Archives For Language

1000 Days of Xiami

October 10, 2016 — 1 Comment

I’m about to clock 1000 days on Xiami logins xD

xiami-1000-days

Sad for this excitement, I know. LOL But I get obsessive-compulsive over these things easily. I took a screen grab because I don’t know whether the count will reset to zero or continue. Back in March when I went to Japan, I told my friend to login for me, so I don’t lose my clocked days, and there was a weird bug that made the counter go back to zero, so we thought for a while that it was done. A couple of days later, it went back to normal :P

I’ve been using Xiami for a lot longer, of course. And gone are the days when you could find everything on the site for stream and download :P Though you can still find stuff and download, it’s often the case when albums are empty. Recently, Xiami has taken to just be able to stream music (which is better than having blank albums), without download capabilities— Faye Wong’s most recent track is only available for stream, so you gotta find it elsewhere if you want it. The site is still a great source for Chinese music, especially from the independent scene. However, now Xiami-approved artists are allowed to mark their music as only-Mi tracks, meaning that you have to have Xiami credit on your account and not download music from your VIP free-tracks perk or use your red envelopes (points).

Having said that~~~ I have like +500 points (you get points for single days and months counted, albums added and music shared, etc.) and haven’t used them in so long. What the heck~ What are the perks of the VIP account if you still gotta pay for the Chinese music that you download; at least make it so that you use twice or thrice the # of downloads for those.

I still haven’t figured out what the note reputation is (eg. Re*), but I’m just a few hundred away from reaching the other level. Increasing my stars is a little trickier because English reviews don’t get as many likes or comments. lol

Also~ OMO! 1000 days on the 10 of 10. xD

I just got a notification that the November edition of Discover Japan [HMV JP] titled Watashi no Kyuushuu (私の九州) features Yu-chan on the cover and on several pictures inside.

Discover Japan 2016?11?? Vol.61 | ebook5

If you visit the Discover Japan website [1][2], you can check out more on the content. There’s even a short clip of Yu riding the JR Kyuudai Main Line (久大本線).

Bless my heart~ I’m the only one celebrating 15 years of Shunji Iwai’s All About Lily Chou Chou xD but if you are too, drop me a line! Tell me how much the film has affected your life~ As a celebration, I sat down for a re-watch and a brand new ‘more professional’ review.

yu-aoi-all-about-lily-chou-chou-glider

I also sat down for my first watch of Shunji Iwai’s latest— A Bride for Rip Van Winkle. It was glorious. At the moment, it’s battling it out with Kubo for my #1 spot~

 

How dare you, Studio Ghibli, do that this weekend?

It’s my dad’s third year anniversary, and I’m Setsuko in this GIF.

grave-of-the-fireflies-hotaru-no-haka-setsuko

Grave of the Fireflies is remains my favorite animated film, and the only animated film in my overall Top10 favorites.

Shunji Iwai’s neo-classical romance, Love Letter, about the woman who wrote letters to her deceased lover and got responses back, is over 20 years old now since its release. However, its mark as a pop culture reference across Asia is undeniable. In its time, the film made actress Miho Nakayama a household name, and it launched Shunji Iwai’s filmmaking career (and hence has given us: Ayumi Ito and Yu Aoi).

The film’s style and cinematography, courtesy of Noboru Shinoda (RIP) has inspired countless of filmmakers across East Asia who have headed to Otaru (小樽市) or other similar snowy places to capture the essence of the film [cue: 张一白 Zhang Yibai’s segment in Run for Love (奔爱), which featured Eddie Peng and Zhang Ziyi], and the classic (though simple) quote of “o-genki desuka?” (お元気ですか?) [1] has been referenced in various places…

Just look at the members of -relatively new- Kpop group G-FRIEND, who played a round of movie quotes to decide who would be the host of that specific One Fine Day episode’s segment (10 months after their debut). The group is formed by 6 young women, all who were born post-95. In fact, eldest member (and leader of the group), Sowon, was born almost 8 months after the release of Love Letter. But it is member Yuju (’97) who first references the movie with the knowledge of all the group.

one-fine-day-ep3-gfriend-yerin-sinb-yuju-shunji-iwai-ogenki-desuka-love-letter

So if you put your hands close together to shout out the words “o-genki desuka?” and the person in front answers back the same way with a “atashi genki desu.” That’s a Shunji Iwai shout-out to ya~

All these feelings~

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=et3j-ZsZ-k8

Next week (+ one day) is also my dad’s 3rd anniversary, so this just hit right in the feels.

The agency in charge of the campaign of Dream Fearlessly [also] was BBDO New York.

… from 10 miles from the movie theater xD

im-not-madame-bovary-chinese-poster-001

It’s like bright highlighter marker color xD I love it. There’s been a couple of other Chinese posters [the series for Song of the Phoenix (百鸟朝凤), and Big Fish & Begonia (大鱼海棠)].

Continue Reading…

I’m not the biggest fan, but I still made a list xD

beginners-guide-priyanka-chopra

Happy reading!

Mina-san! Genki? Ha!

Forgive the complete absent from the blog recently (two entries last month, and this is the first one this month!), I’ve been generally “more busy” updating the MUBI (the site formerly known as The Auteurs lol) database than even actually keeping up with news (trailers/music) on YAM Magazine or watching movies and shows. I’ve also been occupied watching Korean shows, which tend to make everyone procrastinate. And it’s not like it was priority-watching, either~ I’ve been watching Solar and Eric Nam’s We Got Married episodes, but my favorite watch and re-watches was Mamamoo x GFRIEND’s Showtime.

I don’t actually stan GFRIEND, and I already have biases. Bless.

moonbyul-sinb-new-girl-crush

Bless, SinB. Bless SinB with Moonbyul, Bless New Crush Star. LOL

Continue Reading…

‘Tis a thing of pure beauty.

Otherwise known as SamuraiDroneCatIdolSuperhumanRubeGoldbergViewerWarningTooExplosiveHighSchoolGirl (侍ドローン猫アイドル神業ピタゴラ閲覧注意爆速すぎる女子高生) — I don’t exactly know how the translation in English came to being, but in the Japanese, there’s a mention of Pythagora (as in PythagoraSwitch).

Also, obvious dig at Shideido’s commercial.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=P5BVDfHnGvE