Slacking Into The New Week, Fuwa-Fuwa Style

As predicted it was raining for much of the day, to the point where  actually had to bring an umbrella to work again for a change.  On the plus side, it wasn’t too windy, and it didn’t flood in our neighborhood, so the only hassle I had to contend with was the muddy streets, and the vehicular traffic on the way to the MRT station.  Speaking of which, I was able to catch one of the early-morning MRTs, which is lucky I suppose, as the service shut down for a few hours after that (due to the rains again).

The day at work was pretty slow for a Monday as usual.  Was on membership duty again, as the guy I was sharing the system profile was in, but it was a bit annoying, as for the entirety of the day not a single membership went active: for some reason, despite finishing everything, all the new memberships we did defaulted to “inactive” status, which obviously made for a lot of annoyed callers.  And there was no update on just why it was happening from the people stateside.

It was still raining after I got off work, enough that I had to call off my visit to the gym today.  On the bright side, it was so nice and cool that I was able to go straight to bed for the afternoon.  I was feeling a little sleepy, but again I can blame that on watching too much anime on my pc.

Incidentally, I was able to finally find online sources for the R1 dubbed versions of both seasons of K-On.  With my connection, it’s taking a while to download of course, but I’m watching each episode as they finished.  It’s turned into a nostalgic, and at the same time new experience with the English dub.  Still getting used to Yui sounding like Asahina Mikuru of course, but I’m liking what I’m hearing overall, like Sawako and Nodoka’s VAs.  

Hopefully everything is finished by the end of the week, so I can do a proper binge.  

 

 

 

Good Friday Musings and Rewatching Madoka Magica

I think a good part of Christendom is, in one way or another, celebrating the passion, crucifixion, and death of Jesus on the cross.  For us here in the Philippines (for the more traditional-minded anyway) that means a pabasa, specifically through the Seven Last Words leading up to three in the afternoon.  There’s also the bisita iglesia, a pilgrimage through at least seven different churches over the course of the day, but it looks like it’s something the family will have to skip out on this year, as not only is it already pretty late in the day (and as such makes it difficult to finish the journey before night falls), but my sister’s currently conked out at the moment.  Really, the pilgrimage isn’t worth it unless you do it with your family.

For the less devoted, I’m guessing that they’re taking advantage of the day to relax and catch up on whatever it was they couldn’t do prior to the Holy Week holiday.  Among the online circle I’m familiar with, that pretty much means watching anime, particularly the new batch of shows for the Spring Season.

I’m in a particularly reflective mood though (besides, I’ve already seen the first episodes of the new shows), so I’m taking the time to do a re-watch of the finale of Madoka Magica which,  due to a mix of real-life events (do remember it was around this time that the 2011 Sendai Earthquake and Tsunami happened) and production delays, somehow landed on a day that unintentionally strengthened the themes inherent in the last two episodes, particularly of selflessness and self-sacrifice.  To a non-Japanese Catholic watcher at the time, the fact that it aired on freaking Good Friday made the message of the show all the more powerful, as it echoed (again unintentionally) the same type of qualities that lie at the core of why Christianity celebrates Holy Week.

It’s not quite a one-is-to-one parallel however, as despite Madoka’s sacrifice the magical girls of her universe still suffer through what might be considered a bum deal, spending the rest of their lives fighting off daemons without any kind of thanks (whereas Christian doctrine says that the sacrifice of Christ opens the door for definitive spiritual redemption) in exchange for their wishes, but in some ways the girls are better off than how they were prior to Madoka’s changing the rules a bit, so to speak.  With Madoka stepping in to take away their despair, each girl is free to pass on without regret, instead of turning into monsters that would very likely make the world much darker.

There’s no direct parallel to the promise that lies at the end of Holy Week either, brought upon by the Resurrection of Christ, unless one interprets the familiar themes of rebirth, renewal, and of new beginnings, in the persona of Homura (and not Madoka, the supposed messiah-figure), after the rewriting of the “rules” of their world.  Gone is the very dour and driven young woman that we’ve seen through the course of the show, and who we learned had suffered through so much just to be able to protect her friend, replaced instead with someone who literally had the crushing kharmic weight of several lifetimes lifted off her frail shoulders, no less determined, but now filled with actual hope that there will be a friendly face waiting for her, once all her struggles come to a close.

Of course one could also interpret the apotheosis of Kaname Madoka from regular schoolgirl, to this anthropomorphic concept of Hope (for magical girls, hah) existing across time as a sort of rebirth as well (though skipping the three-day death and resurrection thing).  Oddly enough, I seem to recall (though I might be misremembering things) how this matches some of the gnostic interpretations of Christ’s Resurrection to be, where Christ the God discards his earthly body and reunites with his pure godhead.  While I’m sure that being erased from existence wasn’t exactly in the cards when Madoka made her wish, much like Christ (in some interpretations) she likely accepted it as a probable (and necessary) outcome.

At least, that’s my thoughts on the matter.  Funny how this weekend made me feel contemplative (though not for matters that normal people may deem “important”), but I suppose that’s just how things are, two days before Easter Sunday.

Serious Business

I’ve gotten more details about the final project we have for the Translation class, but while it seems simple at first it’ll prove to be something that’ll once again come down to the last minute.  The main issues are of course a) selecting what to translate (the criteria being ‘must raise academic interest’) and b) the methodology and theory that will have to be used.  Surprisingly a lot of the class share my problems with the former, though I’m more worried about the latter as literary theory has never been my strong point.  Although we technically have until the 25th of next month to finish and submit it, the clock is literally already ticking for us.  I really hope I’ll be able to come up with something before the end of the workweek, so I can start on it and avoid the usual cramming.

Speaking of ticking clocks, I have one inside me which I’m trying to ignore.  Yes, I’m terribly aware that it’s my birthday in about two days.  I’m trying to ignore that fact, thank you very much.  It’s also kind of hard to be happy when I only get to have money again just the day before it, and even then it’s not something I can actually spend.  It’s a good thing that both my father and sister are contributing for the barbecue and spaghetti, or else it’d be a very sparse celebration, ahaha.  

Oh well, at least I managed to secure a day off on the day itself as well as the one that preceded it.  Two days away from angry customers can do wonders, I suppose.

I took another walk around Makati today, as soon as it stopped raining in my area in fact. The tightness in my chest wasn’t as bad this time around, and I can job for six to seven minutes now before having to slow down and walk for around four minutes.  It’s not much of an improvement, and for some reason my right leg keeps cramping up, but it’s far better than my previous effort.  If I keep going, maybe I’ll be able to jog a straight fifteen minutes by next week?  

Ahaha, it’s always nice to dream, yes?

On the dieting side of things, I cheated a bit today, since I ate some rice for my breakfast and lunch, and ate half a cob of corn.  The rice wasn’t much, just a cup for each meal, but since I’m trying to avoid the ‘white’ carbohydrates it’s already a guilty pleasure I suppose.  That aside, I think I’m getting used to not stuffing my face at the first sign of hunger.  Though, for some reason I’ve been stricken by gas for the past few days, then again I suppose eating legumes in lieu of rice will do that.  At least my digestive cycle seems better, and it looks like it’s gradually going back to how it was prior to my binge eating.

Now for less yucky dieting-related matters…

Several episodes into my rewatch of Sora no Manimani, and I’ve fully thrown my lot in with the Fuumin camp.  I found Fuumin’s growing attraction to Saku (due to shared interests) far more compelling than Hime’s very high school-ish crush.  Hime might be a nice girl, but she’s trying a little too hard, whereas there’s obvious chemistry between Saku and Fumie.  Also, as Executive Otaku commented before, there’s just something fun in shipping two tsunderes together, ahaha.

My fangirl’s choice of ship aside, the coupling pictured above is almost inevitable.  Mii-chan’s immaturity aside, most of Saku’s thoughts gradually return back to the pint-size bundle of energy who just loves dragging him out of his comfort zone.  You know it, I know it; fate will conspire to drive Mii-chan and Saku together so that they’ll produce a bookwork of a kid, who will then be introduced to a genki older girl… At which the cycle starts anew. All is then right with the world.

I’m close to the end of the series of this point, and new developments abound, as well as new characters, one of whom puts a little wrinkle in Mihoshi and Saku’s relationship (as it is).  Still, it’s pretty much the same lighthearted fun, with a dash of character development. What else can I ask for in a rom-com?  Except for another rewatch or two of course, ahaha!

Survived To See The Rain

Today wasn’t as stressful as I worried about yesterday, but it was still pretty bad.  If not for the fact that one of my teammates was on overtime (on an insane twelve midnight-to-two in the afternoon shift), as mentioned previously there would only be three of us taking calls, and the third member would only come in around ten.  That said… the call volume wasn’t as massive as one would expect with only three people managing calls.  I’m not sure if some strings were pulled, or if it was just Workforce feeling particularly merciful, but there were points where I experienced long avail times in between calls.  Of course, these were counterbalanced with instances where the calls came in fast and furious, but those were expected (they usually spiked around nine in the morning, when most of the full-timers and CS people went home) and as such could be prepared for.  

Also, there is this thing we call ‘petiks’… suffice to say it’s something that call center agents learn to do eventually at some point in their careers, and doing it too much can get an agent in trouble…  I don’t do it often, but I think in this case it was merited, if only to preserve my sanity in the face of so many disgruntled callers (the company that I work for seems to attract that in droves).

That said, I managed to survive yet another stressful week-closer and somehow not collapse as soon as I got home.  That’s very rare in my case, since I get exhausted very quickly if I’m stressed out (though the humidity in the past few days might have contributed, which is why I welcomed the small bit of rain we had tonight).  Indeed I was not only completely coherent, but relaxed enough to indulge in another session of rewatching anime series archived in my external hard drives.  

And guess what series I’ve chosen to view, this time not as a neutral party but with fangirl shipping goggles completely on?

SHIP LIKE YOU HAVE A PAIR!

Why, Sora no Manimani of course?  A quaint romantic-comedy from 2009, the follows the experiences of bookwormish (yet not-apparently bishounen) Saku as he is dragged kicking and screaming into the Stargazers Club by his tormentor childhood neighbor (according to Keima’s guidelines, she doesn’t count as an osananajimi) Mihoshi, who could be described as Yui from K-On and Suzumiya Haruhi mushed together, minus the god powers: energetic, driven, but with the emotional maturity of a 12-year old (despite being a sophomore in high school).  At its core, the series is about Saku’s interactions with Mihoshi, the rest of the Stargazers Club, and the student council, and how he changes from his experiences from a stuffy bookworm who hates being noticed in public to… someone more comfortable in his own skin, I suppose.

BUT like I mentioned, I’m not coming into this rewatch as a neutral party, oh no.  Two years later, I’m going into this with fangirl goggles firmly in place, so I can finally squee with shameless delight as I ship characters with abandon.  Readers have been warned.

Now let’s get introduced to the individuals involved in the ships:

Where to start of course, but with the male lead and viewpoint character?  In this case, it’s one Ooyagi Saku, who despite apparently being extremely bishie (not too obvious in this adaptation) would rather hole up in a room somewhere and spend his free time reading books.  At the start of the story he’s been away from this city for around seven years, and if were up to him he’d rather be somewhere else.  Why, you might ask? Because the city reminds him too much of the two years of his childhood where he was terrorized made the acquaintance of an older girl living a floor above him…

Of course, the girl in question is Mihoshi. Energetic (if a bit dumb), she left a definite impression on a young Saku, primarily giving him the instinct to run away from her as much as possible.  She loves stargazing, and Saku discovers the years he hasn’t seen her has dampened her enthusiasm for watching the nighttime sky not a single bit. She shares the same quirks and type of personality as Saku’s mother — let that thought sink in for a bit.

Interestingly enough, despite being the designated ‘main girl’, Mihoshi is not the main ship of the series (at least as far as watchers are concerned).  Why?  Because, when you come down to it, she has a childish interpretation of relationships (she treats Saku more like a kid brother, for example), which doesn’t lead to interesting shipping fodder.  However the next two more than make up for it.

Now this is a ship.  The first serious contender, as far as watchers are concerned, is Hime.  She’s Saku’s classmate, and has been holding a small flame for him when he was nice to her during the entrance examinations. Of course he doesn’t remember, since she was wearing pigtails at the time, but his small act of kindness definitely made an impression on her.  She pretty much joins the Stargazers just so she could get Saku to notice her, at least in the beginning.  She has an obvious dislike of Mihoshi, what with the older girl’s casual and very clingy attitude towards Saku, and the fact that Saku tends to go along with whatever Mihoshi wants to do.

Hime’s main opponent in shipping wars is Fumie.  A member of the Student Council and the Literature Club (a group Saku would have gleefully joined if not for Mihoshi’s influence), Fumie is confident, and very much in charge. Her browbeating of the Stargazers seems to be her primary trait, at least in the beginning (with constant threats to downgrade the Stargazers’ standing from official club down to fan group, as it saves on the budget), as well as her apparent opposition to everything Mihoshi stands for, but she shows hidden depths later on.

Where do I stand right now on the shipping war? At this point, the flag on my mast is in favor of Fumie, given my own bookish personality, and the fact that Hime seems to be trying too hard right now but… We’ll see.  

It’ll be an interesting few days of anime rewatching, I think.

Enjoyable Distractions

What I initially began as a weird sort of re-familiarization to a more ‘traditional’ Magical Girl/Warrior franchise (particularly in the fact that there is clear delineation in who is ‘good’ and who is ‘evil’) in the wake of Madoka Magica’s genre-subverting run has evolved into a full-fledged binge through the Pretty Cure franchise… And as of this writing I see no end in sight.  Little over a week since I finished my Heartcatch Precure marathon, I pretty much plowed through most of the translated episodes (care of Curecom.net) of Fresh Pretty Cure.  I think at this point the only thing that’s stopping me from completing my rewatch is the fact that I couldn’t find any raws of the untranslated episodes (so far, I’m seeing a lot of zero seeds for the raws, so at this point all I can do is wait until Curecom fills in the gaps (their update list shows that the remaining episodes are mostly translated, just undistributed).  I just hope it happens before I get any older, ahaha.

So for the time being, I’m skipping over to its predecessor: Yes Pretty Cure Five and its sequel Yes PreCure Five Go! Go!  As the case with these sorts of things, the latter is still mostly untranslated, but unlike Fresh Precure the raws for the whole series is available for download.  While my Japanese comprehension has essentially gone down the crapper, for all intents and purposes, it’s still adequate enough to understand most of the conversations in the series (one has to remember that the primary demographic of the franchise is girls aged four to eleven in age).  Some of the more technical terms still fly over my head though, but again, hopefully that gap will be filled with translations.  Someday.

Let me say, while I’m thoroughly enjoying my rewatch through the Pretty Cure franchise, I’m just amused at just how bad the art is at times.  While such gaffes are easily dismissed or glossed over in Heartcatch because of the character designs it used, the same could not be said of the franchises that preceded it.  This is particularly noticeable with Fresh (whose style made the protagonists look a whole lot older than their listed age of 14), but such instances of QUALITY (as many animebloggers would declare) increase the further one goes back in the franchise.  Yes Pretty Cure Five Go! Go! was pretty much the same (though one could argue that, because Five Go! Go! had more funding allocated to it by Toei, it was easier to cover up), but one had to be blind to not notice the issues in its first season.

Incidentally I certainly didn’t remember Yes Pretty Cure Five to be so badly-drawn at times.  Nostalgia can be a funny thing.  Watching the two seasons back to back it’s easy to see where Five Go! Go! improved on (the characters were better-proportioned for one) though, so I suppose it wasn’t that bad really.  A vastly-improved budget can do wonders, apparently.

At this point I’m close enough to finishing both Yes and Five Go! Go!, which means I can start on the next member of the franchise: Splash Star.  Here’s to hoping I can get used to the odd proportions used in it again…

P.S. In order of OPs, I still think Heartcatch’s is the best, followed by Go! Go!’s, then Suite’s.

P.P.S. Incidentally this binge of mine has ironically pushed many of this seasons shows (Tiger and Bunny, Astarotte no Omocha, Anohana, and Hanasaku Iroha to name a few) into my ‘to-watch’ list…  Including Suite PreCure.  Being a Negatone is suffering~

Nothing Ventured

As evidenced by my flood of image posts on yfrog, I’ve pretty much spent most of my morning (and some of my afternoon) watching Fresh Pretty Cure.  It’s not necessarily a bad thing, but the all that time spent marathoning the series leaves little left for actual productive or creative pursuits.  So much fanwork piling up, so little time to actually draw them, scan them, or fix them in SAI…

The day wasn’t a complete loss however.  I was able to drop by DLSU earlier and confirm the enrollment schedule for those who weren’t able to avail of the online reservation last month.  It’s on the 23rd of this month, so that’s still a lot of time, but I have a feeling that the two weeks leading up to it will pass very quickly.  *sigh*

Oh well, better finish what I could before classes start again.  So… Anime and fanart. Maybe even some short fiction.  Right.