Posts tagged as:

geek

Ai Takahashi is a Final Fantasy Geek

January 9, 2010 · 7 comments

This is a Japan Blog Matsuri Post, submitted for January 2010. Theme: Famous Japanese People, hosted by loneleeplanet.

Ai-chan is most likely the cutest and sexiest celebrity geek out there, wouldn’t you agree? She has a major weak spot for anime and games, if that doesn’t make her your dream girl, what does?

I don’t have a PS3, but I want one now^^; [click to continue…]

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LEO Imai Official Blog Translation: Coming Out

September 20, 2009 · 4 comments

in Translations

I’ve previously done translations of idol blogs, but seeing as they are often pretty boring to read I’ve decided to translate something that I find more interesting instead. Leo Imai is one of my favorite Japanese artists and I enjoy reading his blog. I don’t promise 100% correct translations seeing as my Japanese is very limited, but hopefully they’re better than using Google Translate^^

For those who aren’t familiar with Leo Imai, here’s some fast facts.

Father Japanese. Mother Swedish. Born in Tokyo. Raised in London.
Made indies debut in Japan with album ‘City Folk’ in 2006. Played Summer Sonic Festival in 2007.
Made major debut through EMI Music Japan in Nov of same year.
Released major debut album ‘Fix Neon’ in Feb 2008.
Released second album ‘Laser Rain’ in April 2009.
Has collaborated with artists such as James Iha, Zazen Boys, Kenji ‘Jammer’ Suzuki, and K.U.D.O.

[click to continue…]

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Wota Life: Introduction

June 5, 2009 · 4 comments

in Idols

This is the very first post of a set that I’ve named “Wota Life”. In this set of posts I will be telling you about living life as a wota, with interviews and in-depth articles on the various aspects of being a wota. This is jsut a short introduction so look forward to the future posts! Oh and watch out, this post might not be completely safe for work!

Have you ever heard of the term otaku? Oh I bet you have, but have you ever heard of “wota”? If you have followed my blog for a while you’ve probably come to an understanding of the word. Otaku and wota have a pretty close relationship, although there are wotas who aren’t otakus. To put it simply, a wota is what an otaku is for anime, but for idols. Of course an otaku isn’t bound to anime alone, but it’s probably the most common obsession among otakus. Otaku is basically a term to describe people with any kind of obsessive interest, be it trains, computers or cooking, we all have an otaku in us.

Wota on the other hand is just another way of describing someone with an obsessive interest in Japanese idol singers, a music otaku. A wota can be either a guy or a gal, idoling in Japan goes both ways. A few examples of popular idol groups among male wotas are Morning Musume (and all the other groups of Hello! Project), AKB48 and anime voice actresses who often sing theme songs. As for female wotas we have boy bands such as NEWS, KAT-TUN, Kanjani8 and Arashi. All of these bands are popular among mainstream people too, but many cross the line to become obsessed fans.

Although wotas are both male and female, the male ones usually get most of the attention. But the difference between male and female wotas isn’t that big. Both male and female idols appear on a vast variety of TV shows, pose half nude in front of the camera (sometimes even fully nude), make radio shows and photo books. So the only difference I see is the fact that they all try to appeal a different audience. Oh and female praising probably doesn’t go this far.

Examples of female and male fanservice:

There’s also fan-made fanservice, more commonly known as fakes, which I don’t have anything of, but it’s probably better that way.

Well, this post was just an introduction and I will be continuing on the topic of living a life as a wota. Look forward to more in-depth posts and interviews!

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