The day has finally come. I can hardly believe it. In a few short hours, I will be on a flight to…Incheon, South Korea, followed by a long transit before finally arriving at SFO. I will spend the next four years at Stanford and hopefully graduate with a few pieces of laminated paper.

My mind is kind of in a messed-up place right now, so that’s all I have to say for now. In the mean time, watch this awesome YouTube series.

See you in California.

So I am moving soon and I have been spending the past week stacking things (mostly books) into boxes. Sifting through all the stuff I have accumulated in the past ten years really takes me back.

It’s been just about 10 years since I first watched Evangelion, which was kind of how everything began. I would link to my old blog post on it, but I wrote it on my old b2/cafelog (WordPress’ predecessor) blog and it’s stuck somewhere in my site database inside an unconverted b2 table. Just as well, since the post was probably shit.

Games and DVDs. An R1 Evangelion box set is buried somewhere underneath

I’m off to Stanford in just about a month or so and the house-moving will actually take place after I leave. The next time I set foot on Singapore, I’ll be walking into an unfamiliar room with all my precious stuff stacked in boxes covered with (at least) one year’s worth of dust. That ought to be fun.

Crap ton of Haruhi stuff

I am still hanging on to the slim hope that one day pristine limited edition Haruhi goods from the series’ golden age will be worth billions of dollars. But I think the chance that I will make a profit on this collection is probably only slightly higher than this guy’s long-shot investment.

Crap ton of Maaya Sakamoto stuff and other CDs

Honestly speaking, I think my Maaya collection can objectively be described as pretty darn sweet, especially considering I do not live in Japan. I basically have all her singles and albums (including her releases from when she was half of the teenage duo Whoops!!), often two copies of each, plus limited edition and all that jazz. I also have a bunch of posters that CD shops in Japan put up to promote her new CD releases, some related DVDs (including the short movie 03+ she starred in) and some concert memorabilia.

Bunch of manga and Japanese books

I am kind of a compulsive hoarder, but mainly in the sense that I like to collect more things. I don’t actually mind throwing away stuff I don’t need. Not shown in the pictures is a rather large mountain of old magazines and books that are destined for a glorious second life as rolls of toilet paper.

Random English books

Mahoro packed in her box

I actually do not own that many figurines in spite of my urge to collect stuff. PVC figures in particular do not preserve well in Singapore’s hot and humid weather unless you keep them in the box, so I had to throw away some over the years. But the few I keep around are pretty awesome. Maybe one day I’ll finally get a proper dust-proof display case for them and save them from the cruel fate of spending eternity in their boxes.

Kan’u Unchou and Tony Taka’s C73 releases

Haruhi Bunny and Tony Taka’s C75 releases

Going through my collection makes me feel old. I can’t believe that it’s already been a decade since Evangelion first raped my mind. A few days ago, I heard people on the radio reminiscing over 90s pop songs, referring to them as “retro”. Moments like that really turn your perspective upside down.

Speaking of Evangelion, check out my sweet new Esc key

I guess house-moving and college in the States are two huge changes waiting right around the corner that will mark an end of an era for me personally. I have no idea what the future will hold, but things are definitely going to be different soon. Part of me is feeling uneasy (and lazy) about the changes ahead, but mostly I am looking forward to California. Hopefully I will retain the essence of who I am, even as I grow into a new environment.

Manga and CDs

But no matter what happens, I’ll definitely still find time to finish the occasional volume of Kimi ga Iru Machi. That damn thing has more twists than a Taiwanese soap opera. I wonder if the San Francisco Kinokuniya is any good. I hope Maaya performs at Anime Expo again some day…

Anyway, I’ll be in Hong Kong from the 4th to the 10th and spend ten days in Scandinavia towards the end of the month. Things are getting kind of busy around here, but I’m sure I’ll be able to find the time to post some photos from the trips, even though I have yet to finish posting all the photos from my last trip in April…

This is not the post you think it is. Now I admit that as a dangerous anti-American foreigner plotting to destroy that great nation through the evil that is globalization, I am an Obama supporter and I am happy that today is his inauguration. That said, this is not a post about him; this is a post about me. The title is just a bait.

Note: This entry can be considered administrative in nature and should be skipped if you are looking for anime-related content.

Change: Current

Yesterday, 19th January, was my birthday. Incidentally, it was also the birthday of KOTOKO and Hikaru Utada. As you may know, I graduated from high school last year (school terms start in January in Singapore) and I am currently spending my days at home as a professional hikikomori like Satou from NHK ni Youkoso! except without the cute girl.

Live webcam feed of my room

Change: Near Future

But that is about to change soon. Sometime next week, I will be conscripted into the Singapore Armed Forces as part of a two-year compulsory military service that all Singaporean males have to undergo unless they forfeit their citizenships and seek permanent asylum from the decadent Western capitalist pigs (as defined by conventional ideas of “East” and “West” on a frigging spherical planet).

I digress as usual. But the point of the matter is that I will be incommunicado for at least the first two weeks of boot camp, after which I will get to come out on weekends. Eventually when I receive my permanent assignment after a 7-week boot camp, I should be able to return home every night, thus regaining a daily schedule somewhat similar to high school. (For Singaporeans in the know, the letter C should suffice as further clarification.)

It’s a whole new world out there

Blog updates have been getting pretty infrequent in the last two years due to high school — more to do with girls than coursework — but I guess long-time readers are already used to the status quo, so the main point of this post is to give a heads-up that things may get worse before they get better. At the very least, there will be no updates for about two weeks.

Once boot camp is over however, I foresee renewed activity on this site, a blog renaissance if you will, keeping in mind that RIUVA‘s peak posting period happened to coincide with tj han‘s service to the motherland as a “war journalist”. This makes sense if you know that the Republic of Singapore has never been at war before.

Obama City in Japan’s Fukui prefecture

So to sum my ramblings up…

• There will be a period of two weeks or so without any updates.
• There may be weekly updates in the five-week period after that.
• There will probably be a great increase in the frequency of posting after those initial seven weeks.
• I am glad this is not Israel.

Change: Distant Future

After that, who knows? I will most probably be accepting the offer from Stanford, although funding is still a lingering question as Stanford is not need blind for international students and I did not apply for financial aid since I was advised that it is a suicidal option. I also applied to Carnegie Mellon, Cornell and Caltech under regular decision, although watching The Office has since then drastically lowered my opinion of Cornell. (And this Cornellian agrees.) Hehe.

Communist red — coincidence or conspiracy?

Ultimately, it will probably be Leland Stanford Junior University (I wonder why they don’t use that more often). My current plan to pay the exorbitant fees is IDA‘s National Infocomm Scholarship. My mother’s backup plan is to sell the house. I’m also praying for legal-tender precipitation.

The Blog

I want to keep this blog going indefinitely and I intend to write about whatever I happen to be interested in at any point of time. For the next two years, this is likely to mean anime or anime-related topics, but who knows what the future holds? Maybe I will totally fall in love with cooking one day and start to share my recipes here, or probably not. In any case, near or far, my blog will go on.

To end off, I would like to congratulate America for electing competence against great odds, to wish a belated happy birthday to me, KOTOKO and Hikaru, and to wish those of you out there who do not fully subscribe to the Gregorian calendar a Happy Chinese New Year!

P.S. Sora wo Kakeru Shoujo is indeed a great show.

<3 Google. I feel totally motivated to blog now.

Anyway, it’s not like I haven’t been keeping up with the latest season. I’m currently following Hayate no Gotoku, Claymore, Nagasarete Airantou, Lucky Star, Romeo x Juliet, Bokurano and Darker Than Black. This is about the number of series I’ve been following for every season for the past year or so. I just need to find a bit more time for blogging… I wonder if you guys will mind if I blog more about non-anime related topics? My Real Lifeâ„¢ recently has been really… exciting. LOL.