I was really excited. I finally got Evangelion 1.01: You Are (Not) Alone on Netflix today so we could have a whole night of geeking out (complete with the original Japanese dialogue) to weird Angels trying to attack Earth and a schoolboy crushing on a weirdo albino girl with oversized eyeballs who (from what I remember) is actually a clone of his mom…?

But SOMEONE decided that Wednesday night at 8:00pm was a brilliant time to do work, because somehow s/he roped B into a lengthy conference call about website bugs, Internet Explorer and fixing links. I have a sneaking suspicion that this person is just a lonely lady, because the conversation (at least, the side that I can hear) is also about drinking coffee, B’s heritage and polite laughter.

HEY LADY. CAN THIS WAIT? YOU’RE RUINING MY NERD NIGHT. I WANT SOME MECHA BATTLES MIXED WITH HIGH SCHOOL SEXUAL TENSION AND THE BIBLICAL APOCALYPSE.

Waaah.

Hayao Miyazaki’s latest animation, Ponyo, finally has a US release date!!! AHHHH! The film premieres on August 4th, but there is no way in hell I will be watching the dubbed version. Screw you, Noah Cyrus and Frankie Jonas. FRANKIE JONAS? REALLY? Ugh.

Disney hosted several screenings of the original Japanese version of Howl’s Moving Castle at the El Capitan theater in Hollywood, and I am praying that they will do the same for this movie.

Otherwise, I’m going to wait for the DVD.

PS. I LOVE THIS THEME SONG. Even my baby cousin in Japan does a special dance to it. I like to sing it randomly around the apartment but unfortunately, I only know the first line so it’s basically just that, over and over and over again. However, that NEVER gets annoying for the people who love me. *ahem*

This whole “kawaii” thing in Japan is getting out of control, especially when Japan appoints three girls as their new “ambassadors of cute” to help boost tourism and provide more jerking off material for awkward white otaku guys.

Shizuka Fujioka dresses as a schoolgirl, Misako Aoki, a Victorian doll in voluminous frilly skirts and Yu Kimura is a singer dressed in a polka dot shirt with a bunny print, offset by bouffant back-combed hair. Her look has made her “a fashion leader in Tokyo teens’ favorite haunt, Harajuku.”

Three questions:

1. Did you really have to pick the three most stereotypical looks for Japanese girls? 
2. Are any of these girls remotely cute? Maybe the one on the right (despite her horrific hair extensions), but COME ON NOW. 
3. Why was I not picked for this?

I guess I should be happy that they did not pick Magibon. I hate that girl, but mostly because she has such messed up teeth.

Um…yeah. Reading Post Secret is like reading a really bad book. Everyone tries to be all deep, controversial and emotional, like they’re all ready to slit their wrists when all they want to do is talk about themselves. ZZzzz. I kind of want to write up a bunch of fake ones and mail them in.

But yeah, like this one? I don’t know about you, but porn sounds pretty much the same in all different languages. There’s only one way to groan and grunt. Sure, Japanese girls sounds like they’re in a lot of pain but that’s part of the appeal (or so they tell me) but nonetheless, it’s a helluva lot different than someone talking about god.

AMIRIGHT?

PS. And it’s probably not really a sermon. They’re actually talking about you. Don’t you know that’s what people always talk about when they’re speaking a different language?

PPS. Speaking of porn, B was telling me about this funny blog called Boner Party and I tried to look it up in the car. Apparently it’s not bonerparty.com but a Tumblr site. So I almost opened up the gay porn site on my iPhone until I re-read the warning that used words like “anal” and “penetration.” Close one, eh? But at least I know that porn works on my phone. Who needs those iPhone apps when you’ve got this?!

PPPS. This conversation let to another blog idea, which I was going to give a really nasty name but since I like to keep things classy around here, I won’t say what it is. Can you guess?

I’m pretty sure THIS is real.

THIS is just wrong. I feel my thousands of samurai ancestors turning over in their graves. Except that I don’t think they were buried but most likely cremated with their bones all piled up in a little ceramic jar or something like that. And they aren’t samurais, but more like poor peasants.

I wish THIS was around when I was writing my senior thesis. I wouldn’t even have written one. I’d just put the URL on a piece of paper, bound it at Kinko’s and then turned it in.

THIS is why I like to make sure people know the difference between kawaii (cute) and kowaii kowai (scary).

THIS makes me miss the Japanese classes at Brown, which were always so much fun. Granted there were always a couple people who were into anime and one of them asked me out on a date, but most of them were just other Asians trying to pick up more Asian languages. I think I met most of my good friends from those classes (I’m talking about YOU, Lee-san and Yoo-san).

Here’s the trailer for the new Miyazaki movie, Ponyo on a Cliff by the Sea AND OMG I WANT TO SEE IT SO BAD. The art seems a little different this time, but that’s alright, because everything Studio Ghibli does is genius  and I’m a rabid fan like that. I’m already learning the theme song by heart.

Who wants to go watch Spirited Away again for what will be my 20th time? How about a whole Miyazaki marathon weekend? We’ll end it with Grave of the Fireflies and eat dirt balls for fun. YAY!

Po-nyo po-nyo po-nyo!

I would say that shopping is my ideal form of therapy and relaxation, but now I’m going to have to add “watching an artist draw 100 different anime eyes” to my list.

Am I weird? There’s something totally amazing about watching someone expertly draw with a soft pencil or ink as if it’s the easiest thing in the world.

Auuuuuuuuuughhh I wish I could draw like that. It’s not fair. I inherently should be able to, right? Just cause I’m Japanese? No? Fine.

Haha, that was the title to my senior thesis.

Anyway, have you heard of this thing called anime? It’s crazy but it’s animation from JAPAN. Woooooo, scary.

With the upcoming release of Speed Racer, I guess people are paying more attention to this newfangled medium known as anime. Or at least USA Today is.

Racer marks not only a return to the brothers’ filmmaking roots; it’s the first of several big-budget gambles the industry is taking on a genre that remains unknown to many American moviegoers. (link)

Welcome to 2008.

The article goes on to cite Leonardo DiCaprio’s future Akira project, Steven Spielberg’s Ghost in the Shell and even Miyazaki’s award-winning (AND BEST MOVIE EVER) film, Spirited Away.

Excuse me, but what the heck is anime!?

But they also acknowledge that the genre appeals to a select group. “Generation X is very familiar with anime,” says Zac Bertschy, executive editor of the Anime News Network, a website dedicated to the genre. “But if you’re not in that age group, there may be a learning curve.”

Yeah, you know. The average American movie-goer will probably freak out with oversized eyes and boobs, high-pitched “Yatta!” squeals and multi-coloured hair.

Oh wait, guy2525 in the comments already got that covered:

Anime is all the same, just trash.. Everyone has over-sized eyes, the storylines are all the same, and don’t forget the one little character always has the same shrill “he, he, he” laugh.

SO MAYBE IT IS. It’s a lot better than the crap cartoons that are entertaining our youth today.

Sorry if I sound bitter about this, but I’m getting tired of hearing about anime as if it’s this newly discovered entertainment medium. Plus, didn’t I say that anime adaptations were the next step after all the horrible J-horror remakes?

I need to leave now. That photo above is beginning to freak me out.

So after all that fuss about Britney, she’s finally unveiled her new video for her latest single, Break the Ice. Aside from the fact that the chorus sounds NOTHING LIKE HER, I thought the video was pretty interesting.

Guess what Brit’s been doing while locked up in her mansion cause her dad controls everything (while KFed gets fatter and fatter)? Apparently she’s been watching a lot of anime, because that’s what her video is all about.

I’m curious to know who animated this, but I kind of liked it. It reminded me of those post-apocalpytic/mecha series/movies and even a little Sailor Moon with the amount of hair-rippling-in-the-evening-wind going on. All we need is some tentacle sex to make this 100% authentic!

Hi, Britney. Welcome back. Please stay sane and safe behind the anime version of yourself (which I’m sure looks TONS better than you do IRL). Except your anime eyes should be bigger. Please fix that asap.

Seeing this on my friend Ken-in-Hong-Kong’s flickr page made me hyper-ventilate a little. Derek, if you’re reading this…can I borrow your NGE DVDs again? Just kidding. Remember how you let me borrow them the first time, and carefully packaged each disc in like padding and newspaper, cause you thought I would scratch them? Hahahaha good times.