FEMALE PROTAGONISTS

One of my favourite people is in every way the perfect embodiment of a Japanese heroine-type such as you would find in a Manga drawn for both the independent-minded female reader and the lonesome teenage boy who abjures internet-based visual stimulation.
That is to say, she's of Japanese ancestry but surrounded by people with odd-coloured hair (brown, dirty blonde, near-albino wheat, copper, green or blue streaked, auburn, gold, dirty, or mousey-hued), smaller than most Caucasians of equivalent age, has a pretty face, and engages in a pleasing and ultra-civilised eccentricity not normally associated with either women or Japanese people (she smokes cigars).

Of course, I first took note of her because women are rare among the cigar crowd. Most aficionados of rolled-up tobacco are batsh*t crazy men, many of them with extroverted insecurities about their image.
In a word, typical dingos.

[Cigars can be enjoyed by any gender, taste buds are present in all. But several shapes are suggestive of psychological issues: toro, robusto, double corona, gordo...  let us not even speak of the Salomon or equally over-the-top figurados. Personally I seldom go beyond a forty to fifty ring gauge, and prefer no more than five inches. The seventy gauge seven incher is for a man with problems.]


Now, as a typical liberated modern male who is in many ways not much progressed emotionally beyond highschool or college, despite being older than Moses by mere chronological standards (i.e., youngish middle-aged), there are things about her that I appreciate very much.
Visually appealing, smart as a whip, and tolerance of tobacco.
Any one of those three puts her in the top ten percent.
The fortuitous combination makes her unique.

[The top cigar last year was the Oliva Series 'V' Melanio Figurado. Robust Nicaraguan filler and binder, Sumatra-seed wrapper grown in Ecuador. Six and a half inches, ring-gauge 52, pointed at both ends. A true work of art. Highly recommended.]

Typically, manga-babes are a complete fantasy. They seldom exist in the real world.

No, I shan't ask her out on a date, though that has crossed my mind.

It would be unprofessional, and disturb the force.


I like my women the way I like my manga-heroines: strong-minded fully formed individuals. In fact, precisely like most decent intelligent men imagine their mother to be, and wish their daughters to become.

I will admit that I have absolutely no clue what women think of that. Nor what most women think of their mothers or daughters. But I seriously doubt that women want their fathers, brothers, husbands, and sons, to be in any way like the majority of men in Manga, who are dysfunctional glandular freaks, brutish high-schoolers, warped fiends, or anguished lonely nerds wielding great swords of flame and power.
Often with very peculiar hairstyles.


I also like men who are precisely like manga-heroines: strong-minded and fully formed individuals.


No, not that way.


If they do wear panties and frilly undergarments, I have no wish to know. Their secret lives as gender-benders or cat-girls do not interest me im gonzen, and I sincerely hope they have no magic powers.
I'll be happy to discuss books or politics with them.
Perhaps over whisky and cigars sometime.
People with active minds.

I am rather blessed that I know a number of individuals like that, whose company is infinitely enjoyable. Most of them are men, of course. Given my age it would be naturally (and deliciously) suspect if I were to hang-around tearooms and women's clothing stores.


I am nothing at all like Ranma ½.



AFTERWORD

Cigars don't appeal to me very much, I vastly prefer a pipe. For a very long time that meant English-style blends -- Latakia, Turkish, and Virginia leaf, in judicious proportion -- though for the past four years or more I have veered toward pressed flakes and Virginia-Perique mixtures. Like many pipe-smokers I am somewhat obsessive, and it must be said that pipe-smoking often appeals to more introverted types, especially people with an eye for detail, along with peculiar interests and consequently books all over their digs. I'm not at all sure that cigar-smokers read much, if anything at all other than Cigar Aficionado magazine.

If they ever read Manga, or typical American Superhero comics, it is probably for the pretty pictures and zesty costumes. People with a genuine appreciation for the art-form are rare indeed.

I'm just mentioning this as a shout-out to geeks, most of whom do not smoke cigars. Who exist in either gender, and possibly several variants in between.
If anything, they too incline toward pipes and fine briar.
Not that there's anything wrong with that.

Ever.

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BIKINI PHOTOS OF THE DUCHESS OF CAMBRIDGE AND THE JAPANESE!

If you came here for photos of the wife of Prince William, Duke of Cambridge, there are a few minor bureaucratic procedures that must be completed before we continue on to the shocking revelations. We'll need a stool sample, a DNA swab, your fingerprints, and a retinal scan, in addition to application forms filled out in triplicate (you will find the necessary documents elsewhere on this site), as well as a full psychiatric evaluation, and an affidavit from your solicitor attesting to your emotional and financial stability.

Italians need not apply.

Reason being that those silly buggers probably already saw the pictures in a gossip rag published by Mondadori in Milan. Southern European paparazzi pursue the prurient interests of their public with an obsessive single-mindedness and efficiency which puts Chinese military internet hackers to shame. And we WOULD have written about that, but those cleanminded Asians In Uniform just aren't interested in this forum, and, despite the repeated mention of high-rise panties, seafood, and manga characters in a Japanese high-school setting, have failed to compromise the security of this site.

But they ought to read it avidly.

Purely for relaxation.

More about those photos of Kate later.

Please note embedded links at the bottom of this page.


This blogger is both pleased and amazed at the avid public interest in photographic evidence that royalty consists of real humans with real body parts. In that, they resemble us; we also have body parts. Shan't tell you where they're hidden.


MANGA SET IN HIGH SCHOOLS

What flabberghasts many people who seldom read manga (漫画) is the enormous number of strips featuring students. Surely, they wonder, those Japanese must be obsessed with teenagers? Specifically young nubile girls? Panties? Well, yes. Societally they worship nubility. And panties. But the high-school setting of popular manga is not based on that.

As a short sampling of manga will show.

[Note: the following short descriptions of specific manga and anime are from Wikipedia. Enough material is presented there that it seemed better to feature cherry-pickings. For the full articles, please click on the link cited as 'source'.]


Azumanga Daioh (あずまんが大王 Azumanga Daiō, lit. "Great King Azumanga") is a Japanese comedy manga by Kiyohiko Azuma. It was serialized by MediaWorks in the shōnen manga magazine Dengeki Daioh from 1999 to 2002 and collected in four bound volumes.

The manga is drawn in a series of vertical four-panel comic strips called yonkoma and depicts the lives of a group of girls during their three years as high-school classmates. The series has been praised for its humor driven by eccentric characters, and Kiyohiko Azuma acclaimed as a "master of the four-panel form," for both his art style and comic timing. -- Azumanga Daioh chronicles the everyday life in an unnamed Japanese high school of six girls and two of their teachers.

The story covers three years of tests, talking between classes, culture festivals, and athletic events at school, as well as time spent traveling to and from school, studying at Chiyo's house, and vacations spent at Chiyo's summer beach home and the fictional theme park Magical Land, concluding with the graduation of the main cast. It is generally realistic in tone, marked by occasional bursts of surrealism and absurdity, such as Osaka imagining Chiyo's ponytails being "unscrewed" from her head and an episode featuring the characters' New Year's dreams.

[SOURCE: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Azumanga.]


Chibi Vampire, originally released in Japan as Karin (かりん), is a Japanese manga series written and illustrated by Yuna Kagesaki. The story is about an unusual vampire girl, who instead of drinking blood must inject it into others because she produces too much.

Karin Maaka is the middle child in a family of vampires who immigrated to Japan two centuries earlier. Unlike the rest of her family, Karin does not feed on blood, she produces it. As a result, she is forced to bite others to expel the extra blood, lest she suffer exaggerated nose-bleeds. She also exhibits no normal vampire traits, and instead lives her life just as an ordinary teenage girl would. She can go outside during the day, attends high school, and follows the sleep pattern of normal humans. However, the general peacefulness of her life is disrupted with the arrival of a new transfer student, Kenta Usui.

Any time she goes near him her blood increases.

[SOURCE: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Chibi_vampire.]


Cromartie High School (魁!!クロマティ高校 Sakigake! Kuromati Kōkō, fully titled "Forging Valiantly Ahead!! Cromartie High School) by Eiji Nonaka, is a Japanese comedy manga.

It follows the everyday life of Takashi Kamiyama and his odd classmates at Cromartie High School, an infamous school for delinquents.

Shinichi Mechazawa (メカ沢 新一 Mekazawa Shin'ichi): One of the most notorious delinquents of Cromartie. Though there is a rumor that he may be perhaps a robot, no one but the main characters (Kamiyama, Hayashida, Maeda, etc.) seems to notice, including himself.

[SOURCE: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cromartie_High_School.]


Dokaben (ドカベン) is a baseball manga by Shinji Mizushima, serialized in Akita Shoten Weekly Shōnen Champion magazine from April 24, 1972 to March 27, 1981.

Dokaben is centered on Taro Yamada and his teammates Iwaki, Tonoma, and Satonaka and was focused mainly on their activity as a high school baseball team. At first, it focused on Yamada, Iwaki, and Sachiko and was set in Takaoka Middle School. But in Volume 8 the team is transferred to Meikun High School for their baseball skills.

The story of Dokaben continues in Dai Kōshien, Dokaben Pro Baseball Story, and Dokaben SuperStars Story.

[SOURCE: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dokaben.]


Gokusen (ごくせん) is a manga series by Kozueko Morimoto. The story follows Kumiko Yamaguchi, the granddaughter of a Yakuza boss and teacher at an all-male private high school.

The plot involves Kumiko Yamaguchi, the granddaughter of a Yakuza boss, Kuroda of the Kuroda Ikka. Her parents died when she was at the age of seven, and her grandfather had no other descendants, so Kumiko is next in line to head the family business with the title of Ojou. However, her lifelong dream has been to become a teacher. While her grandfather approves of her choice, others in the family want her to become the next boss.

Kumiko (known by her students as "Yankumi") becomes a teacher at an all-boys private high school. Her class is full of delinquents, but she tries her hardest to teach them not just about academics (her subject is Mathematics), but about lessons of life, much like any "dedicated teacher" story. Though she's forced to keep her family a secret from the public, her Yakuza upbringing gives her the strength and the experience to reach out to her students, while also providing comedic relief.

[SOURCE: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Gokusen.]


High School! Kimengumi (ハイスクール! 奇面組 Haisukūru! Kimengumi) is a manga series written by Motoei Shinzawa which ran in Weekly Shōnen Jump from 1982 to 1987. The title literally translates to High School! Funny-face Club or High School! Weird Face Club.

Kimengumi is an episodic chronicle of the bizarre adventures of a group of misfit junior high school (and later, high school) boys who form a club known as the "Kimengumi".

[SOURCE: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/High_School!_Kimengumi.]


Kanokon: Kanokon's story revolves around Kouta Oyamada, an extremely innocent young first-year high school student who moves from the country to the city and thus transfers to Kunpō High School. On his first day at his new school, he meets a beautiful second-year female student named Chizuru Minamoto. Chizuru asks him to meet her alone in the music room. When he arrives, she tells him that she is in love with him and accidentally reveals to him that she is in fact a fox spirit. Chizuru constantly and openly flirts with Kouta, even in front of others, which embarrasses him greatly. Soon after the story begins, a wolf spirit named Nozomu Ezomori transfers into Kouta's school and class. From day one, she is all over Kouta, which serves to embarrass him more and cause Chizuru to become annoyed at her new competition for Kouta's affection.

[SOURCE: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Kanokon.]


Major is a sports manga series by Takuya Mitsuda. It has been serialized in Shōnen Sunday and has been collected in 78 tankōbon volumes. In 1996, it received the Shogakukan Manga Award for shōnen.

The story of Major follows the life of Gorō Honda, from kindergarten to being a professional baseball player, seeking and overcoming tremendous challenges. Sequentially: Kindergarten ~ First grade (volume 01 chapter 01 - volume 03 chapter 06), Little League (volume 03 chapter 07 - volume 14 chapter 05), Junior High (volume 14 chapter 06 - volume 24 chapter 02), Kaido High School (volume 24 chapter 03 - volume 33 chapter 02), Seishu High School (volume 33 Chapter 03 - volume 46 Chapter 10), Minor league baseball (volume 47 chapter 01 - volume 54 chapter 02), etcetera.

[SOURCE: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Major_(manga).]


Midori Days (美鳥の日々 Midori no Hibi) is a shōnen fantasy manga by Kazurou Inoue. It was published by Shogakukan in the magazine Shōnen Sunday from September 2002 until November 2004 and collected in 8 tankōbon volumes. It is licensed in English in North America by VIZ Media and in Singapore by Chuang Yi. The series is about a high school boy who one day finds his right hand replaced with a girl named Midori and his attempts to return her to her real body.

[SOURCE: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Midori_Days.]


Ranma ½ (らんま½ Ranma Nibun-no-Ichi, pronounced Ranma One-Half) is a Japanese manga series written and illustrated by Rumiko Takahashi. It was originally serialized in Shogakukan's Weekly Shōnen Sunday from September 1987 to March 1996, and later collected into 38 tankōbon volumes. The story revolves around a 16-year old boy named Ranma Saotome who was trained from early childhood in martial arts. As a result of an accident during a training journey, he is cursed to become a girl when splashed with cold water, while hot water changes him back into a boy.

Ranma ½ had a comedic formula and a sex changing main character, who often willfully changes into a girl to advance his goals. The series also contains many other characters, whose intricate relationships with each other, unusual characteristics and eccentric personalities drive most of the stories.

[SOURCE: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ranma.]


Saki (咲-Saki) is an ongoing Japanese manga series written and illustrated by Ritz Kobayashi. The story revolves around a first-year high school girl named Saki Miyanaga who is brought into the competitive world of mahjong by another first-year, Nodoka Haramura.

Saki Miyanaga, a high school first-year student, hates mahjong because her family would always force her to play it and punish her regardless of the outcome of the game. Due to this, she learned how to keep her score at zero, neither winning nor losing, a skill said to be more difficult than actually consistently winning.

[SOURCE: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Saki_(manga).]


Sakigake!! Otokojuku (魁!!男塾, lit. Charge! Men's Private School) by Akira Miyashita is a comedy martial arts manga that was originally serialized at the Weekly Shōnen Jump from 1985 to 1991. It is staged in a private boy's school that teaches ōendan to troubled teenagers. The students are trained to "revive the Spirit of Japan" and mainly engage in fighting or killing courses. The nature of the manga is usually considered by the readers as a comical, or even parodic view of Japanese nationalism.

The martial arts depicted in this series are also highly exaggerated. Whenever someone is about to play an otherworldly trick, the author draws a sidebar to explain it and cites an encyclopedia-style explanation from books published by "Minmei Publishing Co." (民明書房) which is a fictitious story-telling device.

[SOURCE: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sakigake!!_Otokojuku.]


Samurai Girl: Real Bout High School (召喚教師リアルバウトハイスクール Shoukan Kyoushi Riaru Bauto Hai Sukūru) is a Japanese light novel series written by Reiji Saiga and illustrated by Sora Inoue. It was serialized in Dragon Magazine from 1997 to 2010.

The story revolves around a school that doesn't break up fights, but rather, they grade them.

[SOURCE: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Samurai_Girl:_Real_Bout_High_School.]


Shakugan no Shana (灼眼のシャナ, lit. Shana of the Burning Eyes), also known simply as Shana, is a Japanese light novel series written by Yashichiro Takahashi with illustrations by Noizi Ito. ASCII Media Works published 26 novels from November 2002 to November 2012 under their Dengeki Bunko imprint. The story focuses on Yuji Sakai, a high school boy who inadvertently becomes involved in an age-old conflict between forces of balance and imbalance in existence.

In an early draft of what would later become Shakugan no Shana, Yashichiro Takahashi set the story in a different dimension and described the main character as having the initial personality of Shana, but the appearance of an older woman similar to Margery Daw. However, after talking with an editor, Takahashi rewrote the character to have the appearance of a young girl. In doing so, he used Shana's small build to symbolize a story of growth and to emphasize the physical conflict between her and her opponents.

[SOURCE: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Shakugan_no_Shana.]



ANIMATED ODDITY

Mention naturally must also be made of Anime, that being the corollary to the mangaverse. And yes, there are high-schools there also.

Just to mention two of them:

Girls und Panzer (ガールズ&パンツァー Gāruzu ando Pantsā) is a 2012 Japanese anime television series created by Actas.

The story takes place in a universe where girls participate in Sensha-dō (戦車道, lit. "Way of the Tank"), the art of operating tanks, as a traditional martial art. Miho Nishizumi, a girl who has had a bad experience with Sensha-dō, transfers to Ōarai Girl's High School to get away from it. However, soon after joining, the school revives Sensha-dō and Miho, being the only student with any experience in operating a tank, is ordered to take part.

[SOURCE: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Girls_und_Panzer.]


K (or referred sometimes as K Project) is a 2012 anime series animated by the studio GoHands and directed by Shingo Suzuki.

Yashiro Isana has lived a relatively ordinary, simple life. He lives in the technology-advanced Shizume City and attends Ashinaka High School, a notable high school that is located on an island just outside the areas. Yashiro is friendly with everyone. Nothing ever seems wrong about him, except perhaps his habit of forgetting where his school-issued PDA is.

However, nothing normal has been happening since the recent murder of Tatara Totsuka, prominent member of the infamous HOMRA. No one knows who exactly killed him but the man responsible bears an uncanny, identical appearance to Yashiro. Seeking vengeance, the Red Clansmen of HOMRA set out to get Yashiro and kill him.

Everyone suspects that Yashiro is the murderer. But whether or not he is guilty is not clear.

[SOURCE: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/K_(anime).]



REMARKABLY ABSENT UNDERWEAR

Mostly, Japanese mangas set in high schools feauture baseball, comedy, and violence. Yes, panties are occasionally provided for your edification, but they aren't the main theme, more of a happy coincidence. The primary reason for setting so many stories in a high school is that these are an easily recognized locale, in which a multitude of characters have good reason to encounter each other under a variety of circumstances. A more intimate microcosm of society, in a way. Additionally, as for most of the readers the stresses and conflicts of the place have become a fond memory, they provide a familiar and non-threatening reference.

Anybody who truly wishes to know the Japanese must read manga. People who want to understand the Italians, however, would probably benefit from reading about the Duchess of Cambridge's bikini instead.

Italians, and famous English people in bikinis.
It's a peculiar obsession, if you ask me.
I kind of lost track of the bikini.
It didn't really interest me.
Sorry about that.
Bikini.

Better they should read about manga anyway.
It's much more interesting.
Panties.



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TEENAGE JAPANESE

Bless the Japanese, they are all perverts.  As their various illustrated stories (manga) prove abundantly.


Consider the most popular manga of all time: Ranma½.
[Author: Rumiko Takahashi (高橋 留美子).]

In short, a teenage boy transforms into a busty maiden when splashed with water, but still maintains his typical male sensibilities, being more interested in food and one-upping rivals than in any form of feminine activity, only using his ('her') charms to score snacks or to sabotage the straight men of the tale.  This is probably the funniest genderbending saga of the vast array of such which have been produced by Japanese artists.  Very nicely illustrated, too.
The target audience consists of four distinct market segments: teenage boys, who appreciate the curvy illustrations and sex-appeal of the characters; teenage girls, who are empowered by the violent and stubborn role models; mid-thirties salary men on the Tokyo subway heading home for the night, who dream of exciting females and their own fading youthfulness; and lastly, middle-aged women who wish to clobber the dunce-like men in their lives, drop-kicking the cretins through the roof.

His dad becomes a Panda when splashed with water.
He often uses this for escapism.
Pandas can't talk.


Another beautifully strange Manga is Midori Days, in which the heroine is transformed into the right hand of the tough schoolboy she adores.
[Written by Kazurou Inoue (井上 和郎).]

This story about  'boy's-hand-as-curvy-female' could be extremely twisted. Instead, it is very sweet. Never mind what you thought. Even the bathing scenes are innocent.
There is nothing lubricious in all eight volumes, due to the hero being in all ways utterly dense. The feminine touch gentles his savagery.
She finally returns to her normal body, and the two of them start dating.


KARIN:  "M-MOM? WHY ARE YOU DRAGGING DAD ACROSS THE LIVING ROOM BY HIS ANKLE?"
CALERA MARKER:  "BECAUSE YOUR FATHER'S AN IDIOT, SWEETIE."


Finally, consider Chibi Vampire, a story about a young teenage vampire (Karin Maaka) who is severely defective.  Not only can't she drink blood, but she walks around in daylight, does not even object to the smell of garlic, and is cripplingly shy.
She eventually falls in love with a classmate (Kenta Usui) who has creepy eyes and no guile whatsoever.
Yes, it's a romantic comedy.  Very heartwarming.
[Writer and illustrator: Yuna Kagesaki (影崎 由那).]


Two things stand out, namely nose bleeds and breasts.

When nosebleeds are shown in manga they indicate profound erotic excitement, such as when a boy sees the panties of the girl of his dreams and promptly faints, with blood coming out of his nose.
In Chibi Vampire, the heroine cannot take blood, but instead produces far too much of it; once a month it erupts from her nose in huge gushing torrents, splattering everywhere. After which, usually, she faints.
It's strangely beautiful.
Touching, even.

Concerning breasts, let me quote her ultra violent and insanely rambunctious grandmother, who wakes from her coffin in the basement one day and starts wreaking havoc. When she finally meets her granddaughter, she exclaims "Christ almighty, girl, where'd ya get a rack like that?!"
Karin looks exactly like the old lady, except in the chest department.
This causes some problems.........

"WHERE'D YA GET A RACK LIKE THAT?!"

To recap: nosebleed sexual symbolism, teenagers in love, panting women biting exposed necks, huge amounts of blushing and stuttering, goth imagery, riotous misbehaviour, blood everywhere, young ladies wearing school uniforms, guilty secrets, and cup sizes.

There isn't anything even remotely naughty about it.

It isn't till the very end of the second to the last book in the fourteen volume series that Karin and Kenta kiss.
They are happily married at the end of the story.
All ends well.

I've reread it several times.  The trials and tribulations of the two protagonists are both amusing and heartwarming, and there are parts that bring tears to my eyes.

The only mildly discordant element is the cleavage. 


Perverse people, those Japanese.

Delicious.




NOTE: Many manga take place in high schools, for the very simple reason that it's an easy way to bring a large number of characters into the tale, in situations which are recognizable to the audience: cultural festivals, school vacations, sports meets, and the many officially sanctioned clubs that are considered essential addenda to a balanced scholastic life (photography club, history club, astronomy club .....).
Consequently characters are often teenagers.
Most of the readers, however, are adults.



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THE ABILITY TO MOVE ON

The food was good, but I daydreamed throughout the meal. There was new year's festival music on the speaker system in the restaurant, and I could not help but remember when.....


Actually, I’ve been in a mijmering-mood all weekend. Remembering people who used to be important in my life, and though they no longer live, still are important.
My mother, who passed away in 1977. My grandmother, 1981. My father, 1990. My brother, and my father's second wife, 1993.
I miss them all. And I'm grateful that I knew them.

Of course, I also miss our cats.
Baines, a big fluffy tomcat who loved music. When my brother played an instrument, Baines would come from the bottom of the garden running all the way up to the house.
Dorothy, who was adventurous and very affectionate.
Her daughter Narnia figured out how to open and close doors - we didn't discover this till one day she brought her babies inside. A brilliant and creative puss indeed.
Narnia's grandkittens, however, were goofy. Quite likely the feline genetic stock in that part of the world was getting exhausted.


FELINE DREAMS

This morning I reread both volumes of a manga about a cat who several years after her death comes back as the twin-sister of her human, who is now in the last year and a half of high school. The cat looks in every way like a sibling....... except that she still has cat ears.
Oh, and big breasts, unlike her flat-chested sister. Gotta keep the teenage boy-audience entertained, even though it is a manga meant for girls.
There is no fan-service. No revealing nudity, no gratuitous views of panties or cleavage. No sexual innuendo. The one male high-school student who crops up in the lives of the two girls is clearly a geek, and NOT a love interest.
The story line, told through sometimes baffling four-panel strips, is aimed clearly at females.
The ending is extremely touching.
It brought tears to my eyes.
I admit to being a softie.

Actually, their home-room teacher is the most intriguing part of the tale. She's a dysfunctional gambling addict, whose teaching-subject is world history. But she is not above using her students grades as suggestions for lottery tickets, and when one of her colleagues invites her for cherry-blossom viewing, she arm-twists him to go to the race track instead. At one point she encourages cheating on tests to make it more likely that she'll win a bet. Her view of ethics is that as no bribes were involved, and there is plausible deniability, her hands are clean.

The twin-sister who is a cat is, unfortunately, not the best student in class by a wide margin.
It is her problem with tests which highlights the teacher's moral failings.


As I said, the end is touching. It is a fitting and happy conclusion to the tale, but it results in the other characters' memories of the cat-girl's previous two years among them being erased, and her friendship with them having to start anew.
The cat-sister does not remember either.
But the human sister cannot forget.

Memories bring sadness. Memories also give one pleasure.
Memories create a sense of belonging, of stability.

Without memory, nothing is new.


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MOUSE WEARING MEDIEVAL SAMURAI ARMOR

Nezumi Isamu moved cautiously across the field, deftly treading around the tall trunks that rose, pillar-like, from the ground. He could still smell the blood that had been spattered all around, which the recent rain had washed into the dirt where it perfumed the top layer. He held his long blade at ready, aware that with the crest (家紋 kamon) on his armour betraying his allegiances, he remained a target.

What he forgot was that in the grand scheme of things, a mouse wandering among the slain would be quite overlooked.
Even if he was the last living retainer of Shō No Kami on this blasted heath.
It had been a fierce battle. All the humans were dead.


鼠侠勇記

Thus begins a great manga adventure, featuring a heroic rodent seeking vengeance for the death of his liege during the Warring States Period (戰國時代 Sengoku Jidai).
It is a tale of gallantry, valour, and the very highest ideals a mouse can represent.

Characteristically, because it strives to appeal to readers among both genders, there is a bit of very innocent nudity: the mouse soon hooks up with a young girl (Tsuyuko), twixt whose soft bosoms he often sits while they travel the land.
The bosoms are significant as a theme, but not really ever actually shown. Their suggested presence peppers the pages just enough to keep a teenage boy fascinated. The girl to whom these items belong is fierce, yet modest.
Let us call her "the good woman of Kansai" (関西の淑女 Kinki No Musume), and take delight in the wordplay that the name allows us.

[In a further nod to the target audience of highschoolers - college-age adults - junior members of the office workforce, the hero Koenosama-kun calls Tsuyuko-chan either "imōto" (阿妹) or "kouhai" (後輩 'protégé', junior fellow disciple), whereas she defers to him as "Koshō-sama" ('lord Koshō') or "senpai" (先輩 'mentor', senior fellow disciple).
All this instead of the high-fallutin' and rather archaic polite language which the setting of the story would seem to require.]


No, I shall not tell you the name of the very nicely drawn fifty volume series of "Dai Nezumi-Kyo Yu Shoki" (大鼠侠勇書記), nor who the author is, or where it may be purchased.
For the very simple reason that, to the best of my knowledge, it has not been written yet.
But it should be.

I am clearly not the person to either write the story or illustrate it, unfortunately, and given how utterly minimal my knowledge of both the Japanese language and Japanese history is, trying to do so would be a Sisyphus-Arbeit of monumental proportions.
But I am thinking of sketching out some story-boards, just for the hell of it.
The idea of a mouse wearing mediaeval samurai armour, riding between the gentle swellings of a yukata-clad maiden, his head barely visible, sticking out of the garment where the cloth overlaps at the collar, is just too delightful not to give some form to.

Think of it as a literary hero-quest.


==========================================================================
NOTE: Readers may contact me directly: 
LETTER BOX.
All correspondence will be kept in confidence.
==========================================================================

JAPANESE WOMAN FANTASY: AKANE TENDO

One of the visual novels which I've been revisiting lately is Ranma ½, written by Japanese mangaka Rumiko Takahashi, published in serial form from 1987 through 1996.
The Chinese translation was completed long before the English translation, in consequence of which I have the entire series of 38 volumes in Chinese, but only a few volumes in English.

It's a good read. Especially when you realize that the author is a woman, writing for a largely female audience. That might not be immediately apparent, as many of the readers in the United States are teenage boys attracted by the clever illustrations of curvaceous insane girls.

Nominally it's about martial arts, but that is merely a story pretext. It's actually a piercing send-up of young Japanese women's self-images and their ideas about men.
Consequently the core characters are all female and (eventually) fully developed people, whereas the boys are often mono-dimensional, and have certain set behavioural patterns from which they barely deviate.

Except, that is, for the boy after whom the series is named: Ranma Saotome.
Who, a large part of the time, is actually a girl.
An extremely shapely girl.

[Explanation: Ranma and his father both fell into cursed pools that changed them into whatever drowned there a long time ago. Consequently when we first see them, Ranma in girl form is fighting with a large angry Panda. Being doused with hot water changes them back to their original shape. The accidental splash of cold water that transforms Ranma and his dad is a recurring comic motif - especially once ancient master Happosai, who is a dessicated old pervert of phenomenal proportions, arrives on the scene.]


"A VERY SWEET GIRL"

Ranma's relationship with Akane Tendo is the crux of the story. The two of them are, unwillingly, engaged to each other as per an agreement between their fathers.
Ranma at times is an insensitive clod.
And, in Akane's opinion, a pervert.

Akane is the one character without whom the story would have far less appeal. She's warm-hearted, intelligent, and capable, but she's also vulnerable and stubborn. As well as extremely short tempered, flying off the handle when irritated. Forcefully so.


"She's really a very sweet girl. She's just a violent maniac."


Everyone else in the series can be seen as tangential to her, she's the central character. Ranma's zany adventures and periodic gender-switching always either revolve around her or interact with her.
That is something that you would not really understand if you were reading the work for the frequent bits of voluptuous nudity - a worthwhile pursuit on its own, as it is very nicely drawn - but without Akane as the lynchpin there really is no story.

This is especially noticeably when you contrast Akane's central role with the comedic interludes that feature Shampoo, that being a young lady who precisely and approximately represents the quintessence of every male teenager's sex-bombe fantasy.
Shampoo, the most over-the-top voluptuous of the many attractive female characters, is absolutely predictable. In every episode in which she appears, she will at some point throw herself at clueless Ranma while entirely naked. Given how she has been drawn, those pages are undoubtedly the most treasured of a young boy's possessions.
Not surprisingly, she is the most avidly sought-after of action-figures among the entire cast of the story.


INNOCENT DEPRAVITY

Probably not coincidentally, Shampoo is also one of the most violent, devious, and ethically limited of the characters. Unlike Akane, Shampoo has no compunction whatsoever about using dirty tricks and blackmail to achieve her goal, that ultimately being marriage to Ranma.
She is likeable, admirable even, but 100% a loose cannon.

It says a lot about the Japanese that the most sexual of women in this work is also the most psychotic, conniving, and extrovert.
What says even more than that though is that Shampoo is not even Japanese.
Being Japanese means having limits; being foreign implies freedom from constraints.
That, and the operatic cartoon violence in every episode - obviously how the author and probably many other Japanese women would LIKE to react to the simple minded males that surround them - indicate that on one level this is by no means just another manga harem comedy with luscious fan service to keep the attention of the masculine reader, but a complex farrago of repressed urges and frustrations to which the characters react, or that they perforce act out.
The tale is, in that sense, one of release.

On an entirely different level, it is also about female courage and steadfastness. Those two traits are fundamental to an understanding of Akane. While the males demonstrate all their weaknesses and irritate the spit out of the women, the females show strength of character and true spirit - despite clobbering the males or kicking them through the roof.
The males are flighty and (at times) deviant, the women are resolute and strong.

Female empowerment humorously writ in every episode.
With appealing visuals for perverts.
There's nothing like it.
Great stuff.
Art.



==========================================================================
NOTE: Readers may contact me directly:
LETTER BOX.
All correspondence will be kept in confidence.
==========================================================================

THREE VERSIONS OF JAPANESE WOMANHOOD

I shall confess right off the top that the title of this post is misleading. The versions of womanhood that will be presented are by no means typical of womanhood, nor of the Japanese, though they are in fact very Japanese indeed.
The title was meant to draw you in while I indulge in my fascination with graphic novels (manga).


MANGA HEROINES

There are several different types of women who feature as main characters in graphic novels, but most of them represent not so much the praedictable fetish-femme of western light literature, but an interesting blend of character traits combined with a physical type.
The physical type need not match the character, and sometimes the contrasts between types and characters are used for comic or dramatic effect (many of the girls in Ranma ½, for instance, are both cute-as-the-dickens and super-violent).
In some manga, the physical type is not particularly significant - either the artist is simply hung up on a particular set of drawing conventions ('can't draw for sh..!'), or the editorial board decided that a certain type would attract a certain market segment (the violent chicks in Ranma ½ appeal to healthy teenage boys of all ages, the four big-eyed high-school moppets of Raki-Suta, oddly, seem only to have a following of perverts and degenerates - Konachan especially attracts the attention of the future sexfiends of America).



THREE GIRL MANGAS



SUNSHINE SKETCH ひだまりスケッチ
[Physical type: saccharine-cute.]

Sunshine Sketch (Hidamari Sukechi), is a four-panel strip about the daily lives of four girls at the Yamabuki Art High School. The characters differ in predictable ways - the rambunctious one (Miyako, 宮子) , the sensitive and mature one (Hiro, ヒロ), the talented cunning one (Sae, 沙英), and of course the main character, Yuno, (ゆの), who is altogether very nice. The illustration style takes cuteness to an almost Hello-Kitty like level of candy floss: cute round heads, cute big big eyes, cute angelic smiles, cute neat little bodies in cute neat little school uniforms in cute cute cute settings and situations.......... If cute makes you barf, you might want to avoid this one. Read Azumanga Daioh instead; far less cute, much more wit, and a sly sense of dementia.



SAMURAI CHAMPLOO サムライチャンプルー
[Physical type: simple and elegant.]

A manga derived from the anime of the same name. Champloo is actually the Okinawan word 'Chanpuru' (to mix or mess together). A period piece, a ronin epic, and a bitter comedic opera.
There are three characters - Jin, the intellectual and extremely skilled swordsman who carves up opponents with single-minded ferocity; Mugen, a brash, unwashed, eternally hungry violent young man with a sword; and Fuu, a petite teenage waitress with somewhat large bosoms, who hires both men to protect her while she goes on a quest. She has a furry pet named Momo (peach, flying squirrel) who lives inside her clothing. The events of their journey to the south are told in the episodes. There are references to western painters, and to hip hop music. It is ultra violent. And very enjoyable. Fuu is more irritating to many of the people they encounter than either of the two psychopathic swordsmen accompanying her. The illustration style is lavish - more so in the anime.

On the very first page, the ravenous Mugen eats a frog, to the distress of a little boy whose mother tells him to 'ignore the bad man'. On the next page the violence starts. This is a good wholesome read for the entire family.



FUJOSHI RUMI 妄想少女オタク系
[Physical type: stylized realistic.]

Mousou Shoujo Otaku Kei, translated into English as Fujoshi Rumi ('rotten girl Rumi'), is a sendup of the Otaku world, written for borderline otakus, by someone who is probably an otaku.
[Otaku refers to the type of young person who is socially inept and relies on manga, anime, and computer games for interactions with the world. Often they are painfully shy, incapable of speaking without frequent use of references and quotes drawn from their reading material (kind of like talmedim), and given to seeing everything in terms of their constructed meta-reality (how yeshivish!). They're also rather like the timid software engineers who roam in giant flocks between here and San Jose, as well as trekkies, lord-of-the-ringies, and others of that ilk.]
The heroine is a shy, nerdy aficionado of Yaoi - gay men love stories written for a female audience. This shades her interpretation of the interactions of two male classmates, and at first she does not realize that one of them is attracted to her, because she thinks that he and the other boy are a couple. She emotionally supports them in their beautiful romantic choice - they are totally baffled, not realizing what she thinks of them. Only when a second girl interferes does it finally become clear, and at this point, Rumi goes entirely over the top Otaku-wise when it turns out that the other girl is a kindred spirit who is also entranced by Yaoi romances.
Full-throttle geek action!

Both girls, by the way, embody several graphic fetishes at once. Rumi is short, shy, curvy, clumsy, blushes easily, has pigtails, and wears huge spectacles (mmmm, blushing, twin-tails, meganeko!). Matsui is leggy, wears short school-girl uniform skirts, and has cleavage that most teenage Japanese girls would die for - how much more so their male classmates!

The story develops as a tale of clumsy romantic intentions thwarted by misunderstanding and nerd-tendencies. Two normal boys, two innocently twisted girls. At the end of volume two, Rumi announces dramatically that she will not let a boy have Matsui's soft breasts and narrow waist, she will have them for herself!
It is clear that if a gay man wanted them, she would have approved wholeheartedly - she is, after all, not herself a lesbian, merely a lover of gay manga heroes. Two totally normal, totally heterosexual, totally clueless male specimens like Abe and Chiba, cannot possible appreciate or deserve the perfect anime-heroine ideal represented by Matsui.
If they were gay, on the other hand......

This is a very clean manga, with almost none of the fan-service that would shock or excite innocent little yeshiva boys. But because of it's subject matter, it should be hidden under your mattress.
Women readers might not get it, despite the humour - you ladies still don't quite understand the geek-nerd phenomenon, nor the thing about blushing, pigtails, spectacles, and school-girl uniforms.
Nevertheless I recommend it highly.

SEVERELY TWISTED TAILS

Despite the title, this is not about nekomimi, though it is about manga.
[Manga: Japanese graphic novels and comic-strips. Nekomimi: catgirls - usually impossibly vixenish damsels with cat ears and long furry tails that extend out from their short short skirts or tight tight shorts.]


There are three manga series which I am currently reading: Chibi Vampire, Pretty Face, and Ghost Talker's Daydream.


CHIBI VAMPIRE

The first is a charming tale about a defective teenage vampire, who is easily embarrassed. Unlike other members of her family, Karin doesn't hide during daytime, and doesn't drink blood - she expels it in huge gushing torrents from her nose once a month instead. Yes, nosebleeds are a Japanese illustrative convention indicating sexual excitement. No, here it simply means that she is chock-full of blood. And let us not talk about what 'normal' girls do once a month with blood.

Volume ten hit the bookstore recently, and I have already devoured it (tongue delicately rimming the lips of my slightly open mouth). I have been avidly following the story since I first discovered it several months ago, and I delight in every new twist to Karin and her shy classmate Kenta Usui's budding relationship. There is nothing sexual here (unless you have a filthy mind, which I do), and the interplay of the various characters has a distinct dysfunctional charm.

There are some memorable bits - "Mommy, why are you dragging daddy across the floor?" "'Cause he's an idiot, that's why!". But mostly it is just a charming romance between two young people who are social klutzes, against a background of their friends and relatives who are also not entirely socially adept. Most especially so the eternally young sex-bomb grandmother, whose psychotic episodes and homicidal tendencies paint a much more cheering picture of senescence than we normally expect.



PRETTY FACE

Self-centered dim bulb high school karate club leader wakes from a coma more than a year after a disastrous traffic accident. Psychotic plastic surgeon Dr. Jun Manabe has worked on him during that time, and restored him to normal appearance.

The problem is that Dr. Manabe didn't know who he was working on, and has rebuilt his face to exactly resemble the girl that our hero had a schoolboy crush on........ Who, with her family, are now convinced that the long-lost twin sister has finally returned after running away several months ago. Albeit with some gaps in her memory.
Doctor Manabe wants to finish the job - a full sex change, with some nips, tucks, inserts - the young man will not hear of it. Meanwhile, everybody is convinced that he is indeed a girl.

It's a straightforward story about your basic gender-bending cross-dressing ultra-cute border-line hermaphrodite, in other words. With plenty of scope for high camp, high jinks, and high drama.

It just isn't particularly good.

By the end of volume two there is little more there than a tale featuring a cast of sexy girls drawn in a stereotypic fashion, with frequent panty shots, panic about being discovered, drooling schoolboys from the karate club (who do not realize that the object of their affection is their former leader), and scenes of amusing discomfit.
This is scarcely worth a second glance - I doubt I will purchase any further volumes.



GHOST TALKER'S DAYDREAM

Small violent teenage albino necromancing dominatrix solves crimes. Great story, surprisingly low level of fan-service (Fan Service: curvy thighs, tight cotton panties, lacy bra edges, etcetera - in this case some rather startling outfits that leave almost nothing to the imagination while nevertheless leaving everything to the imagination).

Humour: What do you do when you're not wearing panties, because a stalker who broke into your apartment stole them all (leaving several thousand yen in their place), and you stumble and land on your posterior, your short dress flipped up to expose your paipan to a garage full of startled mechanics?

Do you A) explain that no underwear and no pubic hair is healthy, good for the circulation; B) inform them you are merely obeying your dying mom's last wish; C) kill all witnesses and dispose of their bodies in the trunk of a car; or D) furiously act as if nothing out of the ordinary happened.

The answer, it turns out, is D.

High heels are dangerous. I've always thought so. This proved it.

A kinui is a daemon rope that serves it's mistress, and will only feed on a victim if she permits it. Normally it is hidden on her body, masquerading as typical Japanese rope-bondage art, interwoven and connecting like a complicated and symmetrical cats-cradle tightly wound around the torso and the fatty thighs.

Mmmmmm, fatty thighs.

MAZZEL TOV, YOU PERVERT

Two of the more socially acceptable fetishes evinced in Japanese Manga and Anime have to do with spectacles and sailor suits.
Spectacles ('megane') are seen by the fans as emphasizing the woman's attractive qualities, accentuating the face and brightening the eyes.
Sailor suits ('seifuku', 'sera-fuku') as worn by high-school girls, well....., I'm not entirely sure what they do. But it's very much like the plaid skirts worn by little Catholic school girls, and subject to the same perverse fantasies. Something about nice thighs, I guess. Plump smooth even-textured and hued feminine leg skin. Delicious.
[There's an entire subdivision of the rag trade vending used seifuku, skirts especially, for role-playing and bed-room fantasies. It is much more wholesome than the sale of used panties in the US, which is baffling and demented - but who am I to judge your foibles?]


For those who wish to see what the fuss is about, here's a link to a totally clean page about seifuku:
http://hontouni.com/taihendesu/?p=577

And here's a link that is just a little bit naughty:
http://animedesho.animeblogger.net/?p=2659


For the spectacle "thing", here's Mizuhara Koyomi (水原 暦), from the series Azumanga Daioh (also totally clean):
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Koyomi_Mizuhara

Please note that Koyomi-chan is not wearing a sailor suit. And gracious doesn't she look adorable. You are probably not surprised to hear that huge (huge!) numbers of lonely teenage men think of her as the perfect date. Without anything perverted in mind, just an all-encompassing otaku loneliness that divorces them from the impossibility of meeting her, or the painful realization that SHE. IS. NOT. A. REAL. PERSON!
[We won't even mention the fact that the typical otaku is a walking conversational disaster zone, nearly incapable of actually speaking to a real woman. Or to any other normal human. Much like a soft-ware engineer, in other words.]


There's also a third fetish, that can combine with either of the two mentioned above: cat ears.
Nekomimi ("cat-ears" - 猫耳) or nekomusume ("cat damsel" - 猫娘) show up only occasionally in manga and anime, but are very often featured in cosplay and fan art collections.
[Put on your cat ears, and remove everything else except that red velvet ribbon around your left thigh - ooooooooooh, now you're "purr-fect"!]


So, to recap: School uniform. Cat ears. Glasses. Seifuku - Nekomimi - Meganeko.
The keys to a healthy sex life.
Now you know.
It's what you've been waiting for your whole life.
Your mother will be so glad that you finally got married.

MORE MANGA? MORE MANGA! PANTSU?

I am currently reading two manga series set in Japanese high schools.

Japanese high schools all have similar layouts, which allows many readers to automatically relate, and greatly simplifies set-design. Having most of the story take place in a high school or having most of the characters attend high school also gives the author a number of ready-made situations where other characters can be introduced.
And, for fan-service ('decorative feminine visuals'), the baths, sports fields, stairwells, roof tops, etcetera, can all be used for pantsu (views of feminine underwear), accidental bosom gropes, naughty winds that blow up skirts, our hero's face landing in inconvenient places........


However, neither of these two manga series are about fan-service. No pantsu!


桜蘭高校 OURAN HIGH SCHOOL

Ouran High School Host Club is a comedy series that deals with the clichées of manga drawn for a female audience. With the exception of the hero, all main characters are male. Shallow, silly, self-indulgent rich-boy male. But the 'hero' is female - we don't find that out till chapter three.
Of all the boys, our hero (who isn't a boy) is the most likeable. He (she) is drawn in such a way that you cannot tell that he (she) is actually 'that other gender', and in any case 'that other gender' doesn't really enter into the story. What could be homo-eroticism is neutered by the egomania of the boys and the superficiality of their emotions.

[Wiki: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ouran_High_School_Host_Club]



クロマティ高校 CROMARTIE HIGH SCHOOL

On the other hand, Cromartie High School is deep. Truly deep.
It's about angst-ridden delinquents. A very texty manga.

Cromartie High School is notorious for having the most violent and under-achieving students. Bullies, thugs, extortionists, criminals, and psychopaths.

Again, no pantsu.

It is by far the better of the two series.

From Wikipedia's entry on Cromartie High School, here are some of the characters:


Yutaka Takenouchi (竹之内豊, Takenōchi Yutaka)
The leader of Cromartie High's first-year students. Known to be an incredible fighter and a reliable person. His weakness (unknown to everyone else) is motion sickness. Though he loves field trips and excursions in general, he hates having to travel because he gets sick very easily, and struggles with all of his might not to vomit.


Gorilla (ゴリラ, Gorira, Hiromi Go (豪ヒロミ, Gō Hiromi))
A gorilla. He sometimes wears a watch and is considered smarter than most of the main characters. He is also an extremely talented sushi chef. He has a sister who looks just like him but has prettier eyes and a red/pink flower on her left ear.


Shinichi Mechazawa (メカ沢新一, Mechazawa Shin'ichi)
One of the most notorious delinquents of Cromartie. Though it is suspected that he is actually a robot, no one but the main characters (Kamiyama, Hayashida, Maeda, etc.) seems to notice, including himself.

[Wiki: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cromartie_High_School]


I should mention that Savage Kitten has also been reading Cromartie High School. It is somewhat disconcerting, while lying in bed with my first cup of coffee, to hear loud hoots of hysterical laughter from the kitchen. I am not ready for loud anything at that hour. But because it starts her day off with a smile I will tolerate it. Encourage it, even.

This is some good stuff. Even without pantsu.

最後の制服

I am currently reading The Last Uniform (Saigo no Sei-fuku).
No, this is not some serious work of literature about militarism in pre-war Japan, or about post-war despair. It does not feature a protagonist agonizing over the conflict between morality and duty. It is not a soul-searching memoir of life at the front, or the futility of being an honest man in a world gone mad. It is not angst-ridden.


It's about darling little teenage lesbians at a boarding school.
The uniform which is meant is the sailor-suit type get-up with pleated skirts worn by Japanese high-school girls.


The characters live in a dorm. Each girl has a roommate. There is no sex. The illustrations are very un-teasing. These little dears are innocent and charming, rather than depraved or pantingly in-heat. Some of the dialogue is over-the-top. There are (heart-felt) crushes. There is hot tea before lights-out. And sometimes there are delicious pastries. It is all very adorable.


=========================

The Last Uniform (最後の制服, Saigo no Sei-fuku) is a manga written by Mera Hakamada.
The English translation is published by Seven Seas Entertainment. Volumes one and two are already available, volume three is still in the works, due out in August 2008. Each volume costs $11.99.
It is not about pantsu or fan-service, hence unsuitable for teenage boys.

YURI - BROAD SPECTRUM GIRL STUFF

Discovered another great blog about yuri manga / anime.
Here:
http://talesteller.wordpress.com/ (~ idolatry ~ for the love of lilies).


The discovery was courtesy a posting by Okazu, who put a link to a detailed synopsis of the movie Seifuku no Eve in this post:
http://okazu.blogspot.com/2008/01/yuri-live-action-renai-shindan-seifuku.html.
The link was to this:
http://talesteller.wordpress.com/2007/09/24/renai-shindan-seifuku-no-eve/

[By the way, dear reader, if you're a yeshiva bocher, you should probably stop reading this post right now, as this stuff may disturb you. Or excite you. Neither eventuality is something that I wish to think about. Once you've calmed down, we can talk.]

I'm sorry, Talesteller-san, I didn't read the entire synopsis - the mention of borrowing clothes (yukata, girls' school uniform) sent my mind off on a journey of its own.



I particularly like of the stated purpose of Talesteller's blog:

[QUOTE]
"This blog focuses on yuri, simply because there aren’t enough yuri fans around yet. =P (Okay, it’s also a place where I can let the yuri fangirl in me out.)
By yuri, I am referring to all sorts of girlxgirl relationships, running the gamut from innocent to adult, and not "hawt lesbo secks!!!" which seems to be the stereotype. In other words, I use the Japanese definition of the word yuri and not the American definition."
[END QUOTE]

I have utterly no problem with hot lethbo-thecks myself, but it doesn't really meet my definition of fun casual reading. Which is one of the reasons why I like yuri manga - most yuri manga seem to have far more character development than much of the stuff aimed at the teenage boy market. If the author has to sacrifice an overemphasis on fanservice (curves, thighs, calves, panties, panties, panties, boobies - repeat three times followed by 'ah-oogah'), there is no excuse for not having a story. The pages seem so empty otherwise.

[To give you a better idea of the differences, in a boys' (shonen, seinen) manga our hero accidentally spots a nice naked breast at the very beginning (page one), whereupon he has a nose-bleed, accidentally sees her in the bath in the next chapter, whereupon he has a nose-bleed and she hits him with a bath-bucket. A yuri manga, on the other hand, has her thrilled at starting a new school year, wandering through a park, blush prettily, and several pages later have a first tender kiss or handclutch somewhere near the end of volume three. Or brutally slaughter a gangster. There will be butterflies, there may be nightmares.
Hotsprings, beaches, and chocolate may occur in both types of manga. Bath-buckets may occur in either type. The phrase "aack, you pervert!" is less likely to show up in yuri.]


The quote from Talesteller contrasts nicely with a great line from Okazu: "I know I've said it before, but I adore evil, psychotic lesbians." This was in reference to Gunsmith Cats Burst Volume 4. She gives it a high rating. Goldie gets her freak back on (I'm not sure what that means - Okazu said it).
I'll probably have to buy the book. Goldie sounds like a nice person.

MORE MANGA FUN

If you didn't think so before, after reading this you will be convinced that Japanese girls are either stark-raving bonkers or interesting and worth getting to know better.


A selection of four Japanese comics, readable on line.


1.Ichigo100% (Strawberry100%)

Manaka Junpei one day goes to the roof of his school to admire the view. While there, a beautiful school girl falls from the utility shed right on top of him, exposing her strawberry panties. The girl runs away before Junpei can find out her name. Junpei is enchanted by both the girl and the event itself, and even though he barely saw her face he is desperate to find the girl again - but all he knows about her is that she has a pair of strawberry-patterned panties.

It turns out that wearing Strawberry panties is not at all uncommon ......
http://www.onemanga.com/Ichigo100%25/


2.
Midori Days

Seiji Sawamura is the toughest brawler at his high-school, who can always be counted on to protect other students from bullies, thugs, and gangs. But he is really a lonely guy who wants nothing more than to find a girl-friend - a quest not helped by his roughness and reputation. One day he wakes up to discover that his right hand has become a miniature woman who loves him.

Midori is an extremely shy girl who has had a crush on Seiji for a long time; she went into a coma while her more extrovert side manifested itself as Seiji's hand. At the end of the series she returns to her own body, with no memory of the wonderful time she and Seiji spent together, but with enough courage to finally speak to him.

Despite the totally pervy premise, this is a rather sweet tale.
http://www.onemanga.com/Midori_no_Hibi/


3.Mysterious Girlfriend X

Urabe Mikoto is an antisocial girl who often sleeps at her desk. One day, fellow-student Tsubaki tries to wake her up after school is over, and accidentally tastes her drool - to which, because he has a crush on her, he becomes addicted.

Once he starts going out with her, he discovers that she carries around scissors in her panties - she is disturbingly skilled and quick with scissors.
http://www.onemanga.com/Mysterious_Girlfriend_X/


4.
Omamori Himari

Once Yuuto turned sixteen, the spell protecting him became ineffective and supernatural monsters try to kill him because he is descended from a long line of daemon-hunters. But his deceased parents had arranged for Himari - an ultra-violent and extremely curvaceous cat daemon-samurai girl - to protect Yuuto once the spell wore off.
There is only one problem: Yuuto is extremely allergic to cats.

Oh, and his girl-friend is not pleased by having the extremely curvy Himari living with him either.
http://www.onemanga.com/Omamori_Himari/


------------------------------------


There are also a few other great manga out there which cannot be read on-line, so you will have to borrow them from the library or hope that a degenerate friend buys them.


Hyper Police
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hyper_Police
In the distant future the lines separating the world of demon-creatures and the world of humans have blurred. The humans are a small minority, officially protected and cared for by society.

The main characters in this manga are a cute spazzy underage electric cat-girl bounty hunter, and her tough werewolf colleague, who recruited her into the force and takes a protective interest in her; he has a monumental crush on her but is too shy to make a move, she is totally innocent about sexual matters and simply regards him as a very close friend with whom to commit mega-violence, explosive mayhem, and destructive acts.

This is one of the most enjoyable over-the-top manga out there. It is very twisted and very Japanese, and it teaches us two things about shapely teenage cat-daemons: Kahlua and cream will turn you into an outrageous drunk, and, apparently, licking someone and rubbing your scent all over them does NOT mean that you are in heat.



Kashimashihttp://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Kashimashi:_Girl_Meets_Girl

After the girl to whom he confessed his love rejects him, Hazumu goes up the mountain outside of town to think things over, where a space-ship crashes into him and kills him. The aliens repair his destroyed body and revive him, but in the process have changed him into a her, all the way down to his dna.

His parents are overjoyed at this change (they always wanted a darling daughter), his best friend is furious (she appears to have had a secret crush on him), and the girl who rejected him before his gender-switch now passionately admits her love for her. This is a coming-of-age comedy about high-school students, with some affectionate lesbianism thrown in. Very sweet.



Yubisaki Milk Tea
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Yubisaki_Milk_Tea
When his sister has a hot date, Yoshinori goes to the studio to tell the photographer that his sister cannot come for the scheduled photo-shoot of bridal gowns. He gets talked into modelling instead - a little dab of make-up, some padding, and the result is surprising. Because of this, he discovers that he likes cross-dressing.

The classmate he has a crush on will not talk to him unless he's in drag; she is uncomfortable around boys, and prefers him as a woman. The girl next door, on the other hand, is deeply in love with the boy she grew up with, and for most of the series does not realise that Yuki and Yoshinori are the same person.

His best friend also does not know that Yuki and Yoshinori are the same - and wants to date Yuki.


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Just remember: Panties, school girl uniforms, operatic violence, and strange situations.
All good stories have these four elements. Plus occasionally, sushi.

Note: The sushi is especially useful if there is a shapely cat-daemon in your life. Cat-daemons love fishy things. They also like batting around the elves who make armour-piercing bullets, so you must occassionally distract them - with sushi.

GOALS UPDATED, NOW AND HERE!

Our HR department has been a right yenta to everybody, reminding us every other day that we need to turn in our goals for the year.

This is something we do on a yearly basis.
Our "goals" are supposed to be 'new-and-improved' every time.
Specific, Measurable, Attainable, Realistic, Time-bound.
Pro-active. With action verbs and out-of-the-box thoughts. Concrete.

......errm?

I'm a beancounter.

My goals do not change, neither does my job.

I do not deal in vague, unquantifiable garbage.

I am not in Marketing, nor in Sales.


How do I write, in acceptable career-speak, that I simply want to do the same thing as last year, without customers or salespeople screaming at me too often, without overmuch oversight, or irrelevant input from other departments, and without being told how to save the planet feed the starving conserve energy husband resources avoid sugar consider vegetarianism sponsor a child pray for peace plus an end to world hunger everybody happy our troops the president and the democratic candidate?

Sorry, that question is a bit long and hence confusing, let me shorten it for you...... "Can't you please shut up?!?"


I know they're not interested in my real goals.

Sleep more. Read interesting stuff. Understand the parshas better. Learn more of other languages. Stuff more into my memory. Eat things I haven't eaten before. Avoid dealing with the inane.

Seriously, I need to get back up to speed with Chinese - I guess that means rereading a whole bunch of stuff, including MengTze, SunTze, Six Records of a Floating Life, Under The Red Banner, plus a whole lot of Ba Jin and the Chinese translation of Ranma½.
And re-watching all my favourite Hong Kong Gangster flicks.

Can do. This is realist and concrete. With action verbs, and without a box. There is no box.

I also want to take a stab at learning Japanese - my favourite manga series have not been fully published in English yet, and I'm desperate to find out what happens next. Some of the tales have not even been officially translated - there are rogue translations on the internet, but these get taken down once the copyright holders discover them and kick up a fuss. Plus many of the manga sites are infested with groisse perverts looking for chibi, ultra-moe, and hentai....... Or little girlie-women who just wuv(!) childish characters with big shiny round eyes and cuuuute big round heads.
Plus flowers, butterflies, widdle doggie-woggies, and other loveable vomit. It's a saccharine swamp out there.

Is there a manga about a fully dressed thirty-year old Hispanic woman who drinks Jameson and arm-wrestles rednecks?

If there is, it'll never be translated.
And I just gotta read it.
Betcha she finds tattoos and piercings just as silly as I do.
With tons of action verbs.

IS IT A BREAST THING? PANTIES!

It has been one heck of a weekend.

Savage Kitten and I spent all of Saturday and Sunday in the sack.

No, it's not what you think.
Would that it were. And had it been, I would certainly NOT be posting about it.
Instead, it was disease.

On Saturday I sounded most like leaky steampipes, on Sunday she surpassed me.


Hack, spit, cough. Hoest, rochel, kuch. Braaaaaaachchchch!


So what do a sick toad and a sick kitten do when bedbound by respiratory distress?

They read.

As you may have noticed from some previous entries, I'm on a manga kick. Current series I'm reading are:


Lady Snow Blood (修羅雪姫, Shurayuki-hime - http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lady_Snowblood )
A totally bonzo gloomy splatter saga with moody illustrations. Blood, death, gore, and cold hard steel.


Chibi Vampire (かりん, Karin - http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Karin_(manga)
A sweet off-the-wall tale about a shy and easily embarrassed defective vampire and the fellow high-schooler she has a crush on - in volume six, matters come to a head, she very nearly admits her feelings, and the last page is a cliff-hanger.
Volume seven does not come out for several more weeks, volume eight sometime in Spring.


GTO - Great Teacher Onizuka (グレート・ティーチャー・オニヅカ, Gurēto Tīchā Onizuka - http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Great_Teacher_Onizuka ).
Horndog biker slacker college grad decides to become a teacher after peeping up girls skirts at the mall. But having gone into teaching, he discovers that he is handicapped with a sense of ethics that prevents him from exploiting people. Seemingly he is the only person in the classroom he teaches who is so cursed, as his teenage students consist of thuggish louts, hot sluts, blackmailers, nasty girls, young toughs, and violent sleazebags. It's a darn good read.


Both Chibi Vampire and GTO are funny. Lady Snow Blood is only humorous if you are warped. Or have a brutal sense of irony.

This is Japanese literature at it's finest.

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NOTE - OTHER MANGA SERIES WORTH MENTIONING:

Ranma½ (らんま½ - http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ranma_%C2%BD)
I already read all of Ranma½ in Chinese, so I kinda lost interest in the English-language version a while back. But it's a fun series, and well worth reading.

InuYasha (犬夜叉 - http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/InuYasha)
After a while it becomes repetitive. Just how much can you read about a high-school girl and a dog-demon? Evenso, it is very beautiful.


Both Ranma½ and Inuyasha are by Rumiko Takahashi, a very well-known mangaka, whose other works are also worth looking into. Lum (Urushei Yatsura), Rumic World, Rumic Theatre, Maison Ikkoku - some very good reading here.


Ai Yori Aoshi (藍より青し - http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ai_Yori_Aoshi).
If you're a male, this is a likeable piece of sexist fluff, and an incredibly easy read - primarily because not much goes on, for sixteen chapters, at the end of which childhood sweethearts Kaoru Hanabishi and Aoi Sakuraba finally do get married. It is all very easy on the eyes, and illustrates abundantly that the Japanese have a breast-fetish that beats Americans out of the water. They trump us, we might as well admit it, their breast-thing is far bigger than ours.

As is their panty thing - I don't think Americans even have a panty thing to speak of.

DRY AND BRITTLE

I'm being lazy today. I don't feel like writing anything original. But I crave your continued attention. So, just in case y'all didn't get enough Azumanga Daioh in the last post, here's more.

At the pool (dry and brittle).http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=jm-gz-MwHJ4&feature=related
[Lawzy, Kimura-sensei is a creep.]


For the benefit of a commenter on a previous post, here's a small selection that really captures the personality of Kasuga Ayumu (Osaka-san), a transfer student who is a bit dreamy.

Osaka-san gets hiccoughs. Persistent.http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=7HTIy_2lCzg&feature=related

Osaka-san at a crosswalk.http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=akl3tfDwP0w&feature=related

Osaka-san selling stuffed animals during the school-fair.http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=zL-fdimcMoA&NR=1



And this is a classic:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=rYGrOSn2WNY
Miss Kurosawa (Nyamo-san) drinks sake, and explains stuff that isn't, strictly speaking, in the PhysEd programme (don't worry, it's totally clean).

I think I'll spend most of tomorrow reading manga, and eating treif.
Happy new year, y'all.


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VARIOUS ADDENDADADADA

The opening credits, and a very nice giddy opening theme song:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ve1U1Vh8DLg&eurl=http://jp.truveo.com/Azumanga-Daioh-Opening/id/917088180

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Lyrics


Lu, La lu, La lu,
Piano wa sekai no yumesaku nohara ni melody;
Kowareta tokei wo shinjite, jikan wa dare no mikata?
Lu, La lu, La lu,
The piano plays a song in the field of blooming dreams;
Believe the broken clock, who's side will time be on?

Doushite konna ni watashi no mune yasashii dareka wo matteruno?
Oshiete sutekina mirai,
Moonlight,moonlight sleeping!
Why does my heart wait so much for that tender-hearted someone?
Tell me my wonderful future,
Moonlight,moonlight sleeping!

Lu, La lu, La lu,
Omoide ringo ni mezame no shoujo ga kiss shite,
Setsunaku hirogeta hon niwa futari no bell ga naruyo.
Lu, la lu la, lu la
The waking maiden will kiss the apple of memory, and
In the book opened with sorrow and hope, the bell meant for both of us will
Ring.

Dakishimetaikara itoshiihito,
Mou nakanaidene,
Good bye sadness,
Fushigina tobira no moji wa 'Soramimi keiku'.
Because I want to embrace my dear one,
Don't cry any longer,
Good bye sadness,
The words on the mysterious door read 'fancy hearing cake'.

Wonderland!
Youkoso kiminiwa,
Fairyland!
Ai no mahou nano,
Love's all way!
Mainichi fuwafuwa komugi no yuuwaku
Wonderland!
Welcome to you,
Fairyland! It's love's magic
Love's all way!
Every day, the fluffy temptations of wheat.

Cake for you!
Tabetene konya wa,
Tea for you! seiza no ochakai,
Mado ni tenshi no chorus
Kiminiwa soramimi 'sukidayo, sukidayo no koe'?
Cake for you! Please eat tonight!
Tea for you! A tea-party in the stars,
The chorus of fairies at your window, did you just imagine hearing
That voice saying "I love you, I love you"?


Lu, La lu, La lu,
Piano ni sekai wa yumemiru chiisana melody,
Yubikara inori no waltz ga afureteii kimochine.
Lu, La lu, La lu,
The piano plays the world a tiny melody of dreaming,
A waltz of prayer overflows from the fingers and it feels nice.

Itsudemo sunaona watashi no mune shizuka ni nemuri no aisatsu,
Himitsu no onegai dakara,
Holly, Holly whisper.
My heart is ever true, quietly welcoming sleep,
It is the secret wish,
Holly, Holly whisper.

Lu, La lu, La lu,
dokodemo danro wa mikkagetten kara oriruhimo
Kogoeru tabibito no kokoro tokashite,
Hug shiteruyo.
Lu, La lu, La lu,
Everywhere the fires, even when the crescent moon sinks from the
sky
Hug the chilled traveller's heart.

Kireina kuuki ni hikari no michi mayowasu arukeba,
Welcome pleasure,
Hitomi ni ukanda moji wa 'Soramimi no keiku'.
A bright path in the fresh air, if I walk along steadily,
Welcome pleasure,
The words before my eyes say 'fancy hearing cake'.

Wonderland!
Youkoso kiminiwa,
Fairyland!
Koi no yorokobi wo,
Love's all way!
Mainichi wakuwaku komugi no bouken.
Wonderland!
Welcome to you
Fairyland!
The pleasure of affection,
Love's all way!
Every day these exciting adventures in wheat.

Cake for you!
Chiisana shiawase
Tea for you!
Daisukina egao de,
Mado ni tenshi no chorus
Kiminiwa soramimi 'sukidayo sukidayo no koe'?
Cake for you! A little happiness,
Tea for you! With a huge smile,
The chorus of angels at your window, did you just imagine hearing
That voice saying "I love you, I love you"

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Ending theme: Raspberry heaven
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=V8C2477LaGY&feature=related

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The test-market short for Azumanga Daioh:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=gF3q32yMGSI&NR=1

Note that this short was intended to see if there was a large enough audience to release it on the internet - there turned out to be enough demand to release it as a full series on television. It is now available in a five cd set - subtitled and dubbed versions.