Here is the story of the guy from 1999. Brace yourselves for a long nostalgia-attack. :<

ROFL. Well, recently I've been bombarded with lots of nostalgic stuff, almost all of which point back to around 1999.

Ah 1999. That was a great year. That was the year that I first recognized anime as its own thing (prior to that, I only thought of all animation as "cartoons"). The first anime I appreciated was Saber Marionette J. And from that I started writing stories, thinking we could one day turn them into anime. We had an old-fashioned typewriter. I remember the smell of the ink ribbon and the grease in the typewriter's parts. And also from that, I started to learn to draw. Provided, all my works then were crappy, both art and literature, it was a start. And it let me figure out a lot of things.

At the same time, due to my newfound awareness for anime, I started watching others as well. There was Rurouni Kenshin (Samurai X) on Studio 23, YuuYuu Hakusho, Vision of Escaflowne, Fushigi Yuugi, on GMA, Akazukin Chacha, Fortune Quest, Cinderella and SMJ on ABS-CBN. all of which I thought were pretty cool at the time (except FY, which I started to dislike soon lol). And many more.

I also remember that this was when my interest in Japanese culture started, mostly because of Rurouni Kenshin. I started to study a bit of Japanese history, I learned to read and write the basic Japanese characters (the kana). I also started getting into Japanese music, because of the songs on the Rurouni Kenshin soundtrack. That's when I developed a my fondness for the bands Judy and Mary and The Yellow Monkey, particularly when I first heard the full versions of the songs そばかす (Sobakasu) and タクティックス (Tactics). I started to learn more about samurai, ninja, and Japanese martial arts, beyond the popular knowledge of what they do.

I was in high school then. I remember the elementary school that we could see just outside our house [at the time]. The sounds of children with their nursery rhymes, songs, alphabets, and playground noises. I remember the trees from that school's yard, and I remember how the tree changed through the months. I remember the smell of artificial flavoring used on the roasted peanuts factory nearby. Also, at the back of my house, looking out the window of my room, there was this big lot, which was a factory that got torn down. A bunch of people lived there I guess, and in the afternoons they used it as a full basketball/volleyball court. I got used to the sounds of the dribbling, running and yelling.

Ahaha lol. That summer, the summer of 1999, I had just failed 3rd year high school P.E., mainly because the teacher didn't like me and gave me a particularly hard time. So I had to take summer classes for that. That's when I first met Mr. Falculan. XD Man that guy was classic. He was the commandant of St. Joseph's C.A.T. If I'm not mistaken, he was an active lieutenant in the Philippine Air Force. I dunno he may have been promoted or demoted since then. :D It's been years after all. Anyway from that summer class I remember walking home from the highway in the morning (the class was 8 AM to 10 AM IIRC). The walk is about 10 minutes maybe, depending on how fast you walk. There were tricycles but I liked to walk in the mornings. And I would pass by this place, which was an old fashioned general merchandise store at the time (I heard this place got torn down and replaced with something else; not sure). They sold all sorts of things, but what I bought were those little picture cards of YYH, because Abby and I were collecting them (we still have most of them now). Then I would come home and see Abby watching Cinderella. :( After that I'd end up playing with my SEGA MD2, which I loved. Or I'd go over to Edson's to play there.

And I had a small basketball court in my room (it took up most of the space there, but my room was pretty big for something I didn't use for much else). And I had a few hip-hop/rap cassette tapes and my own radio to play them on. I particularly remember the song Changes by 2Pac. The song embedded into my mind as a nostalgic memory, and I would remember those days everytime I heard it.

We also had a VHS player that got used a lot. We recorded a lot of the anime we liked! We did that so we could watch particular episodes again. And if we liked the episode enough, we would keep it on the tape. The tapes are still here, but probably broken by now. It's been at least 4 years since we even had a VHS player.

Anyway the stuff that got me thinking back at these things is all the stuff I'm seeing on TV right now, and maybe some other little things. YYH just finished showing on Animax, now they're showing FY, and they show SMJ and Escaflowne all around. It's been a long time, now that I think of it. A lot has happened since then. But when I think of those memories it feels like I'm still there. Like it just happened. I guess that's the way memories work. You even remember how the wind and the sun felt on your skin on some days.

Even though I'm not so much into anime or jrock now as I used to be, I still love to look back, particularly at the anime that we used to see, and the songs we used to hear. Since then, we've moved twice, but the memories of that place from those days may be the most powerful in my mind right now.

Well, okay now for some present news. We got Francis to start playing in SRO. Heheh. Pangya was down for a few days without much announcement, but it's back up now with a new patch. Mikko showed me some new MMORPG, but it looks ugly. Seriously. And it's intentional. The characters are monsters and they successfully made them look hideous, which is one reason for me not to play it.

The country has been going through some tough times, and we went through a State of Emergency, but I hear it's getting better now and tomorrow we'll be back to normal.

Finally, I think I have air chairs down. :D I can get in the position somewhat slowly (not fast or surely enough to put in a routine), but I can do it and hold it up for a few seconds. I'm now thinking of working on my windmills now finally. But I have no space lol. I may end up learning 90's first. I feel like 90's may be easier, but I dunno.

Okay first off, I downloaded another b-boy video from Style2Ouf.com. It gave me a few ideas on some new tricks. Actually there's this one move that I've only seen among French b-boys, which is a drop to your shoulder/upper arm area. It's hard to explain, but I think I can do it. It looks pretty dope so I hope I can get it without injuring myself.

I've got a new trick too, but I'm far from perfecting it yet. It's like an inverted hollowback but you're on your head and forearms. It's surprising because I thought this move would put a great strain on your neck and it would be dangerous and might cause some neck injury but it doesn't. I feel most of the weight on my elbows and forearms. I need to develop more shoulder and abdominal strength to be able to hold the hollowback more dramatically.

Next, I got jSRO to work properly. I can now see the Japanese fonts properly. Too bad the IME doesn't work, though. I still can't type in Japanese. But in jSRO, foreigners like me are probably very unexpected. And, knowing Japan, almost nobody speaks English. So it brings up the obvious problem that I may not be able to interact with anybody properly.

This frustrates me so much. I don't really think I want to continue playing in jSRO because of that, but having seen how much better it is there really emphasized on how sloppy iSRO is, and that makes me want to play there less. But still, at least it's in English. And at least not everybody is annoying there. I may give the international servers another try, but I'll take a little rest from it to cool down.

In Pangya, I got into the Beginner ranks (I'm Beginner D now). I hit a long putt of over 40y (around 40.6) and almost hit another (around 40.3) right after it. I'm still looking for that elusive first hole-in-one though.

Mikko is downloading the Lineage II installer... I'm absolutely going to play it, if/when I can get the installer. The installer is 2.3 GB large, or so I'm told by Mikko. What's worse is that the download seems to get corrupted if you resume it (he tried). I dunno what he plans to do, but he wants to play it badly too. So we'll see.

Finally, I learned something very interesting from the show GameMax. We all know that video games help improve eye to hand coordination, improving your reflexes and your dexterity. But there aren't many practical applications for this, right? Well apparently, it's been scientifically proven that surgeons that used to play video games and those that still play video games are significantly better than those that have never played video games. They work faster and with less errors. If I were the one to undergo surgery, I'd definitely look for one that is a gamer heheh. Anyway, they're putting up a special training program in the U.S. that makes surgeons play video games (particularly those with depth perception and speed and stuff like that). I think this is awesome.

A lot happened in the last few days particularly. To start off, here's a report of yesterday. Yesterday I went to Netopia in Megamall to make use of their hideously fast internet speeds. I downloaded Japanese SilkRoad Online and some Lineage 2 movies.

So I got to play in jSRO last night... Good grief it's so adorable. The community is so interesting. One fine example that struck me immediately is how organized they are in setting up shops. They all put up their shops in organized rows, on the border of the circle around the fountain in the first city. And even those outside of this area all put up their shops to the side. This is just smart. It makes shopping super easy. I always hated shopping in iSRO because it was in such disarray. You'd go to one section, try your best to check every shop and not leave anything out (because you never know what you might find in shops), then move to the next section. When you come back to the section you began with, you notice that the shops have changed! So you're forced to check them again! Shopping in iSRO could take anywhere from 20 minutes to almost 2 hours, depending on what you're looking for.

Another notable mention is that because the server is filled with only mostly Japanese, and maybe a few Japanese-speaking foreigners. That means two things. One it means that most people on the server live in Japan, and two it means that the servers are far less congested than the international servers. What does the first thing mean? It means that you can pretty much tell when people will be most active and when they won't because of sleep. Unlike international servers, where people on the eastern side of the world will be asleep but the people in the western side would be awake and vice versa... There's never an inactive time.

And because the servers aren't congested, and maybe also because they could be using superior hardware, the servers do not lag at all. It's immediately noticeable to me, a dial-up player.

Anyway, now for the downsides heheh. jSRO is 7 patches behind iSRO. That's not so bad. Now for the really bad part. I speak a little Japanese. Probably enough to get through the game. But the problem is that the program does not display the Japanese fonts properly on the English version of Windows XP. Game text is all written as question marks (?), game buttons have invisible text (sad) and player names and text are written in ascii characters. I think it's Shift_JIS, but it's like your Windows can't handle the Shift_JIS. If I had a Japanese OS I'd be able to see the Japanese text properly.

Okay so now I'm torn between wanting to play in jSRO with the adorable community and good servers, despite being probably the only gaijin that can't read a single thing, or go back to iSRO, with all the annoying people and annoying lag, that I can at least read.


Enough of that though. I've just finished downloading a game called Freestyle, which is an online street basketball game. I haven't tried playing yet because the download just finished. But it looks interesting. Mikey told me about it and he enjoys it. Nevermind the fact that it's a Filipino server though, and might end up being p2p, because it's run by Level-Up Games Philippines.


Yesterday and today at the PIU machine a lot of people dropped by. A guy from Sta. Lucia yesterday, and today one of the participants in the tournament last October, from Riverbanks, Belo from SM North, and Jeremiah from San Lazaro.


Finally, b-boy news. I'm close to getting air chairs. Woohoo! I'm able to support my entire body weight now on just my stabbed hand. I just need to learn to balance it. When I lift my legs I immediately lose balance so I'm probably doing it wrong. It'll only be a matter of time though, if I keep at it. Oh and Mikey yesterday did another handstand -> suicide at the end of Funky Tonight. He missed but it was still fun to watch.