Tokyo Game Show '08

I'm going to ignore the pink elephant in the room right now, but I will point out the irony that after just a few adventures a lot of posts seem to accumulate on this blog, but when tons of adventures occur there are no posts at all. Just no time to write about them, you know?

Back in September, a girl in my Japanese class asked me if I was going to the Tokyo Game Show on the weekend of October 11th. At the time I wasn't very familiar with it, but I knew that it was a video game convention similar to E3 in the states. Well, I'd never been to E3 before, but I got really excited about TGS and booked tickets for overnight buses to and from Tokyo. In addition to the admission ticket, the whole trip cost around $110 just to be able to go (plus souvenirs and food). It was totally worth it.

My adventure began Friday night, the 10th, when I said goodbye to my host parents at the train station nearby to board the overnight bus. My first impression was, "they expect me to sleep here?" The seats looked comfy enough, and there was more leg room than the average economy section of an airplane, but you couldn't lean back without smacking into the person behind you. The leg room turned out to be quite limited, and between the many positions I attempted I could only sleep for maybe an hour or two at a time.

We arrived at Tokyo Station around 6 am, and I dragged myself onto the subway after buying tickets to and from my destination. It took another half hour or so to get to the station closest to TGS, and then as a pack everyone got off the train and hurried along to the convention center. Fearing that I would lose my way otherwise, I stuck with everyone until we got to the security check-in about 10 mins. later, when I realized to my dismay, "wait a minute, I haven't even eaten breakfast yet, and the show doesn't start for another 3 hours." I looked back to where I came from, understood that I didn't recognize a thing, and just decided to wait in line. So there I stood, in the rain, tired, hungry, wet, trying to hold my umbrella in one hand and play my DS in the other.

I finally made it inside around 10 and the first thing I saw was a huge sign that said Wii, and I knew I was going to love it there. Although "No Camera" signs were everywhere, people still took tons of them and would only temporarily hide them if told it was not allowed. I was careful not to stand in lines that were too long to play something, when I could otherwise go to so many more booths. My initial run through was rather quick, and then I went hunting for food. Actually, prices and lines weren't too bad, and I ate some decent curry for about $6. Cosplay pictures were only permitted outside between the numerous buildings, which helped with crowds inside but didn't remove them entirely. As expected, Japanese people are great at cosplaying, and I saw characters like Cloud and Sephiroth and Titus from Final Fantasy, Haruhi from The Melancholy of Haruhi Suzumiya, and the character from Katamari Damacy.

I actually played a lot of cool games, especially ones that hadn't been released anywhere yet. Mirror's Edge, for example, is a PS3/XBox 360 title in first person view without a special focus on weapons, adding an interesting creative element that really requires mastering the controls. Little Big Planet was one of the most anticipated games of the year, in which you create little doll characters to solve random puzzles. In terms of anime games, I took a shot at a Bleach title for the Wii (wich had a lot of text and was kind of confusing), a Naruto game for the PS3 (which is graphically and physically the most authentic Naruto game I've played), Dragonball Infinite World for the PS2 (which goes through all of Z, GT, and the movies I think), and a weak Soul Eater game for DS. I played some Bomberman, some Need for Speed, and an odd-job game for the Wii. The last thing I played was a snowboarding game for the Wii that utilizes the balance board (no date set for a North American release at the time).

I took tons of pictures and bought some souvenirs, but I was never able to meet up with anyone. The girl in my class is a video game journalist, so I expected she would be there the two days it was open to the public in addition to the initially two press-only days, but she was in her hotel room Saturday working on a report. There was another girl from my class who went, but we didn't exchange information beforehand. This did allow me to practice Japanese with booth attendents, though, and go wherever interested me.

After staying whole day and being completely exhausted, I wandered out at closing time to hunt for dinner. There was a mall nearby, and inside I found a nice Japanese style restaurant for relatively cheap and decided to eat there. I ate a meal set that included a plate of tenpura, sushi with sashimi, miso soup, and salad for only about $12. I headed to the subway station around 6:30 and had to buy a new ticket because the one I bought earlier was from Tokyo Station (though I was later able to get my money back).

I got to Tokyo Station with a few hours to spare until my overnight bus left, so I got my bearings together and talked to Jasmin for a while as I waited. This time I was so exhausted that I slept on the bust rather well, and got home around 7 am to walk back to the house in the freezing morning weather.

Check out my Facebook pictures!

UPDATE LINKS:
Photos on Photobucket
Videos on YouTube

Guam pt. 2

Sunday in Guam began with a Filipino-inspired flea market, where Jasmin, her brother, and I ate breakfast but didn't have time to haggle for cool items or do much else unfortunately. We went home and changed clothes to go to church, as Jasmin's whole family is Catholic and attends mass. Though I no longer belong to an organized religion, I still dressed up rather nicely, but when we got there others had on either casual formal or very casual. So Jasmin had to break the news that I wasn't Catholic, but the bombshell that I'm not even Christian is still to come. >.> Brunch was at a nearby hotel, where we met up with even more of Jasmin's family (and took plenty of pictures). The food was delicious and consisted of an interesting mixture of East and West, which is what Guam does best.


That day was actually one of the most exciting days of my stay. We hit the road in the early afternoon with the kids and Jasmin's cousins to drive around the entire island. Sounds like quite a task, huh? Well.. in Guam, it only takes a few hours. XD But we had a lot of fun stopping a couple places, like Two Lovers Point and this mountain area. Two Lovers Point is a cliff that tells the tale of a Chamorro woman who was ordered to marry a Spaniard when they came over to claim the land. Well the women was in love with a Chamorro man, and instead of obeying the order they tied their hair together and jumped off the cliff to their deaths. So as you can imagine, the location was sooo romantic.


We also stopped at a mountain area with a beautiful view from all directions, but it didn't have much else going for it so we didn't stay for long. The trip would have gone faster if it were not for a campaign of around 50 cars driving slow and honking in support of some candidate for senator. DON'T VOTE FOR EARNEST!!! The worst part was that at one point the cars pulled off to the side momentarily to get beer from another lady who was part of the campaign, so we had drunk idiots driving around and leaning out of the window, yelling at people to vote for their dude.


After going most of the way around, we stopped for dinner at this place with really good ribs, and then went downtown to an aquarium called Underwater World. The coolest part about this place was the long underwater tunnel with various fish, sharks and turtles swimming around and above your head. There was even a portion for petting sea creatures! All-in-all a great time was had, and right next door they even had a Godiva Chocolate store. @_@ So tempting, but so expensive!

Monday was my last day on Guam, and Jasmin and I began our somber morning eating at Fuji Ichiban Ramen, which I was to learn later is popular in Japan. We washed my clothes and packed my stuff, then took everything to the airport early. We were hoping to hang out and go bowling with Jasmin's best friend on Guam, but that never materialized, and I ended up never meeting him. Lunch was kind of random, and soon it was time to say goodbye. Or at least, see you soon in Japan, and when I return to the beautiful area of Guam in the future.

The rest of my pictures are on Facebook too!

Guam pt. 1

So yes, it's been one of those periods of activity that are too busy to even find time to write about. It's already been almost 2 weeks since I arrived in Japan, and I have yet to blog about it. However! Prior to reaching the land of the rising sun, I had an amazing experience in the land of the beautiful woman -- Guam!! ..and yes, the beautiful woman is my girlfriend. :D

The first thing I noticed about Guam when arriving on August 26th was the humidity. Though it was night time, as soon as I left the airport it felt like I was in the sun. Jasmin was there to pick me up with her nephew Gyles, and we dropped my stuff off at her house before going to eat at a nearby restaurant. It was apparent soon enough that her 9 year-old nephew was a very energetic and talkative handful, but he's just a nice kid with a wild imagination.

The next day was Wednesday, and Jasmin took me to another local restaurant for breakfast. We ate out a lot; in fact, we rarely did otherwise, unless of course it was a delicious home-made meal from her mom or other family members. But there were so many cool restaurants to choose from!! So later on, we picked up her nephew and niece (Coleen) from school and took them to Jasmin's place where we could entertain them for a few hours until dinner time. Jasmin and I went on a little date on a boat called Micronesian Dream, which set sea just before sunset so we could watch it from the deck and take beautiful pictures. They served food and held a show which made for an overall interesting experience, though when we got back we realized -- uh oh -- they never took our money, all $120 of it. The Japanese people who were there had their money collected beforehand, so maybe they forgot to do it for the "locals." Oh yeah, we were the only non-Japanese, which wasn't uncommon seeing as Guam is a popular tourist location and isn't that far from Japan. We then went to the Chamorro (Guam's indigenous inhabitants) village, a very busy place with a lot of cool stands, and we saw Jasmin's brother's fiance helping her family's business.


On Thursday, we went with Jasmin's mom to Ross and then to get food for dinner. We hung out at her parent's business with her niece and nephew, and then ate a delicious meal that her mom cooked that night. I think that Thursday was kind of uneventful.

We picked up the kids from school on Friday and took them to a nearby mall that had a small amusement park inside. Gyles, Coleen, and Jasmin's cousin Abby rode on rides and played in the arcade, and Jasmin and I rode a few rides as well, like the roller coaster, which was short but went around about 4 times. lol The arcade wasn't too great, but it was a lot of fun watching the kids win their prizes. We then went to Denny's in the mall for a short meal before going to Jasmin's grandmother's house and having a MUCH bigger dinner (omg I was stuffed). It was a nice opportunity to meet her family of many aunts and uncles, but alas, that was mainly just her mom's side. x.X Though intimidating at first, everyone was really nice.

On Saturday we went to one of the nicest swimming pool and beach combinations in the world, I'm sure of that. The pool felt like one was surrounded by wilderness, complete with mazes, slides, and of course, waterfalls. Palm trees are everywhere in Guam, and this was no exception. And when we finally got to the beach, it was almost too good to be true. Clear blue water. Bright white sand. The perfect temperature water. Palm trees lining the beach. It was perfect, something out of a postcard. Upon leaving the beautiful beach, we went to Pizza Hut for "lunch" and then took the kids to Ross to go shopping. I was in charge of watching Gyles in the toy section, and he took me on quite an adventure involving space ships and swords with his imagination that tired me the heck out.

Here are the corresponding pictures on Facebook: Click. Enjoy! Stay tuned for the last two days of my trip and a ton more pictures.

Otakon 2008: Sunday

I actually had this post written up a while ago, but I've been too busy to put it up, so here ya go.


I woke up on the final day and, though still tired, forced myself to pack so we could get checked out with plenty of time to spare on enjoying the last day at Otakon '08. Once again, I went down to the gym for some extensive stretches, and when I returned everyone was ready to leave as well. So we brought our bags to the car and then I headed my separate way to the Baltimore inner harbor to find lunch. There were rumors of a Chipotle in the area, and my information didn't disappoint, plus the walk itself was nice and I enjoyed the scenery.

On my way inside the convention center, I met up with my friend Steve and we had both decided to go to the Dealer's Room. Unlike on Friday, I wanted to comb through the entire room nice and carefully. So I would start on one end and look at the booths on each side as I strolled through every isle for anything that caught my eye. I should say at this point that I didn't bother investigating tables of manga or anime, ironically, mainly because I could do that on my own time in bookstores and online and didn't want to start a long collection on a whim, unless there was a cheap, concise box set. Unfortunately, there was still no sign of Hunter X Hunter or cool Rock Lee merchandise, which I have been scouring for every year since I started watching those shows. Ah well, Hunter x Hunter has been licensed now so it's only a matter of time before the mainstream transforms the fandom.


When I was about 2/3 of the way through, my friend calls and tells me that he's ready to go, and seeing as he drove me to the convention that's a sign that I need to be ready soon too. I told him I'd be a few more minutes, then quickened my pace a bit until I got to the end of the room. We met at the front of the con and had ourselves a little arm wrestling re-match since he thought he could beat me this time (poor Chris!), and then spent a few minutes trying to get in touch with another friend of ours (Aaron Q.) so I could beat him at my full strength, but he must have chickened out because he never answered his phone. At this point, it was the early afternoon and we were ready to skedaddle.


It wasn't a long drive back to my friend's house, but I was exhausted and ended up sleeping most of the ride. When we got there, his mom had spaghetti and French bread waiting, which was really nice and quite delicious. I said my goodbyes and headed out, but that wasn't the end of my weekend yet. No, I didn't think I'd had enough of an adventure, so I called up another friend who was staying in an apartment on my college campus and asked if I could chill with him and another friend who lived there too.

I hadn't seen Gary and Mike since school ended, so it was cool to catch up with them and see what sort of trouble they were getting into now. In an attempt to think of something to do, we started driving to a bowling alley but didn't realize until we were in the building that it was lame duck pins. Someone who worked there tried to give us directions to a real bowling alley, but none of us remembered what they were and almost got lost before turning around and going to the mall to see a movie. We kind of wanted to see The Dark Knight again, but Pineapple Express had just come out so we chose to see that for the first time instead. It was kind of funny, but a lot of over-the-top action for a stoner flick. lol After the movie, we went back to campus and soon forced ourselves to go to bed since they had work early in the morning, and I slept on the couch.

I think I woke up around 7 or so Monday morning, ate the rest of my Chipotle burrito from the day before, and left when my friend Gary went to work. Instead of going home, I went to the metro again and took that to Washington DC, where I found myself at the Embassy of Japan a second time in less than a week. I intended to pick up my travel Visa, but what I didn't realize was that morning was drop-off only, so I had to wait about 15 minutes for them to get it ready. By this time, the meter my car was at was running out, so instead of grabbing lunch I went right to the metro and when I got back the meter had already expired. But no ticket, so I was safe.

That's about it, I guess. Add that to the list of exciting Otakon weekends, and hopefully there will be plenty more where that came from. If anyone has plans for Otakon next year, for going or for a group cosplay, let me know and we can take care of those early.

Otakon 2008: Saturday

I woke up around 10:30 on the second day, having gone to bed late the night before. Miraculously, my legs felt great, and I decided to continue my stretching routine by going down to the health club for a half hour. When I got back and changed, I headed straight to brunch at the inner harbor for some pasta and salad, which was a little more expensive than yesterday's sub but added some needed variety.

In order to ensure that I didn't try to do everything on the first day, I intentionally avoided the Artist Alley on Friday, so that was the first place that I headed on Saturday. In middle school, Dragonball Z fan art really helped push me in my artistic ability, so I have tremendous respect for the artists who were stationed around the room or had pieces displayed. There were a lot of amazing 2D pieces in the gallery, but of course I wasn't allowed to take any pictures (I actually got yelled at for taking out my cell phone to look at the time, lol). I walked around to booths of actual artists selling their stuff, and nearly all of them were in the process of drawing something new. I guess that's to be expected, and to promote their abilities, but it reminded me vividly of a friend who is constantly drawing to become a comic book artist.


My next destination was the Q & A session for Kappei Yamaguchi, which I knew would be a popular panel so I jumped into line early. For those of you unfamiliar with Japanese seiyuu (I am too, but someone luckily pointed this guy out to me), he is one of the most well-known voice actors in Japan, having done Ranma (Ranma 1/2), InuYasha (InuYasha), Usopp (One Piece), Kyle (South Park dub), and my personal favorite.. L (Death Note), among many others. My friend was working at the panel, and he said he'd be giving out 25 autograph tickets for people who wanted to ask questions. Well, I didn't have any questions so I didn't bother raising my hand to get chosen, and luckily the people who did go up asked pretty good questions or made good requests of voices and songs. About 10 minutes before it ended, I left to hop in line for his autograph downstairs, and initially walked past a huge crowd before I realized.. that was the line. x_X It turned out that the autograph tickets were to bypass that line, rather than letting them get their autographs right after the Q & A. So I went to the back and eventually it became a line, which I was in for almost two hours (45 mins. after it was supposed to start) before I finally gave up and went to the Fansubber and Industry Discussion panel.

That morning I had read online that people who weren't going to Otakon had been looking forward to hearing what this panel would be about, so I guess it must have been a big deal. ~_^ Basically, there were people from American companies (Media Blasters, Funimation) and from fansubber groups (Live-eviL, Dattebayo, Shinsen, Anime-Empire) to discuss the state of the anime industry today and how it's positively or negatively affected by fansubs. So everyone sat along in a line and discussed topics from an overhead, and we got to see each side respond to the other based on all their experience and data. It was assumed from the beginning that fansubbing wouldn't just go away so it's pointless to ask or expect it, though each of the fansub groups confidently stated that they would stop if they were asked by a company to do so. However, once they stopped another group would probably take their project up, and this would happen continuously each time a cease and desist was ordered. To sum up, Media Blasters was of the opinion that the industry would just have to deal with fansubbing and could get along fine, Funimation thought fansubbers should respect the rights of the creators to earn their deserved royalties, and the fansub groups believed that the only way the industry can keep up is to bring anime into a medium that consumers want, namely quick, subtitled releases online that are true to the original. Funimation did kind of sound like a bitch, though. :/


Phew, so after all this I was pretty hungry for dinner, and I headed to the inner harbor food court for a pizza and bagel. I went back to the room to cool down for a while, then left to go back to Artist Alley with my friend, where I browsed the booths more carefully and found even more amazing artwork than I had seen earlier in the day.

The final panel of the day for me was How to Machinima, which was run by some friends of mine who work on Spriggs: A Halo 3 Machinima. Machinima essentially involves using a video game engine to create your own cartoon, but the developers of the game or engine have certain restrictions, such as Microsoft whereas you can't use any in-game sounds. So the panel was intended for those who might be interested in creating such cartoons, and they went into things like good equipment to use, setting up a good story, utilizing good camera and film techniques, and getting it out to the community. My friends worked hard on the panel, and though I wasn't interested in the mechanics of it so much, I thought that the group worked well together and made the experience amusing for someone who just walked in to pass the time. I hung out with my friends a bit afterward, and then left for the rave down the hall.

The rave is always a cool feature of Otakon, which you'd think might be kind of lame, packing in a bunch of young and awkward otaku onto a dance floor and blasting techno music at them. But honestly, you get into it. When you go to that area of the convention center, there's a stage up front with screens and huge speakers, a large dance floor that's always packed, a back area where people generally perform acrobatic moves, and a small crowded room on the left with different music and colored spotlights going everywhere. Tons of people have glowsticks, and everyone who isn't watching others dance are moving to the beat. The best thing about the raves is watching people dance, though. People are flipping around and performing all types of acrobatics, or having dance-offs that you could swear are choreographed. I would take videos of it, but my camera broke by then, plus it's often too dark to come out anyway. The worst thing about the raves.. is the smell. Some ungodly combination of B.O. and puke. I danced/moved around for a little bit, and at one point I was just chilling on one of the walls and a guy comes up to me and asks where he can score some E. lol So much fun.

Well that's it for Day #2. I got one more day, plus the adventures that follow. BTW, there are pictures and videos up on my Facebook for whoever wants to see them.

Otakon 2008: Friday

It's that time of year again! Otakon is the biggest anime convention on the east coast, and second only (maybe in the world) to Anime Expo in California. It goes from Friday to Sunday and falls anywhere from late July to late August, and luckily for me the city of Baltimore is only about an hour away from my house. I started going to Otakon in 2003 when I decided at the last minute to check it out for a day, and I look back at that as probably one of the longest and most exciting days of my pathetic life. :p The next year I returned for convention goodness (I think for just a day), and in 2005 I went the entire weekend with a friend of mine who lives nearby. Well that was enough Otakon to last me until 2007, when I went for another looong day and even picked up the Harry Potter book at midnight.

This year, a friend of mine at my school's Anime Society scored a free hotel room from points that his dad has accumulated from business trips, so I was there the whole weekend. Each day was pretty long too, so I'll be splitting up the posts.

Just leading up to Otakon is worthy of a post in itself, but I'll keep it simple so we can get to the point. Thursday night, of course, people were allowed to pick up their pre-registered badges so they could get an early start the next day, and that was my eventual goal. However, I first had to wake up early to take the metro into Washington DC in order to drop off my traveling visa application at the Embassy of Japan. I was able to make it just before they closed for lunch, and then got something to eat myself before taking the metro back to my car. From there, I drove to my friend Chris' house so I could go with him and his girlfriend to get the badges. Unfortunately, we couldn't check into the hotel room until Friday morning, so I stayed at his place that night which was about 40 minutes away and watched him and his friends play D & D until passing out.

On Friday morning I woke up relatively early to do stretches, which takes about 20 minutes and ensures that the long day ahead won't bring cramps from constant walking, then had some cereal before running last-minute errands for anything else we needed. The hotel was available for moving in by the time we got to the city, and so we did. The Hyatt is nice, too, with great furniture, a fancy bathroom, a gym with all new equipment, and opportunities around every corner to get charged just for moving things around (hint: don't touch the contents of the mini-fridge). But enough of the foreplay, LET'S GET TO OTAKON ALREADY.


Finally, around noon we entered the convention center and waited outside a panel for some friends. One of the coolest things about cons, especially anime ones, is simply walking around and checking out the great cosplaying. Sure, there are invariably costumes that just downright suck, but the overall atmosphere is exciting enough to overlook (some of) it. So my group of seven or so walked around taking pictures for a good hour until lunch time, at which point a few friends and I left the horribly overpriced convention center for the inner harbor food court. Get this.. $5 footlongs at Subway, half for lunch, half for dinner, and I carried around a water bottle so I never paid for a drink. XD!!


After eating lunch back at the hotel room, I headed for the Funimation Q&A panel, but got there too late and they were already full. I used my short time until the next panel by doing a quick run-through of the almighty dealer's room, and it was indeed as big as ever. My first panel of the weekend turned out to be Tokyo Travel on a Budget, which was fitting seeing as I'm going to be learning how to do that over the course of the next four months. It was kind of interesting, but mainly common sense - go on free tours, eat at 7-11, sleep at capsule hotels, use public transportation, etc. Scary, though, that gas in Japan is around $11 a gallon and DVDs cost around $50, and even some latest and greatest electronics that can be found relatively cheap are domestic only and can't be taken out of Japan. Grr!!

I sort of wandered around after the panel until ending up at the Lovely Complex Live Action series, and left a little while later to check out the Game Room but didn't play anything. Eventually I came upon the Anime Philosophy panel (go figure), where I met back up with some friends and listened to the panelists discuss various themes and lessons in life as introduced in shows like Evangelion, Full Metal Alchemist, Trigun, and even The Irresponsible Captain Tyler. lol It was dull at times, and one of the women tried too hard to make herself sound smart, but I learned how some common philosophical theories are evident in those shows and how they can be interpreted. At this point, I went back to the room and ate dinner while watching the opening ceremonies of the Olympics. OMG those Chinese know how to use $300 million to throw an awesome ceremony. The fact that people were moving those blocks up and down so precisely blew my mind.

After getting pumped up watching the Olympics, I went to the gym to do a quick workout on the energy of cereal and a 1 foot sub for the day. I took some pictures of the gym and everything, but when I went to take pictures on the way back, the camera stopped working, and I've since been forced to declare it dead. RIP 3.2 megapixel camera.. 12/25/03 - 08/08/08, may I replace you well before going to Japan. So now that I had become nice and sweaty, it was time for the RAVE! I went to the rave the next night too, so I'll cover the details there (this post is already pretty long). After the rave, I went to an 18+ panel about adult cosplayers, which unfortunately turned out to just be a discussion, regarding explaining the hobby to family and coworkers and dealing with the younger generation. There was some pointless bickering at times, but it was occasionally funny, and the best part was various rage rants given by the panelists and the audience.

By then, I was done. So back to my room I went, to take a shower and play Brawl until I fell asleep. Huzzah. See my Facebook for more pictures in the days to come.

Beach Week

If you happened to notice my absence from the internet as of late, even though I'm not on AIM as much as I used to be anyway, that's because I was too busy not being very busy at all and chilling at the beach. (You'd have known this if you followed me on Twitter -- add me, someone!) My parents have a really nice beach house in Delaware that's about a mile walk from the ocean, which looks out onto a beautiful canal often used for crabbing, kayaking, and boating. Unfortunately, this is a great selling point, and my dad rents it out for most of the summer. This year, however, some family friends of ours convinced him to leave a week open so we could all go down for a nice, relaxing vacation.

Last Friday my parents, my brother, my dog, and I left for our traditional summer getaway. There were people renting the place until Saturday, so we stayed the first night at my grandfather's beach house up the street. His place is nice and holds a lot of fond memories, but ever since my parents bought the other one a few years ago it just doesn't compare in terms of size and location. So the next day we repacked our stuff and moved into my parent's beach house with the other family to start our vacation.

The best thing about the beach, and something we made sure to do nearly every day, is simply gathering our necessary equipment (towels, blankets, umbrellas, chairs, shovels, boogie boards, skim boards, etc.), walking down to the ocean, and spending hours going back and forth between swimming and laying on the sand. No worrying about work, appointments, or even time in general if you don't want to. It's something that might generate a lot of "necessary" consuming like boogie boards and skim boards, but you could do without a lot of that stuff and still have a great time. One thing that I definitely cannot avoid buying is sun block.. because I am a ghost out there, and as soon as I take off my shirt the sun is raping me. Luckily, my burns were minimal this time around, and I might have even got a fraction of a percentage darker. Yay!

When I wasn't at the ocean, I was most likely exercising, studying, or playing video games. The first is something that shocked even me for how quickly it became part of my daily routine again after a couple week hiatus, a routine that involves running and stretching in addition to pushups and crunches, but I'll save the details for another post. My trip to Japan is ever-approaching so naturally I'm forcing myself to study the language more and more. Currently, the sources are coming from class textbooks and a podcast I listen to, but I'll probably utilize a CD program before the summer ends. When feeling really reclusive I would play some video games, such as Mario 64 which I had gone back to and recently finally beat. My friend in the other family brought his XBOX 360, so we spent many hours strolling through the streets of Liberty City on GTA4 as well.

Apart from our initial two families, we met up with some other people as well. My brother had a friend from school who was staying in a hotel down the street, so he came to our beach and walked around with us a few times, but it was kind of strange because he stayed quiet most of the time and just sort of tagged along. The other family invited some of their friends to stay in my grandfather's beach house (with his permission), one family of which was visiting from Britain. It was interesting to hear some of the differences in terminology, but my favorite had to be referring to "bathing suits" for women as "bathing costumes." XD!! Oh yeah, and if you ever hear the phrase "taking a mick," that means that you're mocking an English person. <.<

So what else did I do? I finally saw The Dark Knight, which was awesome, and I'm definitely planning on seeing it again. I went to the Ocean City boardwalk and walked approximately 84 blocks, or about 8 miles, until my feet just about fell off. I got a call from the airline that my flight to Japan was cancelled so I had to book a new itinerary that now includes a stop to Guam to see my girlfriend. I got sick the last couple days after my dad dusted off all the fans in the house, and still have a sore throat and stuffy nose. And then on Saturday, I came home, after being sick enough to give up on my exercise routine once again. :p

Ah well, overall a very nice temporary distraction for my life.

Movie Review: Wanted

For this and other reviews of my own consumption, please visit my theOtaku World: Sykedelic Entertainment! This blog will otherwise continue to cover events of my life.

To be honest, I wasn't really impressed when I saw the trailer for Wanted. Curving bullets, high-speed car chases, and Angelina Jolie can only mean another action-packed, mindless summer Blockbuster. Strange, though. The more of my friends who went to see it, the more I was hearing what a really cool movie it was, and the more I desired to see it for myself. Unfortunately, my plans kept falling through to see it with various friends, but I finally got the chance last week with friends from my college's Anime Society. Did it meet my initial pessimistic expectations? Eh, yes and no.

From the beginning I could tell that Wanted had quality to it. I knew it was based off a comic book so the content was already there, whether or not the original source was good. The first few scenes did a great job of creating interest and forming questions in my mind as to what was going to happen next and how these things were even possible in this world. The acting was solid and the special effects were cool, albeit kind of overdone at times.

As the movie progresses, so do the action scenes and special effects. Bullet curving and car chases are frequent, as are other spectacular feats of human ability. All very cool. If there's any reason to see this movie, it's exactly the reason I was so quick to condemn it in the first place - there's lots of action and it adds up to a Blockbuster, but it works. Plenty of adrenaline and excitement, tasteful even for me.

Where this movie falls is when it comes to explaining how or why this action is taking place. As I'm sure some of you have feared, the bullet curving isn't really explained. In fact, most of the amazing feats are simply passed off onto a special ability of these characters that, in my opinion, should only account for a heightened awareness of sorts. At other times, training these abilities in the movie consists of a sped-up montage that makes you wonder how much time has really passed and how they could skip so many steps.

But alright, so let us grant that these people can do all of these incredible things. Why are they following their course of action? Without going into too much detail, the basic premise involves "an elite group of assassins," who choose their kills based on a method of reading fate more or less. But where this came from is vague and convenient, and I'm not really sure how it's fate if they can be either successful or unsuccessful at the task. And I don't understand why the main character changes his mind so quickly and with such determination throughout the movie.

The entertainment value is up there, but timeless quality is lacking. In the end, I think I went in there with too high of expectations, but that's not to say that it's a bad movie. It isn't, and the cool scenes are a testament to that. But if you've heard that it's great all around, I'd have to call it overrated. Beyond the sketchy story-line, though, I think there is something to be said for the simple underlying message that's evident from the last words the main character speaks: "This is me taking control of my life." I think that's an important theme to respect.

Challenges Await

Today marks the 5 month anniversary that my girlfriend and I have been together, and two days from now she will be leaving for the Philippines and Guam. Though we're going to do everything we can to see each other during the Fall semester while I'm in Japan, she doesn't plan to return to the states until at least 7 months from now. The best case scenario is that she'll be able to visit Japan once and I'll be able to visit Guam and/or the Philippines once during my study abroad. Now that she's graduated her parents take it that she will return indefinitely to maintain the family business.

So you see my obvious dilemma: our relationship will soon become a long-distance one that will more than likely outlast how long we've been dating so far. Yeah, we'll be able to chat online and webcam on Skype, and call and text each other when she's in Guam. But I've been in this situation before, and it really doesn't compare to being able to hold your partner and share beautiful moments of nonverbal communication.

I believe our relationship is strong enough to overcome this obstacle, though it will no doubt be difficult and test our feelings. We've taken every opportunity to be with each other so far this summer despite a distance of 50 minutes between where we live. If I have ever given the impression to my other friends that you've been neglected, I do apologize but please understand the situation. I plan to hang out with all of you guys before I ship off to Japan.

On Friday night, my girlfriend had a going away party at her place. A few weeks ago it had looked like this might not happen, but I'm really glad it did and that she got to see her friends for probably the last time before leaving. She was also in the process of packing everything, so I came in early and helped transfer boxes to store at my place, took apart her desk to store at a friend's, and moved a ton of junk to the dumpster.

The apartment looked great when the party finally started, and apart from some drama and puking the event was a lot of fun. :] It was basically split up into people playing/watching video games, people looking up videos on YouTube, and people drinking and playing cards. The food was great, but there was soooo much of it, and I was eating like the whole time so I probably gained about 5 lbs. X_x As I was leaving, I gave her an early anniversary/going away present - a bear from Build-A-Bear, complete with voice chips and a heartbeat, all dressed up to look like me. lol It doesn't compare to the DS she gave me a couple weeks ago, but it will give her something to cuddle with when I'm not there with her.

I think back to the 2 and a half years I knew her before we got together, and I can't believe that I used so much time to get to know her before I realized our compatibility. We have difficult times ahead, and these months apart are really only the beginning for what's to come with graduate school and work. But we didn't start this relationship just to end it so soon. I love you, Jasmin, and I'll be waiting here for you.

A close call

Last Wednesday I was driving home after spending some time at my girlfriend's place. It was getting late, and I had to be at work at 9 pm for the overnight shift. I didn't really get a lot of sleep the night before because I needed to be at the car place by around 8 am so they could check the light I fixed on my license plate. The day had been an eventful one and my body was tired, but I didn't fuly realize it until I woke up driving off the road.

The car was shaking on the grass and my mind was numb, but I immediately jerked the steering wheel back into the lane. My brother tells me later I probably over-corrected. So I'm pressing the break and trying to straighten the car, but it's out of control and spins around, back off the road and down a small 8 ft embankment to hit some bushes and trees on the driver's side. Thank God I was the only car on the road at the time.

Before I go on, I want to say that I'm safe with no injuries from the crash itself. I attempted to drive forward and back, but with no luck, so I climbed out of the passenger's side and looked around. Pretty soon, cars started pulling over, and one of them told me that the police were on their way. Some branches and leaves had been shut into the passenger's door when I closed it, so I got back in and was trying to push them out when I shut my fingers in the door. Luckily, there was a rubber covering and my fingers were fine apart from a loss of feeling for a couple days. I found out later that the bushes were poison ivy. -_-;;

The cops arrived in 5 minutes, the tow truck in 15, and my brother in 20. I told the cops my story and they basically said that this stuff happens and let me go on my way. The tow truck pulled the car out and I was finally able to see the damage, which I personally think was exacerbated by the way they pulled it, causing the end of the bumper to bend off and drag on the ground. There were some scratches and dents, but nothing too major. Still, the guy took it to their towing place and I picked it up the next morning on the 4th. After they took the car away, I got a ride with my brother to work, which I got to only a half hour late.

Overall, the experience left me shaky for about a day and feeling kind of helpless about the situation, but happy to be okay. This was my first real accident, the closest to it being when my car slipped on the ice and drove into the median strip. Now I'm faced with getting the damage assessed, though my dad wanted to sell it before this anyway and would rather just give it to charity than fix it up but we'll see.

I kinda feel like I'm no longer going to be seen as a responsible driver, but honestly I think it was just a bad combination of events. Maybe I should start thinking about ways to keep myself awake when I'm not even aware that I'm really tired, though I was playing a podcast at the time which usually helps. Extreme temperature may be a good idea. And slapping myself when I start to close my eyes. Or just give in like I did one night, and pull over to nap for a few minutes.

And so it begins

Not really sure why I've been putting off an introduction post, but this is what I wanted to start with before I get to the actual posts. And enough blogging content is coming to mind that I feel like I can't ignore it any longer!

You've probably found your way to this page as one of my friends, either online or offline. If you don't know me, then you still may get some sort of sick entertainment out of reading about my life, but if you wanted to stalk me then all you had to do was ask. ~_^

Since this is going to be geared towards friends, I probably don't need to introduce myself, and I consider the About Me section to the right to be perfectly sufficient for the job. Besides, I'll be updating that from time to time so there's no point in restating it here. For the sake of archiving, though, I'd like to highlight some of the points that I'm at in my life: 20 years old, just finished my Junior year of college, about to go to Japan for a semester, and nearing the 5 month mark with my girlfriend Jasmin.

This blog will primarily be used for documenting events in my life, ranting about various passions, and reviewing entertainment I consume (including movies, video games, anime, manga, etc.). I've had other blogs in the past, including blogspot, Xanga, and myOtaku, but came back to this one because it seems to be the most widely known and best supported on the interwebs. One thing I've learned is that you can't set a schedule for posting, so I'm not going to make any promises. Sometimes life gets too exciting and exhausting to even find the time to sit back and think about it, and when I do post I'm going to go for a simple style that's reasonably short and excessible.

I suppose that's about it. This will get a lot more exciting when I get to Japan in September, that's for sure. :p

Hello World

Testing the waters of our temporal nature.