On Rereading (and Kakashi agrees)

from aschs

(But it’s been so long I had a book so absorbing I read until morning… the last I recall is The Hundred Thousand Kingdoms by NK Jemisin last May.)

What I like about this, though, is Kakashi re-reading. The second time is always better than the first, because usually in the first reading I go too fast because of the suspense and wanting to know what happens next. I love what author Poppy Z. Brite had to say about rereading:

"But if the story is interesting enough, I’ll want to reread it examining how it happens, how it’s constructed, how the author elects to tell it. These are often difficult aspects of a story to attend to when you don’t know what’s coming. When you don’t have to worry about page-turning suspense, you can take more pleasure in a story’s subtler aspects.

But it’s not always that technical. There are many books I reread simply because I want to spend more time with the characters, or want to return to the mood the story put me in the first time I read it.”

[fave fictional people #2] We are all alone together: Tomoko Kuroki from Watamote

This is dedicated to those who have haunted empty places to spend time in, a corner where no one passes by. To those who have silent rooms in the mind to retreat in when the outside world is much too noisy and imagination is the only escape. To those who can spend weeks and months and years with no one but themselves. To those who have been desperate for friends who could understand, a group to belong in, and found only disappointment and learning that in the end you were better off with no one and you shouldn't have opened up. 'Open up' only means you also open yourself to unwelcome judgment, and it only ended with hurt.

Cheers to our loyal companion, the one who will truly never desert us... toast your wine glasses to loneliness! Whether you hate it or love it, whether it makes you cry or makes you content, whether you accept it or reject it... "We come into the world alone and we die alone. Why, in life, should we be any less alone?" said the cynic Diogenes. We learn a kind of zen here, we know how to live with it, and keep the wolves out, and keep our sanctuaries of screens, keyboards, and bookshelves clean. (Random Reader complains: "Here she goes again with the same old topic!").

"Books were safer than people anyway." ~Neil Gaiman

Ah, that was just an attempt to write a pretty-sounding paragraph and not that related to the subject. I'm okay, and time alone is as important as time with others... But we've all been there once, alone in a pit hole of that shitty experience unique to you and only you. Good people may have tried to help, but ultimately we face it by ourselves. Anyway, we all find ways to dig a way out and survive.

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I'll talk about an anime. First, this character is odd in a way that most internet posts I've read say that they can relate to her so much. It's almost like their lives animated. She's hysterical, lonely, desperate, paranoid, deranged, perverted, bitter and envious at the same time about people she thinks are better than her. She just wants to be popular but she just can't! Here's our girl, Tomoko Kuroki from the CRINGE comedy (yes, that needed all-caps because it is a major depressing cringefest) WataMote -- shortcut for a long title, No Matter How You Look at It, It's All Your Fault I'm Not Popular!

The new face of that expired meme, Forever Alone, but still relevant for our times

"When she enters her first year of high school expecting her life to suddenly turn around, she is stunned when absolutely nothing changes. This forces her to take a hard look at herself for the first time, and resolve to become more sociable and popular. Horrible, horrible Hilarity Ensues."

Replace that high school with "college" and you get the worst version of myself way back (Only the first sentence, not the trying to be popular part). The show is funny, it's sad, I cry from both laughter and sadness for both the hilarity and the biting truth of it. Tomoko's life seems to be one embarrassing moment after another as she tries (and always fails) to be popular.

"I'm not all that quiet either! I'm actually a cheerful and funny girl!" Yeah right. 

What I found funny is after a long time of not looking at a mirror, she puked at the sight of herself. I can't count how many times I've laughed during all the episodes. She pukes a lot, actually. The show focuses on her often hysterical inner monologue, her delusional thinking, and overactive imagination.

An accurate summary of their loving relationship

Aside from her misadventures, what keeps me watching is her family life. Considering she has like less than three people she can call friends, the anime shows many mundane scenes with her at home. Also, her younger brother is often the victim of her silly antics, and it's a realistic depiction of typical siblings -- mutual irritation, bickering, and keeping your sister/brother out of your room. 

“At some point, this show will hit way too close to home for you. You will either be incredibly depressed or appreciative that someone out there understands you, but you will inevitably experience one or the other. Watch, laugh, cringe, perhaps feel a little better about yourself.” -madp bully pulpit, Reviewer

I hope it will have a happy ending.

On English and reading

"Why do you want to improve your English?" you ask them, on the first day of your new tenure. The diagnostic icebreaker, cheap but to the point. It helps with trade, Phoenicia's descendants inform you. It's the world's second tongue, say the refugees of Sidon and Tyre. A smiling, bearded Nawaf in the front of the room summarizes. "America bosses the world around in English. We need English, just to tell America to go to hell."
-an anecdote

I can't speak English properly. I'm only decent in reading or writing it, but when speaking there's always the mispronounced words and the native accent making it sound bad - and I speak too fast when tense. When I hear native English speakers, they sound unfamiliar. I find it weird myself that most blog posts here are in English, but all comment replies I write to people I know are still in Ilonggo. Maybe because I think in English, imagining my thoughts as written text on paper. There are even days when I write more than I speak, when I'm busy with a project that has to do with writing. I also take notes too much and think through things by writing it out.

I didn't grow up a reader. I grew up watching Tagalog anime in GMA and ABS-CBN, and Cartoon Network shows. When Harry Potter was all the rage and other classmates stayed up late to read the newest installment, I was made insomniac on pirated-DVD marathons. Then, I picked up The Dark Half by Stephen King at around third year, the first novel I finished. The more paper fiction I finished, the less I watched anime. The last anime I watched was around 5 years ago, they were Speed Grapher and Blade of the Immortal. I don't know a thing about the newer ones, and I prefer reading manga scans on the net.

Right now, I can only finish around 3-5 books a month due to school and the internet. Most of what I read now is non-fiction: textbooks, self-help, even the inspirational and motivational books. My favorite thing about reading fiction is when I'm totally absorbed by a story, there's this zen connection where I feel I'm really in that imaginary world. I find that reading is much more entertaining and immersive for me than watching TV, or anything else really.

But then... I find that my attention span isn't as good as it was like when I was 15. It seems that I can't concentrate on anything for more than ten minutes. I'm trying to get back to the 50-100 pages a day habit, and now I'm getting through The Master and Margarita.
- - - - -
I once saw a comic on the school publication. I know its supposed to be ironic, targeting "pseudo-intellectuals" who engage in the following activities: 1) Drinking coffee, 2) Analysing paintings and art, 3) Reading books in public. And my reaction was, What? Those normal acts are pseudo-intellectual now? Most people drink coffee, thinking about what art may mean is normal, and if I read while waiting because its better than staring off to space... am I trying to show off? No. But, the comic seemed to be intended for those who do those things to show off... but what exactly is so show-offy about actions so normal? I mean, the supposed humor intended by the artist felt lame and unfunny to me, and doesn't make sense.

One really shallow reason why I read is it makes me feel like this guy:
...and when you feel like Kakashi, everything is cool in the world and nothing seems to bother you.

Reaction: Rurouni Kenshin live action movie

There's no anime I watched and re-watched more than Samurai X. I watched it in Tagalog, in English, in original subtitled, over and over again in grade school that I almost memorized everything that happened in the story. My fondest memories of the summer just after Grade 6, before high school, was watching the marathon run of around 10 episodes a day during afternoons in Studio 23 (along with Final Fantasy, Rave!, and Angelic Layer. Loved all of them). I imagined that if I could relive a past life, it will be in 1890s Japan (2nd to medieval Europe). Never again will I be so absorbed in a story that way! Knowing there's a live action film, more than a decade after the anime's airing, of course I could not miss it.

The movie is set in the Meiji Restoration, ending a violent era with Japan adopting new systems from the Western World. The Samurai class is no longer influential. "Its the wives and daughters of samurai who now run the brothels, former samurai are now gangs of petty thieves," says the businessman who celebrates the 'New Age' with drug and firearm trade.

The former notorious killer Battosai Himura decides to live a new life as a wanderer, and now carries a reverse-bladed sword as a vow not to kill again. But can he run away from the past, or his past can't help but stay? As Saito (a former samurai, now a cop) says, "Wandering is the easy way out. We live by the sword and die by the sword." To those familiar with the story, we know Kenshin will still fight many enemies along the way, old and new, challenging his beliefs. As the antagonist in the movie says: once a killer, always a killer.

A still-scarless Battosai (now Kenshin with the scar).

In the movie, they encounter two villains: the greedy businessman Kanryu Takeda and the psychotic killer Udo Jine. Megumi, who came from a doctor's family, makes opium for Takeda. Udo Jine is a former Samurai who works for Takeda, but still blood-thirsty, kills many using the name of Battosai. He mocks Kenshin's new ways. Jine would be very satisfied to see Kenshin as the merciless killer again, and provokes him. Will Kenshin yield?

Clockwise from left: Kaoru, Sanosuke, Saito, and Megumi

Their cast is perfect for their roles. My favorites were Saito and Sanosuke. Sano: who else would pause in the middle of a fight to eat lechon manok and even offer some to his opponent? They even drink together. Then back to the action. Saito blurs the line of morality, and mocks Kenshin too. As a former Samurai, he easily blended in the new age as a police officer. I like the way he smirks.


Overall, a fun and action-filled movie. Let's end this post with Takeda and his fruity assistants. The masked guy could be an endorser for Pantene. 

I don't have anything to say, here's links

• Why Naruto should be over: Kakashi has nothing left to read

"The only character who anybody really cares about on this damn show is Kakashi, who never gets to do anything interesting because we're supposed to be more interested in his neurotic asshole students.  Kakashi is so bored on this show (and who could blame him) that he's been dealing with his stultifying life by reading erotic novels, especially his favorite series Come Come Paradise. Well, the author of Come Come Paradise is no more, meaning Kakashi's spiritual sustenance is gone. Now, rather than sticking his nose in the latest CCP to give everyone the message that he doesn't care about their idiotic little lives and their idiotic little problems, Kakashi will have to stand there and listen to what the other characters on this show have to say. It is true that his character is somewhat shrouded in mystery, but I don't see what he could have possibly done in his past to make him deserve this.

In this situation, either he will commit ritual suicide, or he'll defect to another anime that actually features intelligent people, like Ghost in the Shell or something."

• Adventures in Depression: "If my life was a movie, the turning point of my depression would have been inspirational and meaningful. It would have involved wisdom-filled epiphanies about discovering my true self and I would conquer my demons and go on to live out the rest of my life in happiness." This short funny comic describes my petty depressions one time (Jan'09-Oct'10)