Merlin

It’s been a long time since I’ve said anything here. Not that nothing good has happened – my 5×10 concert goods FINALLY arrived, and I have been completely, completely addicted to the new Arashi song – but midterm week is crunch time in a very, very bad way. But I survived my Japanese oral (yay!), and so I am finally relaxing for a moment. And since it’s a Saturday, relaxing means Merlin! And right now, it especially means this:

Gosh, this video is just haunting. It’s a different side to Merlin than is usually portrayed, but I think it works wonderfully. This may be why I really love the show: it can be so funny and silly (the not!hug in today’s episode, for example…), but it still has that magic and power and darkness to it. And I love it. (Except, of course, that it needs more Morgana. Because it always needs more Morgana).

Little April Showers

Sometimes, when it rains, the water seems to soak down to my bones. I wrap my arms around myself, shivering, and hurry onwards. Sometimes I refuse to go out at all, knowing that I am trapped wherever I currently sit.

Sometimes, when it rains, I feel as though I could walk in it forever. I hold out my hands to catch the raindrops, and turn my face towards the sky. And I smile at how beautiful it is.

I guess it’s all just a matter of perspective.

Childhood Memories

So, this post on the redesign of Rainbow Brite has got me thinking. I never knew Rainbow Brite when I was little, so I don’t have particularly strong feelings on the issue of her “cool” new redesign. However, at the bottom of the page is a doll that I LOVED and had completely forgotten about.

They smelled like cupcakes and everything! I really loved mine.

And this just reminded me of another old favourite of mine that has been horrifically redesigned since the early 90s…

Polly Pocket! From the days when she actually fitted in your pocket. (I suppose she would be considered a choking hazard now). Anyway, even though this picture doesn’t have Polly in it, I chose it because I owned the exact same one!

Then there were…

Puppy in my Pocket! I probably had 100 of these. I remember they first came free in Cornflakes packages… but my favourites were the Animal Hospital ones, where they were “injured” if you ran them under hot water (the paw would get red), and then if you ran them under cold water, they’d be healed!

But of course, my favourite was…

My Little Pony! This was my first one. She talked!

My favourite, Fizzy! I never owned her… but I LOVED her in the cartoon.

And the pony that is currently sitting on my bookshelf beside me! Because I never really grew out of these toys…

I wonder how many of these were big in the US. But in England in the early-to-mid-90s, they were absolutely the toys to have.

Lord of the Rings Live

This Saturday, I went to New York to see The Fellowship of the Ring at Radio City Hall with my not-seen-for-ages friend, Alex. And it was pretty darn amazing.

We had a pretty good day before the concert even started, at least in my opinion! We met up outside Grand Central, and headed up Madison in pursuit of an elusive Japanese bookstore I heard was lurking there. It proved difficult to find… but that was OK, because we DID stumble across a Lindt chocolate store. The woman offered us free dark chocolate samples, and we both ended up buying probably the cheapest thing there: little “spooky” ghost chocolates on sticks for a dollar.

The Japanese bookstore, Asahiya, was rather heavenly, although it easily made me think I was back in Japan again. Unlike the bigger, more well known Japanese store in New York, this place was quite small (the size of a regular town bookshop, maybe), and only sold Japanese language books (except for, I think, a small section of English language books on Japan) and magazines. I picked out a couple of pop star themed magazines (yay for interview based reading practice! Also, useful summaries of this season’s dramas in case I magically get more free time, and an Arashi poster!), and browsed the manga for a while, although I decided not to buy anything from there in the end. Such a cute store, though, and relatively cheap too! Shame I also found out that it’s closing down at the end of the month.

We also found a street market, where we could buy cheap Thai food and lemonade, and wander around going, “Oooh, this is cool!” Then I dragged Alex to the OTHER Japanese store, because I am cruel and coldhearted towards her German-and-Italian-studying-self, and we browsed for a bit, although I didn’t buy anything there. And then I felt bad for inflicting such torture on her, and we went outside to sit in the sun in Bryant Park and talk. There was some kind of Cosplay thing going on, and lots of families playing with their kids… it was perfect, until Alex commented that it was the sort of day where Godzilla was bound to attack. Because it was. It felt like the “before” scene in some kind of horror/disaster movie. So then we fled to China Town, where we… stood in line at Starbucks and ate at Subway. But it was in China Town! So it was more exciting and cultured! Or something… neither of us had ever been to China Town before without several Chinese speakers in tow, and it turns out that it’s way more intimidating without people to tell you where to eat and what sounds good!

And then… the concert. Ahh, the concert! They projected Fellowship of the Ring onto a big screen, and then a huge orchestra (complete with all the singers) played the soundtrack live. I have love the Lord of the Rings soundtrack since I first heard it, and so I was reeeally excited. And the music live was simply gorgeous. Especially the tear jerking moments – if normally I would be a bit sad, here, I cried. If normally, I would cry, here, I was bawling. The only problem was that I kept forgetting about the orchestra, and then wondering why the music was so much louder than usual!

Either way, I hadn’t seen the movie in a couple of years, so a lot of it felt fresh again. And so moving. The story of the Lord of the Rings has always affected me very deeply. With that music played live with it too… it really got to me. Especially the end. So much loyalty and friendship and determination against the odds… and corruption of good people, sacrifice of so much… it was really affecting.

My hope now? That I’ll be able to see “the story continue” with The Two Towers in October, 2010.

My Girl

Yay! Watched the first episode of Aiba’s new drama, My Girl, today. I wasn’t quite sure what to expect, since I haven’t read the manga and have never seen Aiba act in anything, but wow, it passed any expectations I might have had by far.

It was, of course, adorable. And I may have cried… a lot… especially towards the end of the episode. The part when the little girl was talking about how people tell her to forget her mom? And Aiba’s character is crying and says that he could never forget her. God, I was bawling. Other tear jerking moments included when he had tears in his eyes and was all, “But her… my daughter… it’s impossible,” and the scene where she was waiting in the rain… omg, sad.

The big, delightful surprise was Aiba’s acting. Like I said, I wasn’t sure how good he was going to be, but I thought he pulled it off pretty much perfectly. He just seemed so natural, even though that shy, uncertain character was so different from what we see of Aiba on the variety shows. Plus he pulled off the crying thing really well, unlike certain other Arashi members who do a lot of acting… (*cough*MatsuJun*cough*, even though I do love him and his dramas). Yes, I was really, really pleased with the whole thing. Even if it did make me cry a little too much for a first episode.

Can’t wait for next week!

Arashi: My Girl

So, guess what I’ve been listening to on repeat all night?

At first, I’ll admit, I wasn’t too sure about it. The verse sounded a little too expected (makes me think of Ashita no Kioku, to be honest), but then the chorus… ohh, I love the chorus. And the lyrics are so sad. And it’s been on repeat ever since.

Well, they’re so sad now that I’ve listened to it a few times. On the first listen, I only caught the meaning of the chorus, with just smatterings of the rest (why are Arashi choruses so much easier to understand than the verses? Perhaps it’s just a fluke of my listening skills…). But even on the first listen, I felt so sad from it all. It’s a pretty song.

At least, it’s providing good release for my overstressed, sickness-addled brain right now. When you have lots of work to do and a cold (gosh, I hope it’s just a bad cold and not something that’s gonna get worse) that makes it hard to do any of it, new Arashi singles are the best solution, ne? I can’t wait to hear the full thing (soon?)!

For the first time, I feel… Wicked

This week, I went to see Wicked on Broadway with my roommates. I’d seen the show once before, in London, when the show debuted there and Idina Menzel was playing Elphaba. After that experience, I thought no performance would be able to live up to it. However, I got the chance to sit about 15 rows back from the stage for only $25, so of course I decided to go.

And it was really, really great. Even though I was surrounded by audience members who were never taught simple theatre etiquette (no talking, no cell phone lights…). When the show started, with No One Mourns the Wicked, I felt so much emotion well up in me. Memories of a time addicted to this soundtrack, to this show, perhaps. And my gosh, both the actresses playing Elphaba and Glinda were AMAZING. I think it’s really easy for Glinda’s part to sound annoying, but the actress this time just had the most stunning, powerful voice. And Elphaba… well, wow. She played the role completely differently from Idina Menzel, both with more anger about her situation, and more vulnerability. Whereas before I’ve only heard The Wizard and I sung with complete optimism and excitement, she put a lot more uncertainty and insecurity and a sense of “but… but maybe…” into it, which was great.

The first time I heard this show, I of course identified with Elphaba an incredible amount. And I of course wanted her to end up with Fiyero. But this time… I just felt so much for Glinda. Her best friend, who she hasn’t seen for ages, runs off with her fiance, and then both of them, as far as she knows, die. That’s horrible! I’ve loved the song Thank Goodness for a while, because who can’t identify with that feeling, but her whole story just hurt this time.

My only disappointment was Fiyero. I thought his acting was really unconvincing, and thought his singing could have been better… which was a shame for Dancing Through Life, one of my favourite songs from the show.

But overall, I was surprisingly delighted by the whole thing. Delighted, and of course upset. Because I’m physically incapable of sitting through a well done performance of For Good without crying.

The Flavour of Life

When I first heard this song, I didn’t really like it that much. And now, in that strange way that happens sometimes, I have just listened to it on repeat for over half an hour. And this isn’t the first time I’ve done that with this song. It’s just… so haunting. And perhaps simply because I now actually understand the lyrics, it packs a powerful emotional punch to the gut too. The kind of pain in those lyrics… who doesn’t recognise that?

My current favourite, for its ridiculously true simplicity: “どうしたのと急に行かれると、何でもない。” When suddenly asked, “What’s wrong?” I always say, “Oh, it’s nothing at all.”

And only kind of related, but god I love the scene at the start of this video. <3

New Arashi Single?

It certainly sounds like Arashi to me! And it would make sense that they’d do the theme for Aiba’s drama, right?

Also, I get the feeling this is going to be one of those dramas which is meant to be cute, but actually makes my cry buckets. Even from just this teeeny bit of dialogue. “Because I’m waiting for you.” “7 years ago, there was the love I’ll never forget.” And then the cuuuute girl putting the necklace around his neck. “As long as you have this, you won’t be lonely.”

New Arashi! Cute new drama. I’m looking forward to October.

The Storm

Yesterday, we had a storm.

All evening, you could feel it coming. The air had that pre-storm heaviness to it, like a promise of what was to come. And then I had a mini-adventure.

I think I’m a fairly spontaneous person. Certainly annoying to travel with, because no matter where we’re going, I always want to take a detour, see this place with a interesting name, go to some weird sounding festival, just stop here cos it looks pretty. But it’s hard to find people who agree. Well, last night, just before the storm, I was walking back from my club with two friends. It’s about a 5 minute walk back to my dorm, but just as we left the club, we spotted the free campus shuttle. “Let’s get on it!” said one of my friends. We didn’t really know where it goes or where it stops, but of course we got on, expecting it to turn right at the end of the road and head towards our dormroom. It turned left.

We went down by the lake, around through grad student apartment areas, and some places that we didn’t recognise in the slightest. It was already 11:30pm, so everywhere was pitch dark, in a way I’d never seen southern campus before. And we just stared out of the window and enjoyed the ride. Eventually, we got off the bus near the Dinky train station (about… a 5 minute walk from our dorm) and walked up campus. And then the storm started… sort of. Suddenly, a flash of lightning lit up the sky. There was no thunder, no rain. Just this flash. A minute later, there was another flash, two flashes fast in succession. And just as my roommate and I reached our dorm room, light drops of rain began to fall.

The windows in my dorm room are pretty amazing. By sitting on a bookcase and leaning onto the windowsill, I could push our slanted window really high and reach out. I live on the third floor of a Gothic style building, and the window is at a point where two slanty bits of roof meet. There’s a small platform outside my window between those roofs, sloping downwards. I can see roofs, windows, a courtyard, and sky… and as I leaned out, juuust before the storm, I felt so at rest. So captured in the moment. The sky was a swirled red, lit up every now and again by those flashes (which seemed so much closer now, on the third floor). The air was completely still. Then the rain started up again, just drizzle again. Then it got heavier, and I stuck my arm out further to catch the raindrops. And then it started getting heavy enough to come in through the slanted window, so I had to shut it and come inside. And just as I did that, the thunder started.

I moved into my roommate’s bedroom, where a slanted window spread right over her bed. She lay there, staring up at the storm, the room getting lit up every minute or so with lightning, and then shook by the now loud thunder. And there, wrapped up in the storm, we sat for ages and talked, about the past, about relationships, and all of that fun stuff.

And then, as the storm quieted, we went to sleep.