place. Around them, the towering shelves rustled with the pages of a thousand hallowed tomes. The altar was bathed in a soft, yellow light from the small frosted lamps; for candles were not allowed, and no-one was heretical enough to bring in a naked flame.

It was cold. The disciples were glad of their thick hooded robes, which kept them warm. The more restless ones shifted around nervously, occasionally glancing towards the altar, which was bare save for the podium with one of the Holy Books.

As last, the Head Librarian arrived. Immediately, the congregation was silent. The Head Librarian did not like loud noises in the sanctum. He was an elderly man, and he slowly made his way up the small flight of stairs until he stood at the podium. He cast a knowing eye upon the crowd before him, seeing the hundreds of faces looking up at him anxiously, expectant.

Smiling slightly, he reached into an inner pocket and withdrew the ceremonial reading glasses, placing them upon his crooked nose. Then he opened the Holy Book, and in a thin, wavering voice, began to read.

"The Book of Merriam-Webster, section P, entry 243," he read. "Perspicacity, noun, one: keenness of mental perception and understanding; discernment; penetration. Two: archaic, keen vision. Origin: 1540-50, earlier perspicacite, Late Latin..."

-----

Just an idea. Influenced a bit by Philip Reeve and his Mortal Engines universe, of which Scrivener's Moon I have just finished reading. He is an amazing writer with an amazing world, and he better finish writing the next book soon.

The definition is taken from Dictionary.com. The entry number is made up. No slights on religion were made in this short story. Any resemblance to persons living or dead is strictly coincidental...

"The Future is something that sneaks up on us while we are busy doing other things."
The Edna Man

Forever Alone

So as I was eating my solitary dinner in Takshimaya this evening, I had an idea for a for a short movie.

It's about this guy who has this shirt. It's a simple shirt with the words "DO YOU BELIEVE IN LOVE AT FIRST SIGHT?" printed across the front. He wears it everywhere. (He's quite desperate.) He goes about doing his daily routine for most of the short (2-3 minute) clip, while people pass him by every day. Then right at the end, a girl with a shirt with the word "YES" printed on it says hi to him. The film ends.

My god I am lonely.
The Edna Man

A Certain Emotional Review

I've just finished watching To Aru Kagaku no Railgun, following both seasons of To Aru Majutsu no Index, which I have to say are both awesome.

Both shows, set in the same universe, have a huge number of characters. I think the creators did a really good job with the character designs, because they're all distinguishable and unique in their own way. I thought the frog-faced doctor, the Heaven Canceller, was hilarious, and even more so when Misaka mistook him for a real-life Gekota (which I'm guessing means frog, or something). I liked Index, Misaka 10032, and Himegami Aisa, and Last Order, who are all adorable, and Misaka Mokoto herself, of course. Kuroko Shirai is FREAKING HILARIOUS. Saten Ruiko has a really nice voice (actress).

What I liked about Index was the way they merged magic and science. It's a very interesting system, and like the universe itself, was quite well-balanced. The graphics for both were amazingly well done. Loved all the magic circles and battle nuns and crystal ships and everything. The world was complete and cohesive, with nary a plot hole anywhere. That's my kind of universe.

Railgun ended nicely, which gave me that heart-accelerant feeling that I now associate with brilliant stories. When I was done, I thought it was a bit demoralising to realise that I don't have that kind of really close friend, the kind that you can call up during guard duty to talk without feeling like you're bothering them. But my friends are awesome in their own other ways, so I don't think I should be complaining. Besides, they're all not girls, so.

And there still isn't any Index season 3 or Railgun season 2.

Such misfortune.
The Edna Man

Privileges

There's this problem with people. They seem to think that they're entitled to things, even when they're not. They think that all their supposed hard work is supposed to pay off in the end, that they get their dues, and what they're owed. They don't imagine for a moment, that perhaps they are not worth the rewards, that they came up short, that they are not worthy to hold the titles and accolades which they demand.

And that is how the world works. And that is why the world is never happy.
The Edna Man

BEST. WEEKEND. EVER.

My first Anime Festival Asia and I am high.

Three weeks ago I was at somewhere stupid wasting my morning, when Bryan came up to me and bugged me to go AFA. I went back and looked at the schedule (and pricing) and was debating it for a few days. I should go back in time and tell my past self to go for it, no regrets.

I wanted to check out the Miku concert, but tickets were sold out by the time I made my decision, so I forsook it. I heard it was not as awesome as a real Japanese one though, so I don't think I missed out that much.

Saturday at arrived early to redeem my tickets. It was quite exciting first stepping through the entrance to the hall. I wasn't very interested in the merchandise since they were mostly figurines, which I don't go for, so I wandered around with a few of my friends, watching them steam over the characters they love. There were a lot of good artists at the indie corridor, and I purchased a nice matte poster of Kyoko-chan. I was considering getting the full set of Magia posters, but they didn't have Madoka and the Homura one wasn't very to my taste.

There were many cosplayers at the festival. Some were good, and many were brilliant. I wouldn't mind cosplaying in the future; it's fun to pretend to be someone else, but I will go over the edge and remain completely in character. That would be awesome. I can't go through all the cosplayers I saw over the last few days, but there were a few good ones I remember (that I recognised): Madoka, Mami, this girl in the centre of the second floor with the huge red dress, the awesome hair girl from Index who just took off her hair, cute vocaloid girl, Black Rock Shooter, the random rage comic memes.

Boey dragged me to watch LiSA's artist appearance in the morning, where she sang the opening of Fate/Zero. I was also there to catch the live dubbing of Magia by Homura's seiyu, Chiwa Saitou. Danny Choo is awesome in that he went to live his dream in Japan. He's also quite funny. However, he doesn't know how to host properly. He keeps pointing out all the mistakes, which is very pointless and quite unprofessional. He doesn't even turn it into a joke, which is what should be done. But I have found out I arbitrarily LOVE Mirai Suenaga because she's so ORANGE! Gotta give credit to him for that, if nothing else.

Saturday's concert was awesome. I didn't know many of the artists, but I thought the music was quite nice. For all the criticism Sea-Star-A seems to get, I don't think they're horrible; their songs are quite happy and catchy, and one of their songs did get chosen to be this year's AFA theme song. Ichiro Mizuki/Aniki was from a generation before mine, so while good, not very emotionally attached. Also, his blowing-in-the-wind scarf was hilarious. I didn't really like Flow; they were too loud, and they came on after LiSA.

I shall now dedicate two paragraphs to LiSA and her performance.

LiSA was easily the best performance of the night. She was really energetic and looked like she really enjoyed the music and performing. She's adorable. It didn't hurt that I knew a few of her songs from Angel Beats!. I loved her whiplash-hand action thing. She stole my heart when she cried after Ichiban no Takaramono. She put her heart and soul into that song until it became too much to hold in and it exploded out of her. I'd admire any singer who can do that, and LiSA was it.

Boey Yang was (probably) the happiest person alive in the concert hall that night. He is a huge fan of LiSA, and wants me to tell the world (or whoever reads this blog) how much he loves her. You should have seen him explode when he recognised all her songs from Angel Beats! and the Fate/Zero opening. I have never seen another person quite so happy. I mentioned to Jonas that it's a nice feeling to see Boey happy, because he's never happy: he's always complaining or emoing about something or other.

I noticed that many of the artists thanked us for supporting Japan after the tsunami disaster earlier. It made me feel a bit bad that I didn't really do anything to help Japan back then. I shall do more in the future.

So I was exhaused after jumping around for LiSA and my arms were dead. Unfortunately the concert ended at 11:30pm and it was a mad rush to the MRT station to catch the last train. Split an ice milo with Jonas (sweet elixir of life, after three hours of dehydrating concert) and managed to catch the last train, AND a bus back home. So awesome.

Sunday was more of the same, but this time following Bryan Ong around, who refuses to take photos of everything and didn't even want to look around. So I ended up wandering around the same stalls of figurines I didn't want to buy. I found out that the booth which I bought my Kyoko poster from was now selling Madoka, so I was wondering if I should get the complete Magia set, but I found out they were out of Mami, so I just got Sayaka instead. Jonas got a signed Anisong poster from one of the artists in a lucky draw.

Managed to bump into Xi Min who found out his neighbour (who is a girl) was cosplaying there as well, and around our age. START OF A BEAUTIFUL FRIENDSHIP XI MIN. She looks like a loli though. Speaking of which, Xi Min used me as a human blocker to shoot a photo of a really small girl cosplaying as some loli character. Like a true pedobear. Sigh. And speaking of which, there was some guy in a pedobear costume going around in the afternoon, and many photos were being taken of him and little kids. And then, he met with another pedobear cosplayer, and they acted like they knew each other and embraced like old friends. Best cosplay meeting ever. I was hoping the Homura cosplayers would go around shooting all the Kyubeis, but I never it happening. I was also hoping the Ash and Misty cosplayers would bump into the Bug Catcher, and he would shout, "Hey! You looked at me funny! Let's battle!" But nothing happened.

Also went to check out the AKB48 artist appearance. One of the girls (there were only two) was quite pretty but didn't seem very honest; the other was not as pretty but more honest, I felt. I always thought they were a Korean group until yesterday, when I found out they were actually Japanese. Oh there was this really funny part when one of them said something-something-otaku-something-something, and the translator was like, "...and all the... uh... anime-fans...", which I found hilarious.

I also checked out the cosplay competition in the afternoon, and the Philippines one was clearly the best of the lot, with a light-up display that no one expected, and a dramatic twist ending. The Lightning was not bad, and the Singapore girls dressed up as guys (with really low-cut top and revealing abs which were not real), which I thought was a bit weird. I never really understand crossplay, especially guys dressing up as girls, which is not appealing at all. But oh well, whatever floats your boat.

We were approached in the middle of area next to the cafés by some showgirls working for Canon who wanted to give us free photos, to advertise the portable photo printer. As there were five of us, we had to stand around awkwardly while the photos were being printed. Boey and Jonas asked them some questions, and they said that they weren't into anime, and were just working for Canon, so they were probably quite lost as to the whole atmosphere of the convention. There were also a few girls advertising Kit-Kat and Milo and giving out free samples, and they were affectionately known as Kit-Kat-chan and Milo-chan by my more otaku compatriots.

Before the concert on Sunday we didn't bother to queue with hordes of people, so we walked around a bit more and discovered the graffiti wall, which had a lot of awesome art and a lot of hilarious stuff tacked to it, because it wasn't an officially-designated spot, just a large area where there weren't any posters or anything. There were some funny Kyubei recruitment posters, and a whole wall dedicated to Singapore's Bronies, but my personal favourite was the poster which read "OCCUPY AFA: WE ARE THE NYAN NYAN PERCENT (who were denied a drawing space) *pic of nyan-cat* WHO THE HELL DO YOU THINK WE ARE". I thought that was hilarious, and whoever did that, I totally salute you for your awesome pop culture references.

Sunday's concert was okay; I didn't know a single song except the Magia ending theme by Kalafina. I kinda liked Kalafina; they have this edgy refined goth-opera style which I didn't dislike, and one of them had the awesome half-cornrow hairstyle which is probably my favourite hairstyle for a girl. The Stein's Gate singer (whose name I cannot remember now) was not bad, but I didn't know the songs. I thought Milky Holmes was like Sea-Star-A, in that they were cute, with happy songs, but I cannot say I really liked them that much. Angela was nice, with a lot of stage presence and audience interaction, and there was a special Nico Nico Douga live stream in the middle of their performance too. May'n was good, I think I shall start listening to her songs. It's hard to believe she's only in her early twenties. I also realised that Day 2 performers had a lot more English than Day 1, which was quite surprising. I'm sure that all the screams from the audience is totally oblivious to every line of Japanese they say.

So that was my two days of anime festival, which totally rocked, and we ended with a group shot of all the GEPs into anime, which was a nice finishing touch to the whole weekend.

WE ARE THE NYAN-TY NYAN PERCENT,
The Edna Man

Angel Beats!

Angel Beats! is another really good anime.

I got through my weekend guard duty on this wonderful masterpiece by Key, which is (for me) on par with Love Hina for pure Crowning Moment of Heartwrenching. Albeit this time is heartbreaking instead of heartwarming. Still, I got that same emotional restless adrenaline-pumping mind-blasting feeling that I got when Love Hina ended. I'm afraid I might becoming addicted.

I loved the artwork. When you realise that most anime is just awesome artwork with a slow pan or slight zoom, you start appreciating more of the tiny details of the world. I loved the 3D 180-degree wrap-arounds of Yui at the baseball pitch. I loved the closeup of Yuri's eyes. I loved the artwork throughout the entire series.

The story also tantalizes with so many philosophical thoughts and literary themes. It talks about the meaning and purpose of life, fulfillment of your dreams, of friendship and leadership, of the amazing power of unconditional love in the face of an unjust world. (The world is cruel, and the only morality in a cruel world is chance. As an aside.) It's about acceptance, it's about life after death, and another life after that.

Then there were the other bits that just made my day. Yui was extremely adorable whenever she appeared. TJ was hilarious. I found that the creators mixed the perfect balance of humour and I-want-to-stab-myself-right-now melancholy that you're able to survive the first few episodes without falling into depression. I also loved the Matrix-esque computer room and its Architect. The plot twist which revealed Otonashi's real cause of death also had me mindblown. I also loved the graduation scene, even though it was tear-my-heart-out-now depressing. I thought it was brilliant that the "afterlife" was mostly the same as "life": you can't die, but you can be erased, so accepting your life is also like accepting your death.

The only thing I find disappointing with this anime is that it's part of a mixed media project, which means a lot of the story is found in the light novels and manga, and the plot is also quite rushed and not very cohesive. That said, whatever they managed to squeeze into the anime worked well enough for me.

I would like to grow up and write like these writers do, to take your emotions and throw them on a roller-coaster, and stretch them, pull them, smash them, until you're panting and sweating and you feel so alive.

My soul, your beats
The Edna Man

Inevitability

Loathe as I am to contaminate this sacrosant journal with green, I feel I should write this down for all posterity, so that in the future I can look back and laugh at the stupid problems I had when I was younger.

I had my first duty as a guard commander (second-in-command) yesterday, and a bit of today. I can honestly tell you that it is a terrific¹ job and I really salute those men who do it every day for two years.

I am honour-bound (and also bound by other prevalent and undesirable punishments) not to reveal precisely how terrific the job is, but the thing I want to rant about involves something that has nothing to do with any organisation whatsoever, but a flaw in the human design system.

Firstly, I get scheduled to sleep, however minimally, from about 10pm to 2am. I go to bed after turnout, which is so hygienic and spotless and not shared by multiple people at all, and lie there for an hour until I fall asleep. Typical problem; but it's duty, so oh well, no big deal.

Then I'm awake from 2am to 7am, fuelled by nothing by Terry Pratchett's Interesting Times (which explains the "highest form of flattery" style of this post) and the fear of seven extras gnawing at my soul. That's okay too; I managed to stay awake pretty fine with two hours of sleep.

So finally when I get on the bus and I'm on the way home, I'm reading again, since it kept me awake for the past six, seven hours. I'm halfway down the page, when I wake up and realise I've missed my stop by about three of them. I had completely no idea when I fell asleep, or how, but the funny thing is, I know at roughly what point I fell asleep, due to the rest of the page being unfamiliar.

Of course, it's funny now, future me, but at that point when it's nine-thirty in the morning and you have to cross hordes of traffic just to get to the bus stop opposite and take a bus three stops backwards which would have been completely unnecessary if not for your falling asleep, it was quite awful.

¹ Horrible-horrific; terrible-?

Because [undecipherable pictogram] you.
The Edna Man

Singaporean ComiCon and Natsu Matsuri

So once again I dropped by the Singapore Toys, Games and Comics Convention (STGCC) this year and it was a blast. As always, it cannot quite compare to what I've seen at the actual Comicon, but it's close enough I guess.

I went down crazily early this time, queueing up before the doors opened at 10am. And the most amazing thing you see when you step in is this huge booth decorated in pulp-fiction styled posters of almost every comic book-related movie imaginable: Captain America, the Watchmen, Superman, Batman, etc., belonging to the figurines booth. I can honestly say I didn't really take notice of the figurines, even though I know that they are quite awesome and had a few hundred photographers milling around.

I TOUCHED PAUL LEVITZ'S HAND AAHHHHHH! I am such a fanboy. Once President of DC Comics, he's now Contributing Editor of DC Entertainment. I TOUCHED HIS HAND AHHHHH and I, for some reason, COMPLETELY FORGOT that I was wearing my French Connection Iron Man T-shirt (the only genre-appropriate shirt I have) when I asked him to sign my preview of Justice League #1, and he asked me, "What's that on your shirt?" I was like, CRAAAAPPPPP (Iron Man's a Marvel character, in case you don't know). But he was cool, he said it was okay, he's had thirty years of Marvel experience behind him. I got a nice Legion of Superheroes badge from him as well. Should have been a ring, but I'm not complaining. AHHHHH I am SUCH a fanboy.

Most of my attention was caught up at the Marvel vs. Capcom 3 area, where I got to see live-action (in a manner of speaking) MvC3 action. It was kinda disappointing to see everyone using the same few characters, but I guess it was to be expected since it was a tournament and all. Sometimes you'd catch a glimpse of Viewtiful Joe, or Ameratsu, or Felicia, or Storm, or Haggar, but not very many other tier-two characters. Bumped into Cleon after lunch there; he was participating in the tournament. Stalled out a Dark Phoenix in his first game, and I had diahorrea and missed his others. Said he hadn't played for two months, and he was still quite good.

I invested $150 in comics that afternoon. It's roughly the same amount I would have spent on comics over the next three months, but at the insane discounts at the convention, got double the number of books I would have gotten if I'd spent $50 a month at Kinokuniya. Bargain! Plus there were so many Civil War trade paperbacks there that are never stocked on Kino's shelves. Double-victory!

I managed to work up the nerve to ask this Black Cat cosplayer to take a picture with me. She had the most authentic Black Cat costume I've seen ever. I was being so totally awkward and chasing her between booths and waiting for her to get her commissions and stuff and then I finally asked her. I figure I still have so much to learn about talking to girls. Such a nerd.

Anyway, I spent a considerable amount of time watching the guy demo Dragon's Nest, and I have to say, it has gotten me quite hooked. I might try it out soon, maybe once Team Fortress 2 becomes less interesting. Who knows.

Well after that it was a train ride to Tanah Merah for natsu matsuri, the Japanese summer festival. On the way I was standing a short distance away from this girl, really pretty, whom I noticed had a STGCC stamp on her arm as well. I was hoping for a chance to get closer to maybe (I don't know!) talk to her, or something; point out a price tag sticker was stuck to the front of her blouse, then remark about STGCC, and maybe start talking. The opportunity never arose, and a couple of stops from my destination, she moved away to the centre of the carriage. I figure I still have so much to learn about talking to girls. Such a nerd.

The festival itself was insanely crowded. I have never seen so many non-Japanese people attempting to do a Japanese thing outside Japanese restaurants or AFA. I had no idea that it was so popular, or that so many people know about it. It was packed, and the stalls were all overrun, especially the food ones. In the end I didn't try much Japanese cultural stuff, because all the queues were too long, and the festival music stopped just after I convinced Jonas to join me in the dance. SIGH.

After that was a nice dinner at Changi Airport, where Sheu Zhi completely confused the waitress by asking for "wen-leng shui" (warm ice water) and the entire night she was calling him that. Hilarious.

Best part of the day? No mob!
The Edna Man

Otakuism

No, I'm not. Not yet.

Though I did drop by the Cosplay Summit Asia thing at Orchard Central this weekend. It wasn't very spectacular, though the Sepiroth guy looked quite cool (with LED lights too, wow). I wasn't really looking at the costumes, but more of the people who were there. It was kind of a big, unintentional social experiment.

Obviously there were random normal people who happened to walk by and chance on this eccentric group of people who would spend money, time and energy to dress up as fictional characters, and most of their reactions were "Lol these people are so pathetic" or "WTF is that guy wearing" and etcetera. There were some who were definitely not into the whole anime thing but joined in anyway; to these people, I salute you for daring to try something out of the ordinary. And then of course there were the people who wanted to be there for the event, which weren't that many. The host was vainly trying to rouse the crowd; believe me, I know what it's like to have an uncooperative audience.

There was this performance by the waitresses from the maid café, and they were really not excited about their job. There was one girl though who was really enthusiastic with the dancing, which was nice to see. Oh and there was this creepy old man with grey hair and an overcomb and a huge DSLR taking pictures of EVERYTHING.

It's always so interesting to see people committed to something so willingly and unconditionally. There were one or two really good cosplayers there (especially the two Transformers, they were awesome), and when you see the kind of skill and dedication they put into their work, it's more of an art form than anything.

Speaking about anime, I realise I'm not the kind of person who falls in love with the characters (unlike a number of people I know). Even in novels, comic books, movies, TV shows; it has never been the character which has brought me through. (WITH ONE BIG EXCEPTION: CAPTAIN JACK SPARROW. WHO IS AWESOME. YEAH.) I haven't become a raving fan of a single anime character, even the girls who are always, y'know, really pretty and stuff. But it's more of the story that captures my attention, that leads me through the entire series of unfortuante events and makes me like the show as a whole. Pirates of the Caribbean has pretty good stories too, by the way.

Nothing much else, just wanted to write some stuff.

Kawaii,
The Edna Man

Death is the New Life

So I hear blogging is dead. Heh. Well, I still write stuff here, so I'll take this URL scratching and kicking to its cyber-404-grave.

I've started listening to more Sam Tsui recently, and I'm sure that this kid is gonna go far. I picked up Sara Bareille's King of Anything from him, and it's crazy good. Got that song stuck in my head a couple of days. And because of his collaboration on Just a Dream, I think I've got a crush on Christina Grimmie, who is also crazy awesome and really pretty.

Hmm just watched Pirates of the Caribbean: On Stranger Tides this weekend. It's awesome in the Jack Sparrow sense of awesome, and I think I'm kinda watching the shows just to see his suave antics. I found the show quite historically accurate (for a dramatic movie adaptation) because Blackbeard really (historically) stuck firecrackers in his beard to make him look scarier, and the rumour that his decapitated body swum around his ship five times is also in historical records. Quite cool.

And so the piratical exploits have inspired me to continue my TCG roots, and I'm currently making a Pirates card game. I don't know how balanced it's going to be, since I'm mostly creating this game from scratch, cobbled together from mechanics of the various games I know. Only time will tell if it's a good game though.

Gaah I need to write more.
The Edna Man

Election Fever Reaches Epidemic Proportions

SINGAPORE -- The outbreak of "election fever" has reached epidemic levels, experts warn.

As of 8am this morning, more than 2 million Singaporeans have been infected by this rare disease, forcing Ministry of Health (MOH) officials to raise the disease's Threat Level to five, the highest on the scale.

The outbreak has already claimed hundreds of man-hours worth of news coverage, from both digital and print media. Words like "reform" and "opposition" have reinfected the local vocabulary, and political rallies, which are usually contained within the Speaker's Corner at Hong Lim Park and usually never exist, ran rampant in open fields across the island until officials put a stop to them on Thursday night.

"It has never been this widespread before," said Mr Poh Ah Peng, a spokesperson from MOH. "Since it surfaced in Singapore in 1959, election fever has kept intensifying over the years every time it appears."

"It promises a very frightening future for this country," said Mr Poh.

Election fever, officially diagnosed as democracitis, is a recurring disease caused by the virus votium ballotpox. It is transmitted through the air by political discussions, and, once it infects its host, makes its way to the brain, causing the victim to suffer increased political awareness and a uncontrollable urge to make a choice. It only affects adults, but strains of the virus are increasingly being detected in youths and teenagers, often as young as eighteen years of age.

Earlier this week, dozens of the Ministry's political doctors, or "politricians", took measurses to quarantine the population into various isolation zones, called "constituencies". They are hoping to contain the outbreak until Saturday, when the only known cure for election fever will be administered: an election.

Democracitis is not native to Singapore, where it resurfaces about once every five years. The first recorded outbreak of democracitis was in 507 BC in ancient Greece. Since then, cases of election fever have been recorded in republics across the world.

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Why does everybody get so excited over this?

"Truth is not determined by majority vote." ~Doug Gwyn
The Edna Man