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ambientlight) wrote2014-07-25 10:46 pm
ambientlight) wrote2014-07-25 10:46 pm
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ohisashiburi
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egelantier tagged me for a meme! so here we go.instructions: comment on this entry, and i'll give you three themes by the lines of "username and [some idea or concept or thing]'. you then post what you have to say on these themes in your own livejournal, and tag me back.
ambientlight and friendship narrativesThis may sound silly, but I'm actually not very interested in straightforward friendship narratives. I can certainly enjoy them -- in Chihayafuru, for instance. But the dynamics that interest me most are those which are flawed or fragile, and friendship narratives have to involve some sort of difficulty for me to really care about them. (I think this applies to my taste re: all sorts of relationships, frankly -- I'm generally bored by fluffy romance and I much prefer reluctant comradeship to something more secure.)
I suppose Natsume Yuujinchou is the best series to talk about, here. I like watching the tentative friendships that Natsume's making, but I like this precisely because of how tentative his progress is: how it isn't easy, how he still doubts others and flinches from closeness and has trouble allowing people to care about him, even if he does all that less and less. If Natsume gets to the point where his friendships become smooth-sailing and uncomplicated, then I'm sure my interest will wane.
This applies many times over for fic. Fic which charts the development of a friendship -- great. Fic which deals with the difficulty of connecting with others, with the limits of a friendship -- excellent. But I don't really care to read about established happy fluffy friendships.
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ambientlight and favourite mangaWhen it comes to anime, most of my favourite series are favourites largely because of how they're crafted -- because I marvel at how they're put together, at all the deliberate and pointed artistic decisions involved, at the tightness of their structure or writing, or how they make the most of the visual possibilities of the medium. (A lot of these also tend to be short, self-contained series.)
Manga, though. Most of my favourite manga series are favourites because of the emotions they elicit, I suppose. Obviously there can be a lot of craft underlying that as well, but I respond to my favourite manga on an emotional level first, whereas my engagement with my favourite anime series tends to be more immediately on an aesthetic level.
Fortunately, MAL has already forced me to choose several manga series to list as my favourites, so here they are: Mushishi, Natsume Yuujinchou, Kimi to Boku, Horimiya and Pluto.
Mushishi just resonates with me. I love its atmosphere and tone, how it's neither mawkish nor grimdark, how it affirms nothing more or less than existence. The world is indifferent, not cruel. People are flawed; some, but not all, can save themselves. Also, Ginko. ♥
Natsume Yuujinchou is... well, see above. I like the manga more than the anime because it's less soft, a little more challenging. The anime is very warm, even down to its colour scheme.
Kimi to Boku is very fun to read and immensely enjoyable as a low-energy ~seishun~ series. I find it genuinely funny, and when it aims at poignant (which it does more often that you'd expect, maybe), it always succeeds. I came for the humour and stayed for the poignancy.
Horimiya is probably the only romance-centric piece of media I've cared about! It genderflips the standard set-up of "shy girl meets popular boy and learns to make friends", which I appreciate, and takes the characters beyond those stock roles. It's another very ~seishun~ series, capturing the awkwardness of adolescence in a way that doesn't make me cringe.
Pluto involves detectives and AI, two of my narrative weaknesses. Detectives!! It's by Urasawa Naoki so you know you're in safe hands. The ending was a bit of a letdown, but otherwise I absolutely loved this series. So much humanity in its stories, without making the robots seem just like humans.
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ambientlight and travellingI talked about travelling a while ago, and I suppose my views haven't changed much. In short, I travel to see and experience new and beautiful things. I guess there are some vague concerns about authenticity in there too, but I'm not hung up about them and I do consider myself just another tourist, not a ~traveller~. I feel no obligation, so to speak, to visit anywhere in particular -- you know, of the "50 places you must see in your lifetime" sort.
I enjoy natural landscapes, vast expanses, and views from heights. I like places with a deep sense of history and with the buildings or ruins to go with it. I really like trying new foods. I'm biased in favour of cooler climates; if I'm going to go on holiday, I figure I should go somewhere colder than where I live. I am no good at roughing it; I don't stay in hotels, but I have grown accustomed to private rooms in B&Bs and hostels, and I am not keen on camping. I am uncomfortable travelling in countries where, as a tourist, I enjoy a significantly better standard of living than the average local resident. (So I don't really travel in such countries.)
I have grown quite fond of light walking holidays, by which I mean the sort where you don't need to lug a 20kg backpack around with you. Unfortunately this does limit the walks that one can attempt.
I haven't had much occasion to travel alone. There's a certain deep sense of freedom that comes with doing so, a sharper appreciation of how vast the world is, and of course more chances to chat with strangers. But I still prefer having someone else to share the experience with, I guess.
I am the sort of annoying person who will share their relevant travel anecdotes re: a certain country if they find out that someone else is going there or has been there.
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I've always wanted to ask--when in countries where you don't speak the language, how do you get by? This is my #2 fear that prevents me from burning the midnight oil and going places.
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i have to admit, i didn't expect you to like fluff. ^^;
sometimes i'm with a travel companion who knows the language or a helpful one (e.g. french in morocco), but i guess that's cheating. mainly it's a combination of 1. i try to get by in the language until the person i'm speaking to gives up and uses english, and since i'm mainly ordering food and buying tickets, i don't actually need to know that many words, 2. i go to a lot of places which receive english-speaking tourists, so the people i'm most likely to interact with often have some english anyway.
travel guidebooks help with deciphering menus, and i've bought train/bus tickets in several places by writing down where i want to go and when, haha. i think the only time i've ever come up against a wall was in a laundromat in residential stockholm where the old lady running it didn't speak english (i think she knew german instead).
(...should i ask what the #1 fear is?)
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Ahhh, so studying up beforehand and general fearlessness. :D I totally did the writing down thing the last time I was in Japan.
(#1 is general phobia of unfamiliar locations. so i admire your ability to travel very much! I armchair-enjoyed that period when you were in college and took advantage of being in Europe to go all over the continent, that looked like fun.)
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not so much fearlessness, just not really travelling to places that are very tricky tourist-wise, i guess. :D;; like, russia is one country i definitely want to visit someday, but i feel like knowing the language/travelling with someone who does would be particularly important there, so. :| also i have a lot of other fears, e.g. travelling to places where you need lots of jabs beforehand (so i haven't, whoops).
(ah, fair enough! i've still managed to travel a bit post-uni but have been very lazy about linking my facebook photo albums on LJ...)
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(i might try out horimiya! the description sounds very intriguing).
i agree with you re: complicated fraught friendships, but for myself i'd also add us-against-the-world: friendships that are completely (not always healthily) rock-steady in a face of common enemy or enmity. the loalty holding fast.
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(i hope you like it, if you do check it out!! it's sweet and delicate and funny. there's a bit of stuff about society's unfortunate expectations re: gender, but i think the text presents those expectations without necessarily endorsing them...)
i can definitely see how those are compelling! i think i quite like us-against-the-world dynamics but in larger groups, so e.g. i have a soft spot for stories about plucky resistance groups, not that i've come across many of those.
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and the art is beautiful, clean and calm and full of air. I love it.
(i kind of ship miyamura/tooru right now, i must admit. mostly because of how matter-of-fact miyamura is about it).
re: plucky resistance group: have you read laurie marks' elemental logic series? eventually it's about a plucky poly family group overthrowing the invasion and trying to rebuild their country.
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i really like simple, clean art styles so i'm glad that aspect works for you too, cafe kichijouji de is another manga with such art, i think, but it's basically just a pure comedy series.
(hahaha, i can definitely understand that. if a fandom existed i would happily read such fic. i do like that about miyamura, too.)
thanks for the rec! i confess, i have a bit of a hard time with worldbuilding-heavy narratives, but the resistance angle and the queer-as-default setting sound interesting -- i'll give it a try.
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i am trying to watch mushishi again (made it through the first few episodes / chapters of the manga but it is so creepy to watch/read alone because some of the scenes really freak me out, i am SUCH A WUSS)! and i will always associate the soundtrack with the finnish summer, especially during the midnight sun.
re: travelling, i am only recently starting to come to terms with being a tourist instead of a Traveller. i still feel super awkward and self-conscious whipping out a big-ass camera and taking pics, especially from weird angles :/ and travelling alone is indeed liberating but kinda terrifying too, especially as someone who dreads approaching strangers in the first place. add a language barrier and... eek, i would probably have more cool experiences if i have moral support along! although i still feel like an idiot then.
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oh man i don't blame you, episode 2 of mushishi definitely freaked me out. but i think it gets less creepy and more just melancholic/otherworldly later on! the soundtrack always felt quiet and cold to me, so it's interesting that you'll associate it with summer now.
luckily i have a consumer model, not a DSLR. :p and yeah, moral support definitely helps. i do unfortunately end up badgering my travel partners into doing more of the talking, unless we're in a country where i know the language and they don't.
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as for the soundtrack, i think i associate it with summer here because of the endless stream of light, and the abundance of nature/forests/green -- both of which feel very surreal and atmospheric (and yes, otherworldly) to me, just like the soundtrack itself. and summer here is quiet and cold :D
i am usually beaten (not physically!) into speaking to strangers by my mum and aunt, who cannot understand my reticence and have no qualms approaching others for assistance despite their inferior language skills. >.<
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