Have been doing some reading for the past week or so in a bid to tweak my bio-clock before Uni begins…

Ok… Lemme explain… Since #1 books = boring…. #2 I read on lying my bed…. #3 Reading Fantasy books is a relaxing activity… Haix… Can’t think of anymore reasons…. Anyways the main reason is it gets me off the computer and on the bed.. So I am like one step closer to sleeping….

So.. Ya, that’s why I am usually gone by 11pm, to read some book and try to sleep…. But it sorta doesn’t work.. I still sleep at around 2-3am…

So anything up to this point is just pointless crap….

Anyways, that was how I ended up reading about 2-3 hours a day, and I have finished Terry Brook’s High Druid of Shannara trilogy, David Eddings’ The Elenium and also a couple of Arthur C. Clarke books (Science fiction)….. I guess its good to get back to reading something before Uni begins…

But I sorta ended up reading more an more Fantasy books… Lolx…

In a bid to look for something I like… Although I am kinda corrupted by Tolkein’s The Lord of the Rings Trilogy (the book), into thinking that a good Fantasy book will have to have this huge world with lots of different races (not just people) and also lots of characters with family histories that can probably be written into series if the author bothered….

Didn’t really like High Druid of Shannara because the story was kinda slow, not enough history… The Elenium focused on too much racial/religion topics(?), with the knights talking like US. marines…. Just stating the stuff that I don’t like about them… I did finish reading them after all… So they aren’t that bad I guess… Currently picking up Robert Jordan’s The Wheel of Time and also Eddings’s The Belgaraid…

I am currently sleeping at 12+pm and waking up at 9am, thanks to a few morning sessions of tennis and also meeting up in the morning to ride around Ubin…. Just need to wake up a little earlier…..

Being marketed as the latest Ghibli movie (2006), I without doubt had some expectations of it…. I guess everyone who watched their fair share of animes has a certain expectation (actually its more of a form of respect for Ghibli movies, but shan’t digress) that Ghibli movies almost always occur in a fascinating world with equally if not more fascinating characters that captures the watcher’s attention right from the beginning…. The watchers will then be constantly wondering (Yes, in awe….) what other interesting aspects of the world will be shown to them next…

“Gedo Senki”, however, had a pretty much normal-looking kinda ancient world with a few wizards, with some details specific to the world of Earthsea but probably won’t be spotted by those who haven’t previously encountered the world of Earthsea…. Ya.. I admit that didn’t read any books related to Earthsea prior to watching this movie, so I probably did not get much of the little details that would make Earthsea readers nod their heads in agreement with the accurate portrayal of the Earthsea world and also the hints dropped throughout the movie before the unveiling of the plot (was busy waiting for Ghibli surprises here, probably missed them all together)…

So yup… Advice to those watching would be read up on Earthsea and don’t expect a Ghibli film, just watch “Gedo Senki” like how you would watch a normal anime movie, it should prove itself to be enjoyable… Meanwhile I will go and read “Earthsea Quartet” before watching “Gedo Senki” again without expectations of a Ghibli movie…

Arghx… A lot of 21st birthday parties to attend this year…. And ya…. A lot of presents to buy too….. Which gets quite troublesome….

Anyways… To solve the problem for other people I will just tell you guys what I want…. Ok.. I need forty people to fork out $15 each for this….

IBANEZ RG350DX Bound Rosewood Fretboard…..Basswood Body and Maple Neck!!!! Sounds kinda exciting!!! Don’t see many white guitars around also… Black and Sunburst are too common ne…. The RG350DX is currently on offer on the zZounds.com. US$399.95…. That’s about S$600….

Ok… I was just kidding… That guitar is way over budget for a birthday gift…. And I don’t even intend to have any sort of parties….

Anyways… I first saw this guitar here: (Canon in D Jap Collab. [watched on noir’s blog, its quite interesting to watch.. Definitely one of the better videos if you want to watch Canon in D rock Ver. videos….])

With yesterday’s run at East Coast Park, I can finally declare that my break from Sunday runs has ended (the last run was 3 weeks ago)… Quite tiring to run after such a long break… *Thinks I will need to run more….

After that we (Aloy, Benji, Meleen. Yong Kang and I) had Katong Laksa at 328 Katong Laksa (also coyed by Alvin as the “red-haired auntie Katong Laksa”)… that kinda reminded me about our NSF days (which seems so distant now) when we ended up there in many occasions after Saturday book outs or Life-runs…. Anyways the laksa was good this time much unlike the last encounter which left us feeling that the gravy was too thick…. [Sighx… Didn’t occur to me that I should have taken a photo or 2 since this is the only Laksa store we frequent regularly…]

After laksa, Aloy drove us to Island Creamery, this Ice Cream/Dessert place @ Serene Centre off Bukit Timah Road…. Hahax… Funny that I haven’t heard of it until yesterday, especially after like 6 years of studying in that area…. Maybe I wasn’t an ice cream sorta person till the army days…. Ok.. Back to topic…. The place was like completely filled with people when we reach there? We had to settle for some tables outside, but it wasn’t that bad outside… Island Cremery has quite a lot of interesting flavours that can’t be seen anywhere else? Erm… Like…. Burbur Hitam, Chendol, Kahlua Latte, ReversO…. I had a double scoop, Kahlua Latte and Soursop… Kahlua Latte was like milky coffee (wonders where the alcohol went though couldn’t detect any….) but still it was quite creamy and enjoyable…. and soursop was like fine ice-blended soursop (quotes Yong Kang) it was quite enjoyable tho tastes exactly like how good soursop would taste…

Here are some photos… (#1 from left Very Berry, Strawberry Sorbet, Kahlua Latte and Soursop. #2 Inside of Island Creamery. #3 The Sign.)

Yup.. We chatted there until about 9:30pm??? It was quite interesting and enjoyable, the eating and chatting part, but whatever eaten must have replaced whatever calories we burnt, since we ran quite a lot less than usual….

I guess I might be posting too many posts on anime…. In fact, I still have a few more anime reviews to write???

Anyways… Contrary to popular belief… I don’t sit at home and watch anime all day… Let’s see… Currently I am waiting for University to start… (In about 3 weeks’ time) And I am just occupying my time by doing various stuff such as playing with Photoshop (mostly with anime pics tho), reading some books (trying to adjust my bioclock here… using books to send me to sleep…), playing the violin (yes… I can play the violin… still working on getting twinkle twinkle lil star to sound right tho…), playing Arcana Hearts (if I get a chance to), replaying Final Fantasy 7, trying to run once a week and maybe helping with household chores… But ya.. All these aren’t really worth blogging about so they don’t really appear in the blog…

Ya.. So… I wil be making a conscious effort to blog less on anime and try and make this blog a lil more friendly to non-anime-watchers.. KK.. That’s all…

Remember the blog entries on my Japan trip earlier this year??

I have compiled them into this Japan Trip 2007 and added a new entry….

Well the new entry is about Kiyomizu-dera… Or at least that part of the trip…. Hahax… Here’s a preview…

Hmmmm…. Another Anime review… Two actually….

The two animes that will be reviewed together are Planetes and Gundam SEED… Actually the two share very little similarities besides the fact that they are both futuristic anime that have a huge part devoted to scenes in space… Other than this little similarity, the only other reason I can state for reviewing them together is Laziness… (yes Sloth the 3rd of the 7 sins) I think i will go on forever if I talk about how lazy I am… So without further ado let’s start….

Planetes is revolves round Hachirota Hoshino, an astronaut in the Space Debris Section, which is in charge of (whatelse?) debris collection in space. And debris collection in space is quite crucial to the safety of the space shuttles flying around, although the debris section is still made out to be the lowliest section in the whole of the Technora Corporation… The anime starts off showing the everyday situations in the Space Debris Section and their everyday jobs…. Kinda like a slice of life kinda anime with some comedy infused in it, and some heartwarming moments, which bring you to realise that nothing has really changed for the people, only technology has become more advanced….

Gundam SEED, on the other hand, revolves around Coordinator Kira Yamato, who got drawn into the conflicts between the Coordinators (genetically modified “super” humans) and the Naturals (organic humans??), which really is a long story that I don’t intend to touch on… Somehow Kira stumbles upon the GAT-X105 Strike Mobile Suit (yes… Gundam) and ends up fighting for the Natural side from aboard the battleship Archangel….

Planetes eventually reveals its main plot, the Jupiter Exploration mission which Hoshino intends to join and the constant threat from the Space Defence Front which is actually a terrorist organisation which opposes Space development, arguing on the point that only developed countries tend to benefit from developments in Space.

Gundam SEED still pretty much focuses on the war between the Coordinators and the Naturals, how devastating it is while providing insights of how the people fighting the war are actually very normal people…

Both animes are equally enojoyable, but in different ways… If you are looking for something different from the normal fare, watch Planetes, it really feels like a drama more than an anime…. if you are looking for action watch Gundam SEED.. Well its my first Gundam Series…. So I can’t rate it against other Gundam Series…. But if you are looking for CGed mecha fights like Soukou no Strain, there aren’t much….

Noir… it is the name of an ancient fate Two maidens who govern death The peace of the newly born their black hands protect Well… That’s what you will be hearing (in Japanese) for most of the episodes right after the opening song…. But that is just what “Noir” is supposed to be in the anime “Noir”…. The anime “Noir” is about two assassins in modern times - Kirika and Mireille. Together they set off to find out about Kirika’s mysterious past and about the people who are trying to kill her…. But on the journey in search of Kirika’s past, they realise that their pasts are somehow linked.. And then the main plot unfolds….

The soundtrack is by Yuki Kaijiura, the same composer who did Tsubasa Chronicle’s soundtrack…. So if you enjoyed Tsubasa’s soundtrack then you won’t be disapppointed by Noir’s… Animation-wise… Well its an old anime…. The drawings of the cities and certain landmarks are quite nicely done tho….

Despite the “journey in search of the past” thing making Noir sound like an adventure kinda anime, it is actually quite dark and complex, as it not only involves a lot of killings but also the different feelings that go through their minds before and after they kill due to their different personailties/backgrounds. All in all, Noir’s quite interesting especially near the ending, but would have liked it better if the ending “arc” is longer and the finding the past part a bit shorter…

Bored… Its weird to feel bored like 1 month before the start of University, when I have been slacking like… already 4-5 months????

Hmm… Need to cherish whatever time I have left to slack around…

Anyways, I restarted Final Fantasy VII… Played about 2 hours, managed to meet Aeris and escape from the Turks….

Meeting Aeris :

“Famous” Reno scenes :

Guess what led me to play FFVII???

This :

Final Fantasy VII : Before Crisis, a prequel for Final Fantasy VII that was supposed to be released in 2006 but… Think there wasn’t much news after that…. And it was already out in Japan since 2004???

Anyways its a game that’s supposed to be played on a mobile phone, online… And the main characters of the game are the Turksand you are supposed to get jobs from other people and carry them out… Pretty cool ne… Plus, the Turks happen to be my favourite bad guys from the Final Fantasy series… Well cos of stupid stuff they do like the scenes above….

Yup.. Hope they release in Singapore…… Baaaah…. *PS2 withdrawal symptom*

Ya… If you wanna find out more about Final Fantasy VII : Before Crisis, you can visit “http://www.beforecrisis.net/” or the official webbie “http://www.square-enix.co.jp/mobile/bcff7.html“.

The recent appearances of red, blue and other coloured borders and mis-aligned stuff have nothing to do with this:

Or espers or time-travellers or aliens or whatever else you can imagine…. (just ignore whatever I just said, if you don’t understand… I do not discriminate between anime-watchers and non-anime-watchers… [Just that non-anime-watchers probably don’t understand what I am saying more than half the time anyways])

Its just a result of my implementation of my blog on the Wordpress system… Sorry for any inconvenience or any unfound fears caused…

Anyways the blog will still be undergoing some minor changes over the next few weeks(?), so there might be other weird sightings. Also, feel free to post feedback (esp IE6 users… I am not using IE6 so I don’t know what you guys are seeing….)

Song Title: The Light Before We Land (Gunslinger Girl OP)

Performed by: The Delgados

Takened from: www.animelyrics.com

In cases such as these I'd like a hand
Don't wake me up without a master plan
With black & white instead of colour
Don't you understand?
When things that once were beautiful
Are bland

And when I feel like I can feel once again
Let me stay awhile
Soak it in awhile
If we can hold on we can fix what is wrong
Buy a little time
For this head of me
Haven for us     

In truth there is no better place to be
Than falling out of darkness still to see

Without a premonition
Could you tell me where we stand?
I'd hate to lose this light
Before we land     

Before we let euphoria
Convince us we are free
Remind us how we used to feel
Before when life was real

Gunslinger Girl is a 13 episode anime about a group of girls/cyborgs who have differing personalities but share the similarity that all of them belong to the “Social Welfare Agency” and are one half of a special ops team call a “Fratello”. Throughout the 13 episode anime, we are shown the operations carried out by these special ops teams and also the training and the everyday life of the girls. In which we find out about the relationship between them and the other half of the “Fratello”, the “handler”. The graphics and the sound is pretty good. And the anime is quite interesting too.. Just that some might find the pace of the first few episodes abit slow….