Japanese influences and new years resolutions

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At last I have applied for uni. 4 sessions with a careers advisor to help me write my personal statement and encourage me to apply to more than one uni as a backup, they all have such a different criteria and pros and cons to them; it'll be so tough if I get a few offers.

It's been so tiring lately worrying about my college and passing every criteria, it turns out if I get a Distinction* 3x I will get almost 500 UCAS points which was a complete surprised to me- so long as I do it. I've been juggling work with college and redoing my assignments, and this week I did 33 hours of taking orders all last week. Tomorrow I break up from college so hopefully by then I'll be up to date on any outstanding work so I can just work and work like crazy and save. I haven't been paid yet since joining mid-November but I'm expecting a big pay packet on the 24th, hopefully I'll get dad's xmas present by then. (Or I'll just be inventive)

I'm a little more convinced about my plans in March to meet my boyfriend and really planning carefully from tickets, insurance, excursion expenditures and packing lists. I'm not sure which order to break the news to dad though; buy tickets then tell him, or tell him then buy tickets.

Finding tickets for under £600 is a dream come true, especially for Emerites and only a 3 hour stop.

We sent each other a Christmas present this year, both small boxes- I sent him a £2 coin because he's interested in them and never got one when he came to London and a few bits and bobs he liked in my room and a handmade card. He sent me a smaller box but with Green Tea Kit Kats, he knew I loved them when he gave them to me in July. Plus a few ore things, but I don't know yet and I'm so excited to celebrate our first Christmas together.

Influences

A while back, when reminiscing with old PS2 games I used to play as a child, I realised a lot of characters and gaming developers were Asian. I never really noticed as a child just that they were young and cute. My favourite games at the moment and always will be are Ico and Okami.

Games

Ico is basically about a boy born with horns and sacraficed in a castle to protect his village- he meets a girl who doesn't speak his language and so have to go through a series of puzzles to escape and go home. There's more to it than that, with a lack of dialogue and with no demo to help you, it's one for you to just explore freely and enjoy the eerie atmosphere. Lately I figured the language was Japanese in reverse which I thought was quite inventive. I just totally fell in love with it as a child and was glad to go back to it, I'd never completed it myself and just watched dad, but I remembered most of the answers and did it in 3 settings. Later, it became a book by Miyuki Miyabe and was translated into English. It was a must have for fans and it was her interpretation on the story as the dialogue was very little and we never knew Ico's history or the answers to its mystery.



Okami depicts Japanese Shinto God's and Goddess's. Okami means wolf and also sounds like Omikami Amaterasu who is the Sun Goddess, it is a massive game, much bigger and longer than Ico but completely different from each other. You're learning Japanese religion and beliefs without really realising it. You are a wolf who controls the sun and protecting everyone from evil spirits including Orichi; the 8 headed serpent.

There's a lot to talk about in this game and it's too surreal to take it all in, but it's about all the elements of the earth ad controling them with your brush and journying with a small companion and reviving plants, towns, animals and even god's which were trapped in a constellation. The soundtrack contains Koto and Shamisan to add to the traditional feel of ancient Japan.



Another game I've been playing since 2002 was Tekken, it has evolved over the years with me and technology. I think I liked it mostly for it's mindless fighting with crazy characters and insane techniques. It's a Japanese game by Namco, complete with the obligatory silly humour- despite the gritty content, but to me that was always outcasted by the beautiful characters. My heroes started off being Ling Xiayou for being the youngest and cutest girl who was also very strong and brace, something I never thoguht I would be.

But that's also got some traditional Japan to it as well- some of the arenas being in tatami matted temples and wearing traditional attire, some even were sumo wrestlers while others wore Noh inspired masks including Kitsune, Kunimitsu later became my hero. It's also very strange as it has characters from across the world with different fighting styles, but they also talk through their own language to each other and understand every language- they must be really smart!



Books

I read Memoirs Of A Geisha, and I have a guilt for liking it a lot- it's a guilt because its supposed inaccuracies, but Arthur Golding had such a natural talent for depicting a young lady in that period, I was stunned to find it was fictional. Back then, I was 14 and couldn't pronounce any of the names or towns properly, but I had no trouble visualising the beautiful kimonos and dances.

I'm inspired to read even truer stories about like as a Geisha, I also read Madam Sadayako. It was not the easiest book in the world to read as it steered away from life as a Geisha, to her Kabuki lifestyle with her husband. She was supposedly the first woman to take part in acting in Kabuki, and only recently I can appreciate that I'm one of the few people to know of that. It contained a copy of her portrait by Pablo Picasso. My art teacher was a huge fan of him, insisting he'd seen every piece, then I showed him that one and he was absolutely amazed.

The only downside to the book was that it just stated the facts, not as a story as the prologue had me believe though it does tie together in the end.



Of course, I'm a fan of Ring. Dad got me into the American and Japanese version, there's not much of a difference between them, but I'm always curious to see how people depict them from country to country. I found it very authentic to watch and just had to read the book when I first saw it was one. By Koji Suzuki, it's amazing how far apart it is from the movie and yet how close it is- the only main difference is that the protagonist is a man with a three month old baby and not a women with a grown up son.

The story was even more gripping to read than to watch, even though we had some idea what was going to happen in the end, it was a bit of an anticlimax to find that the part with the girl climbing out of a well was completely fabricated so it would pass as a horror.

My boyfriend and I are both a fan of Sadaco, the Japanese protagonist and often talked about her sometimes when talking about movies. I want to read the next few instalments and see where it leads too.

Films

Dad was quite supportive of my interests in Japan and would sometimes come home with a new Anime by MANGA. which is a bit more maturer than Studio Ghibli. We've watched Origin, Paprika and Apple Seed, but our favourites were Summer Wars and The Girl Who Leapt Through Time. I don't watch a lot of films and I really only liked them because of the fact that they're Japanese as their stories were always long and way too out there for me to enjoy.

However these two were definitely better. Hayazo Miysaki is no exception to the quirkiness though. Film 4 dedicates a week to his films annually as a tribute for the Animation appreciation as it's not as big in the UK and so don't get aired much. I sat down to watch Princess Mononoko and I had no idea what was going on, again I just watched it to see if it referenced Japanese living and because it's in English subs, but it was two hours long! It felt like an assignment and just got weirder and weirder and more random as the story went on.

Spirited Away was also quite disturbing, I do sometimes wonder what they're thinking when designing. I think drawing all day long gets to the animators' heads and they start going off track and decide to add a bit of gore here and there.

One that I can sit down and watch is The Cat Returns, though it's got bloody Ann Hathaway in it.

My mum also liked the idea of me having an interest in Japan, on my 12th birthday we went to HMV and she found one called The Raman Girl with Brittany Murray- about a lady stranded in Tokyo after her boyfriend abandoned her. She has to survive on her own, to do so, she quits her job after discovering a raman house opposite her apartment, she didn't speak any Japanese and the chef who was the owner didn't speak any English. She was a typical college drop out from America who fancied the journey with a man she was on with for a short period before insisting she should come with him, but didn't see he wasn't overly keen on the idea or was that committed either.

There's a huge theme of culture clash in the movie, lots of shouting and accusations which was quite funny to watch because she's so stubborn she's right and he's wrong with the way they do things- and in Japan, they're very specific to how they do things.



My favourite animal is Wolf and Fox, my boyfriend recognised that and once suggested the Wolf Children to me. It looks like it's about a woman who gives birth to children who are both human and wolves, and the father dies so she has to raise them herself. It looks like an emotional one, I bought it a while ago and have been itching to watch it, but wanted to save it for when I go and visit.

Manga

A friend I hardly hear from one day announced she is officially moving to Japan, I was obviously glad she liked it but when I asked why she said it was because of the anime. I don't understand why people would want to move out there for that reason. Manga is pretty, even I like a bit of merchandises from things I like from TV, but to go for that reason baffles me.

I love looking at the pictures and reading the story, but I've never really gone past volume 3 in any series. They're mainly for TV I believe, as the panels are so fast moving and random, it's more enjoyable to watch as the clever animators keep true to the manga than any normal book to film thing.

However, I've decided as it's 2015 and my reading has been going badly, I'm going to treat myself into getting back into Manga.

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Photos

Synopsis
Interesting artwork for a cover, it's used for both the book and the game- unfortunately it didn't do too well but what's inside the game;
A boy with horns, marked for death.
A girl who sleeps in a cage of iron.
The Castle in the Mist has called for its sacrifice: a horned child, born once a generation. When, on a single night in his thirteenth year, Ico's horns grow long and curved, he knows his time has come. But why does the Castle in the Mist demand this offering, and what will Ico do with the girl imprisoned within the Castle’s walls? Delve into the mysteries of Miyuki Miyabe's grand achievement of imagination, inspired by the award-winning game for the PlayStation® 2 computer entertainment system, now remastered for PlayStation® 3.

The beauty of the game
There are two characters in the game, plus the boss. But they sill have a connection by holiday hands to guide each other to safety.
If the girl is left too long, she'll be taken away by these creepy black shadows.

Kamiki Village
The artwork is stunning, like XIII but more oriental and vivid.
It's ever so elegantly beautiful and dainty.