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kyidyl · 3 years

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Kyidyl Explains Bones - Part 4.2

(These are all collected in the KyidylBones tag. Additionally, this is the second half of part four - please read the first half here, especially if you have questions or comments about the ethics of what I’m talking about here. I’m going to be leaving that out as this is a continuation of that post.)

Since I’m skipping the talking and ethical statements in this one, let’s just get right into the bones. As a reminder, this is about race determination in skeletal remains.

White/Caucasoid.

Female, front view. (Source)

Male, profile view (Source)

So let’s break this down in an orderly way (I will put the comparisons and stuff at the bottom in an orderly table for easy reference. Hell, this is partially for my own reference too bc I never remember this stuff off the top of my head.):

Eye shape and sharpness - This is easiest to see in the front view, obviously. White skulls that have stereotypically white features will have eye orbits that are technically called “square with rounded edges” (or as we call them in the nail world....sqoval.), but they sit at kind of an angle where they’re higher in the middle and lower at the lateral sides so most of us just refer to them as “aviator glasses” which I think is pretty funny of us. And although you obviously can’t feel it with your fingers, the borders of the eye sockets will be sharper.

Prognathism - As you can see from the bottom image, on a caucasian skull there is a low amount of prognathism. The chin is often behind the spine of the nose rather than protruding. European skulls have flatter faces, basically. Although this male has a bit of an overbite so the curve around his teeth is more severe than it otherwise might be. Generally speaking though, you’ll be able to draw a line from the nasal spine to the chin and not much will stick out past the line and the line will be straight. The “muzzle” area of the face is less pronounced.

Nasal Shape - This is actually mathematically determined by a measurement called the nasal index. It is the ratio of the height to the width multiplied by 100. European skulls have thin, tall noses, and you can see that illustrated pretty well in the woman above.

Nasal Sill - On caucasians, the nasal spine aka sticky-outy-bit at the bottom of the opening that you can see in profile is more pronounced. It sticks out further. This means that a caucasian skull will also have more guttering behind the edge of the sill. IE, if you stick your finger in its nose and run it along the bottom of the nasal passage, you will feel a distinct dip. Europeans have a distinct nasal sill.

Nasal Bridge - White have shorter nasal bones, and so the bridge of their nose is shorter in profile. It also usually has a more extreme curve in the area inferior to the browbone. This male actually isn’t a good example of that, because his nasal bones are long for a caucasian skull. Basically, our noses stick out further.

Unique skull features - None. Caucasian skulls are kinda boring TBH.

Next, we have black/African skulls. In the US especially this can be a lot harder to determine because of centuries of admixture with the white population:

This is a front and profile view of the same male, african individual. (Source)

Something you’ll start to notice as we go through this is that Black skulls and white skulls usually have opposite features and asian skulls are between these two extremes (Except for eye orbit shape. Here it’s Asian on one end and African on the other, with European inbetween.). If you think about geography here, it kinda makes sense. Anyway, the skull features:

Eye orbit shape and sharpness - African skulls tend to have eye orbits that are more square in shape, and often aren’t angled the way they are in whites. This individual’s are angled though so they’re not super stereotypical of what would be considered characteristic of African eye orbits. His are fairly square though. The edges of the orbits tend to be softer and less distinct.

Prognathism - African skulls are prognathic, meaning that they stick out the furthest. In this individual, you’ll notice that it isn’t just his teeth that stick out past the line because of an overbite, the entire upper part of the maxilla is curved outwards. African faces are much less flat than white ones. The “muzzle” area is more pronounced.

Nasal Shape - As you might expect, African nasal shapes are much wider and shorter than European ones. They appear a lot rounder, and this is something that’s fairly unique to them, especially if the individual has very stereotypically African features.

Nasal Sill - The nasal spine sticks out much less in an African skull - I’ve seen individuals who barely had one at all. Between that and the prognathism, the bone almost seems as if it stretches, and you see very little silling. So if you stick your finger up its nose you won’t have a sharp edge with a dip behind it in the nasal passage. Sometimes there won’t even be a sill at all. I actually found a really good image of this, but I don’t want to mess up tumblr’s list ordering, so I’ll stick it in below the list.

Nasal Bridge - Africans have flatter noses, and to accommodate this their nasal bones are longer and the curve that’s inferior to the browbones is much less acute. Their noses stick out less than that of Europeans’, and it’s something that is fairly consistent in their skeletal remains.

Unique racial features - Not many, but Africans do have something called a “bushman’s canine”. Now, I’m gonna be honest with you guys and tell you that I STILL have problems identifying this feature. This is despite the fact that I was taught dental anthropology by one of the dudes who basically came up with these guidelines. So on the bottom of the upper canines there is a bump of tooth enamel that is more pronounced on Africans than it is on other races. There’s a grading scale and stuff. You can read about it here. Now I found that by just googling Bushman’s canine, but one of the authors (Joel Irish) was my prof, lol. Here’s a picture of it, but actually the drawing in that paper above is better at illustrating the two opposite ends of the scale. I added the lines:

(Source)

In addition, here’s the image showing the nose shape:

(Source)

African skulls will also sometimes have stronger muscle attachment sites, but honestly there’s a lot of that part of anatomy that’s social so it’s not something you can use to ID them unless you know what they should be for the society you’re looking into.

Ok, so that’s African skulls done. Next up, Asian. As a reminder, Asian and Native American skulls are *extremely* similar. This is because they share common ancestors. This is also confirmed by their genetics (Native American genetics are super interesting, but that’s a whole other thing.).

(Source)

This is an Asian male.

Eye Shape/Sharpness - Asians and Natives have round eye sockets, and the edge of the socket is of middling sharpness. In addition, their cheekbones tend to be flatter and wider, so the combination of these things makes their skull shape pretty distinctive. Personally I find Asian and Native American skulls to be the easiest to ID, and a lot of these features persist through admixture, too.

Prognathism - Asian/NA skulls have a middling amount of protrusion. This individual has a distinct prognathism, but it’s honestly hit or miss. They can have it either way. Asian cheekbones tend to mitigate the visual effect though so it’s a bit harder to see without specifically looking for it in profile with a straightedge.

Nasal Shape - As you can see from this individual, the nasal opening is neither as tall as caucasians nor as wide as Africans. Again, this correlates to what you might expect given their phenotypes in life. Theirs are the most heart shaped, too.

Nasal Sill - This is another area where they fall between the “very pronounced” of whites and the “not at all pronounced” of Africans. This individual barely has a nasal spine at all, but does appear to have something of a sill that would be present if you felt inside the nasal passage for it.

Nasal Bridge - Same as above, it falls in between the two extremes in shape and length.

Unique Racial Features - This is why I think Asian and Native Skulls are the easiest to ID. They have some really interesting racial quirks i their skull anatomy. First off, they have what’s called a persistent metopic suture. When we’re all babies our forehead (frontal) bone is in two pieces, and then they fuse. The suture between the two is then obliterated, IE, completely healed and smoothed over. In Asians and Native Americans, this suture fuses but you can still see it:

(Source)

It’s a completely harmless genetic variant that runs in those racial groups. The second easy to identify feature is shoveling. On the back of the upper (Maxillary) incisors. It’s basically just a difference in shape; a border around the back of the tooth. It looks like this:

(Source)

And here is the scale we use to grade it:

(Source - heheh there’s Joel again.)

It’s found on the lower incisors as well, but it’s easiest to see on the maxillary ones.

The last easy indicator is found along the sutures along the top and back of the skull. The coronal (arc along the front like a crown), sagittal (top center) and lambdoid (where the parietals fuse to the occipital. It’s like a downward V on the back of your skull.) sutures can be what’s called simple or complex. In Africans and whites, the sutures are mostly simple. In Asians and Native Americans, it’s complex. What that means is that the wiggly line is so wiggly that it loops back on itself and forms extra small bones called wormian bones. Sometimes these bones can actually be very large and have names. Here’s what a skull with small wormian bones looks like:

(Source)

The bones with the star are the wormian bones, although there are other, smaller ones. Very large ones are called Inca Bones, after the population they were first identified in. They look like this:

(Source)

A and B are examples of Inca bones. They’re generally a harmless genetic variant.

Lastly, we’ll address aborigonal features:

(Source)

This is an aboriginal man. Aboriginal is a generalized term for any indigenous group, but in anthropology - and from what I can see most places - we use it to describe people indigenous to Australia and the surrounding islands. The reason why it is only sometimes considered a separate category is that it’s pretty localized, and the differences really come down to some special features. So here are the main differences you can look for to tell if a skull is aboriginal:

Large teeth. Aboriginal people have really big teeth. There’s no other way to put this, they just...they’re large.

Very pronounced browbone. As you can see above, the browbone is MUCH heavier on an aboriginal skull than on any other kind of skull. This is especially true for males.

Flatter chin. It’s called the mental protuberance, and on an aboriginal individual it is less prominent than on other individuals.

Large occipital bun. The occipital bun is the bit at the bottom back of your skull where your neck muscles attach. You can see it in the profile picture in the far right sticking out of the bottom of the skull. It’s especially pronounced in aboriginal people.

Ok, so there is one more important characteristic for judging race that I totally forgot to include yesterday, and that’s palatine shape. The dental arcade is the area of the maxilla that houses the teeth. Basically the top of your mouth. And as you, a human person, knows - it’s in the shape of an arch. But that arch varies in shape from race to race. And, what your probably don’t know from not seeing a bunch of skulls, is that there are sutures in there. Between 2-4, but even when you have two they bisect each other and look like 4. The shape of these sutures also varies from race to race. Again, it’s a harmless genetic variant that runs in various geographic areas. However, I’m going to elect to skip it because there’s already a LOT of info in this post and going into it with the depth it deserves would be a lot. Instead, I’m going to just summarize here for you all WRT the characteristics I’ve listed:

Eye sockets: White - Aviator glasses, rounded square, sharp edge. Black - square/rectangle, blunt edge. Asian & Native - Round, middling sharp edges.

Prognathism: White - little to no prognathism. Black - most pronounced prognathism. Asian & Native - varies between these two extremes.

Nasal Shape: White - tall and thin. Black - short and round. Asian & Native - in-between these two.

Nasal Sill: White - sharp nasal spine, deep well behind a sharp wall. Black - Little or no spine, smooth sill. Asian & Native - Varies between these two.

Nasal Bridge: White - short nasal bones, more extreme curve. Black - longer, flatter nasals, a much less extreme curve. Asian & Native - you guessed it...between these two extremes.

Unique racial features: White - None. Black - Bushman’s canine. Asian & Native - tooth shoveling, persistent metopic suture, wormian/Inca bones.

And that is it! The rest of this series shouldn’t be quite this sensitive with respect to the subject matter. Tomorrow is gonna be the archaeology of graves AKA how to dig up dead people. =D After that will be (in no specific order) age determination, height determination, and teeth. Maybe other things if I feel like it. If you have questions or requests, don’t hesitate to ask!

#KyidylBones #science #race #forensic anthropology #bioarchaeology #human remains #human anatomy #archaeology #anthropology #skeleton

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mcrmadness · 3 years

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Rambling about my (dä fan)art...

I was writing another post and this kinda got out of hand and turned into me talking about my art overall. I’m gonna put this under the cut because I don’t know if people are interested in my art nor especially in my thought about it and my “art history” basically, but if you are, then I hope you enjoy.

And yes, this is gonna be about my die ärzte fanart mainly!

So let’s start with the HELL coverart drawing because that’s what I was talking about originally:

I’m extremely happy with how the drawing turned out in the end and I like that feeling of success when I’m happy with something I have created. That is not always self-evident with myself. More than often I have plain hated my drawings or have felt like there should be something done differently, or something that I could always improve at and do better. So this feeling where I’m actually content and happy with what I have created is something new and different. I have a dopamine rush every time I look at that drawing. I like the drawing. I think it looks nice. And I’m extremely happy about this fact and I am not afraid of admitting it. Perfectionism is a curse and a gift. It can sometimes make your life a living hell when something that is perfectly good still feels like it’s not enough. When everyone else sees that what you have done is actually good or even great but your brain just keeps repeating how it’s shit and everyone else is just delusional and that they don’t see what you see. And this is like the polar opposite of that feeling. It wasn’t other people who were delusional, it was you and youself all along. You were the one seeing the image in your head and the drawing not matching that image. Other people saw only what you had created and couldn’t compare it to anything. And that doesn’t mean it was never good.

So whenever I do these comics and comic style drawings nowadays, I just feel so happy. I feel that I am no longer failing them, I feel like I can draw the image I see in my head. I finally feel like I can draw, I have some skills, I’m not a professional and maybe not as good as everyone else but I’m good at what I’m doing. This is my thing and I’m good at it and it’s enough. And I love it when I feel like I’m improving. For years I felt like I was stuck, like my skills would have been glitching somehow, I didn’t get better no matter how much I drew. But I guess I tried too much and was too harsh on myself because I believed that a drawing is good only when no reference photos have been used. And I sucked at drawing without them. I still do! I was staring at the Hell coverart the whole time I was drawing! I wouldn’t have been able to do this if I didn’t! And this feels particularly good also because this is the first time I have tried something different with these comics. I have never tried to draw a photo or existing picture with this style. I have only drawn my comics and those I have created all by myself. The clothes come from what I have seen in videos and photos but the plots are created by me alone, with a idea coming from somewhere actual usually, as inspirations do.

For comics I do look at reference photos of people sitting or standing, or I look at the mirror, or even take photos of my own hand to be able to draw something. And that’s lots of fun and also challenging because I’m mixing there my old habit of portrait drawing with my less serious comic book style but I really really do like the combination. It also makes me feel that I am memorizing what I draw and the next time when I need to draw that same posture, I no longer need the reference photos because they’re no in my brain. And in my muscle memory. My hand remembers how to do the lines now.

Here you can see one of the sketches I did in 2018 - I had this image in my head and I wanted to draw it and I just... drew it in my sketchbook. Didn’t use pencil. But now I’ve noticed I like doing these on proper paper instead of the sketchbook AND it’s so much more fun to first draw the sketch with the pencil and then draw on it with the fineliners. That I have always done with the comics (apart from one) because they take more time than these quick sketches. But here you can see Farin’s legs on the first image - I think I might have looked at reference photos for that but then it was so much easier to do the to the comic I made in 2019.

I have now also figured out that a big part of my style is not to draw just simple straight lines. I like making those sketch-like lines even with the marker. They look more rough but that’s something I like seeing with my art. That’s what I was missing when I was staring at the lines I had drawn before and hated every detail of them. They were too clean and neat.

^These two I have also drawn on my sketchbook in 2018 and I don’t really know why. I guess I was still a bit stupid and didn’t really realize I’m drawing again. But anyway, they both were inspired by my own fanfiction I have written a long time ago. It’s one of my favorite self-written fanfics and it had these two scenes I just saw in my head and felt like I could try drawing them. Maybe that’s why they are in my sketchbook, I wasn’t sure if they were going to turn out even good... The marker around the second one obviously was shit and the paper wasn’t good for it, and I never finished with it so it looks a bit weird. Do I need to say that I really enjoy drawing very small, repetative details, like those tiles? It’s so soothing, almost like a therapy.

I think that quitting antidepressants in 2013 has done so much good for my creativity. If you compare my work from 2011 to 2019, the difference is huge - all are just parts from my comics:

Can you guess see the difference? But have to admit I am jealous for myself for how I have drawn Farin’s hair to the 2011 one and maybe have forgotten to color Farin’s arm but... I actually had so long pause from drwing (~8 years) that I forgot how I did that and had to use THAT as a reference when I was trying to draw late 80s Farin’s at some point last or this year :D

Anyway, my style with the shadows is a little different when I use colored pencils than when I use markers. This is from my latest comic from this year, where I experimented with Promarkers the way I had never done before and I really like how it came to be:

I have owned this set of Promarkers (black + 5 greys) for years and have never really used them, apart from the black which I usually used for the thick lines anyway. And wanted to see if I could find some use for the greys too! (Yes that’s Bela back there - this comic was an alternative ending for Für Immer music video :D)

And I wanna end this post with a face progress comparison for all three. During this I also noticed that before I used to draw their side profiles and it was really difficult to find images where I’d have drawn from from the front. And nowadays I have mainly drawn them from the front and it’s hard to find side profiles! Interesting! Here’s one of Farin and Bela from a drawing I made this year:

Also the hand that was so much fun to draw but I also took photos of my own hand in that posture in order to even draw that - that was fun! :D

But here are the last three images - using the HELL one as the last for each, of course:

Bela has always been the easiest to draw. And the first one of these three is actually from my first ever Bela&Farin comic! I didn’t color their skin back then. With the next ones I already did color their skins too but I used darker colors to do the shadows. Nowadays I do the shadows with fineliners. Or it depends - that 2019 one doesn’t have that lol.

Damn it was so difficult to find something where I’d have draw Farin from the front :D And I see the HELL one literally is my second (or third) time drawing Farin with his grin. Or if you count all those numerous extra mouths I drew because I failed the first one, then I have drawn his grin at least 15 times by now. I probably can draw his teeth with no reference photos from now on.

I haven’t drawn Rod too many times. I can actually count about... 5 times? And then there’s only 2 times when I’ve drawn his side profile but he’s at the background. I don’t know if I’ve ever really succeeded at that, I usually try to draw his head a more round and his eyes smaller than for Bela and Farin and I was actually bit worried for the HELL one and was wondering if I’m going to ruin the whole thing. But in fact, that was actually easiest of them to draw. And STILL I’m surprised by how alike he looks in that last one. In fact, I think his dacial features are perfect for a carricature drawing so you don’t need to do more than a few lines for the mouth and it looks like his mouth. The middle one was for a drawing I made for a friend and with this I actually looked at photos so that I could draw some of his hairstyles from the 90s and I liked this one the best and it was also quite easy to draw too.

Do I even have to say that I’m not extremely motivated what comes to drawing? I feel like my creative has become what it has never been before. I still don’t really know what to draw but I just feel that whatever it is I’ll start next, it will be good. And if it doesn’t... who cares? I had so much fun with those extra mouths of Farin which was maybe visible from the video I filmed, and that is what makes drawing worth it. Before I took the drawing process so seriously and a mistake felt like the end of the world but now I laugh at them and make fun of them and don’t take them too seriously. And I always have ways to fix these, or I can redraw. Just like I did with Farin’s mouth (or a half of his face actually) for this newest drawing. The most important thing is that I’m having fun and enjoying what I do, that way usually the outcome will also be a success.

I have now at least 2 dä comics on my to-do list (I don’t remember if there’s a third one too) + one pencil drawing that is halfway there. It will take one more night/day for it to get it finished. I also have probably 5 ideas for self-comics etc. in my sketchbook and I try to find some time to work on those. Or actually I have a plenty of time. Adhd, time blindness and executive dysfunction just make it feel as if I didn’t :D Can’t wait to get working on my next drawing projects, tho!

(I wish I knew how to make art for a living even but that’s a topic that will need its own post which I’m probably do in a near future if I don’t forget :D)

#mcrmadness’ art talk #mcrmadness draws #the post has lots of text but also quite a many images #dä fanart #die ärzte #I have been drawing dä comics since 2010 - the old ones are very stupid but whatever :D #long post

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haru-sen · 5 years

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Out of curiosity, why do you write as a hobby. What do you feel when writing? Do you see the whole plot first and details later?

You’re about to get a whole ass answer complete with childhood trauma. Mild trigger warning for child abuse?

So, tumblr ate the first draft of this and I’m annoyed. Today has been very annoying. But I digress. The easiest thing to talk about is the process. I start everything with a small idea. It can be a few lines of dialogue, a character prototype, or a “what if” question. One of the first scenes I thought of for IAL was the “Jack making bad sandwiches” and Lucky asking “Are we poor?” And I realized I really wanted to write that relationship dynamic. Obviously that scene came much later in the story, but it was one of the first building blocks. And then, I have to take that idea and build it into something that can stand on its own. Because alone, it’s just the ramblings of a maniac. Great, some OC made a joke about Jack’s cooking skills? Who really cares? Well, you do, by that point in IAL. (I assume you do if you made it that far...)

Feng’s an AU version of my main character from a novel series I really need to rework. Spoiler: the conceptual question was, “what happens when heroes/adventurers settle down and have kids? What kind of family life do they have?” And then it turned into an in-depth examination of unhealthy family dynamics and the difficulty of being halfway between worlds both metaphorically and sometimes literally. Second spoiler: Just because you’re an awesome monster-killer/mercenary duo, doesn’t mean you’re going to be great parents.

So it’s usually some kind of idea, that I just keep building on till it becomes something that could be a more concrete story. But it takes time to foment. I’d been two months into the Overwatch fandom before I started writing IAL.�� I had all kinds of ideas, mostly for the Angst!AU and the current timeline. I’d written a few teaser scenes for that, but on a whim, started IAL instead. And it grew so much faster than I expected.

So it’s taken me awhile, but I’ve gotten to the point with ideas (and drafts!) where I can be excited about the shininess of a new thing, but also know that I’m really going to have to work on it to make it better. It’s rarely just “poof!” and “awesome.” I have to take an extra step to ask what makes this idea/character/scene stand out from everything else that is out there. What am I really adding? And you know, sometimes stuff isn’t better/different/greater than everything else out there. But it’s still enjoyable. And I’ll take that too.

When I write, it’s planning and creativity. On good days, I’m entranced in what I’m doing, really planning/living the scene in my head, and really pleased with my progress. (Heavily focused daydreaming?) On bad days, it’s a slog to stay on track, nothing feels good/inspired, and I feel like a hack. I’ve learned that how I feel while creating doesn’t actually guarantee the quality of the work. When I go back to edit, sometimes the stuff is really good, sometimes it’s not, and the stuff I write when I feel bad can actually be really good and vice versa. But it always needs to be edited.

On a side note, all my internet friends groups I made because of writing. Sometimes we shared fandoms, but it was always the writing/reading that connected us. (Sometimes, that was bad, because writers are neurotic and sometimes egotistical. Shocking, I know.) Put us all together and the insecurities were numerous. :P

Now, onto the heavy shit. In my case, I don’t know if I can call writing a “hobby.” It’s a coping mechanism. I know that sounds a little pretentious, but bear with me. I would write even if there was no one else left to read it, because I’ve grown my brain in that direction. It’s easier for me to work out shit on paper than it is to talk about. (Or at least, I can make it sound cooler and more coherent on paper than just putting it in stream of consciousness sort of blather.)

I started writing when I was 12. I have loved reading all my life, but up till then never considered myself that creative. I did some fiction writing before that, never very seriously and never with any intention to be a writer. It might have never caught my interest, but I have immigrant parents who had good intentions and terrible parenting skills.

In middle school, things were pretty terrible at home. I didn’t have outlets. I will flat out say they were abusive and crying got the response “I’ll give you something to cry about.” I was kind of crybaby when I was five (yes, even for a five year old). I had an excellent poker face by eleven.

I used to draw, but I wasn’t very good at it, and my parents didn’t encourage it, because I wasn’t very good, so what was the point? (Yes, I know that logic is wrong, but that’s what I got told.) And also, even if I was good, I wasn’t going to make any money. So don’t bother. I wasn’t allowed to play sports. I had no musical talent or inclination. I wasn’t really allowed to leave the house very often. If I wanted to go anywhere, I had to take my younger sisters (four and eight years younger than me) with me, because I was the oldest and what kind of sister was I if I went out with people and left them at home? (Ahem. More bad logic, I know.) No, they were hardcore serious about this. And if they didn’t want me to go somewhere, they’d just say that they didn’t trust those people with my sisters. And let’s not even get into the power dynamic with my sisters and how that worked. It wasn’t pretty, for any of us.

My parents, like the Asian stereotype goes, were obsessive on schoolwork. So if I was doing “homework,” they left me alone. And if I wanted to use the computer, I had better be doing homework. I started journaling, for both therapeutic and legal reasons. It was depressing as fuck recording the nonfiction events of my life. One day, I wrote a little fanfiction scene from Sailor Moon in crappy script format. It was so terrible. But I liked it. I reread it so many times. It was empowering. So I wrote another one. And then started a whole damn series. It was baaaaad. I filled multiple notebooks with this saga, in pencil, so it’s probably illegible now, though I have them in trunk somewhere. I wrote a more polished (but still bad) version for a Sailor Moon fanfic archive and was thrilled when people actually read it and kind of liked it. (...they had terrible taste, lol) But that’s how I passed the time. At home. At school. I just started writing when I was upset, or bored, or just because. It was melodramatic, self-indulgent, and a coping mechanism. My teachers encouraged it. (English teachers usually liked me.) And gradually, I got better at it. I stopped writing scripts, started writing proper stories. My characters became better, more fleshed out. I expanded into original fiction.

Now seriously, I’m not going to say that I don’t have issues because of it. But sharing this stuff doesn’t hurt me. It’s uncomfortable in the sense of “oversharing with people you don’t know super well should be uncomfortable...if only the person in the cubicle beside me would learn that.” It’s mostly just weird. So there’s no need for obligatory comforting comments. It’s cool. I talk to my parents every few months in a civil fashion, once a month if I’m unlucky. And it’s not anything to brag about, but there are boundaries in place and I’m good. So kind of a happy outcome.

But yeah, that’s why I started writing. It was that or kill real people.

*insert serial killer joke because I'm too tired*

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315-no-stage · 5 years

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[20190827] TFG 「My dear Summer」Release Event Photo Session fan report

(Yeah, I know it’s been over two weeks since the event. LOL I’m not much of a timely blogger but if you want the blow-by-blow as it happens, my Twitter is the best bet. I tend to word vomit especially when I’m going through an anxiety episode... as you would see later on. I’m mostly doing this for memory keeping, for myself lmao. And for information too, if you’re interested, especially if you’re a fan living outside of Japan. Please keep in mind that my listening skills are stronger than my speaking skills. However, when put on the spot, under pressure, that goes all away ahaha. I can’t read Japanese apart from name kanji.)

I guess I should begin when I first heard about this event. It was around May 2019 when the TFG twitter announced that they are holding a two-shot cheki chance event to celebrate the release of their first single My dear Summer. At that time, I simply wanted to get my hands on the CD lol. We had dreams of going to Anisamano plans of going to Japan any time soon (since I only just came back from my Tokyo no Jin trip earlier that month).

I had my brother help me out with buying the CDs (Google Translate can only do so much) when he actually encouraged me to try for the cheki. He said it’s a lottery system, as usual, and it won’t hurt to try since I’m buying stuff anyway. So I did. I bought both the First Press Limited Edition sets A and B using my boy Haruto Sakuraba’s link and didn’t really think much of it. They said they were going to announce winners on July 24. The event was the following month, August 27.

The ball started rolling after that. July was the 2.5D Actor Appreciation Month. #25DAAM on twitter.I featured Haruto and Mayu Yoshioka on mine. Then we somehow secured tickets to Anisama 2019. A small part of me was hoping... what if I hit for that cheki chance with Haruto. Anisama was happening the weekend of the cheki event after all. My brother was willing to either go to Japan early or stay late. Our schedule all depended on the cheki event results.

The day before results were to be released, I was a mess. It’s been a long time since I got a panic episode but something was in the water that day. Add to that, the results. The time difference threw me off and I was obsessively checking my email. My brother told me to give it a full 24 hours to account for the time difference. So what did I do? I distracted myself with Kenji Arita lmao. My brother and I had been fairly lucky with chuusen whether it be for tickets or fan events. The last time I attempted a lottery was for the Nelke Planning panel with Shiratorizawa at JF19. I didn’t hit for that because they only recognized actual JP addresses and my proxy wasn’t allowed. (But it was all good because the standby crowd got so large they allowed us to watch behind the ticket winners anyway haha.) I was praying that that won’t be the case here too.

When I woke up the next morning for work, I checked my email... and it was there. I had my brother actually open the email and translate for me. We were looking for a "できません" but instead, it was a long email full of instructions and congratulations. I actually got picked! I read and re-read the email many times just to convince myself that I actually won. The email said that exact time and place of the event was to be announced only to winners in a separate email nearer the date. Cool cool. I felt so special LMAO.

I actually got the specifics about a week after the first email. The directions were weirdly specific... and helpful for someone like me who doesn’t know what to do with North-South-East-West directions; I work better with “Turn right when you see a Mini Stop across the street from a pachinko parlor” types AHAHAHA. Time frame was 5pm to 8-ish, then they specified that Haruto would have less than an hour to get through all the chekis with fans. They also said something about which forms of identification were required, which gifts/letters are accepted, even how the poses were chosen.

But even with all that... I had no idea what to do. I tried lowkey Googling and stalking butai/idol social media for fan reports and... I couldn’t find anything that answers my questions (and quelled my anxiety over the matter haha). So I hope if you find yourself in the same situation later, AND IF YOU’RE AN OVERSEAS FAN, I hope this long ass post is going to be helpful to you. I’ve been to one other cheki event - with Hiroki Ino in Cosplay Mania 2018 in Manila - but that’s more straightforward than this one.

(My slogan should be “Will travel for cheki” ahahaha.)

Now that you’ve read through all that, let’s fast forward to August 27. After a hearty lunch at DiveryCity Tokyo, I made my way to the venue using the EXACT directions they provided in the email. I got there at exactly 5PM. I get by okay by myself in Tokyo but my brother usually acts as translator for me, like a crutch. But like on my May trip, I was by my lonesome on this adventure.

I see a couple of girls in skirts (I was in a skirt too and it was a good call because it was pretty much dress code lol) waiting by the lobby. The sign said B2F so I go down and see more dressed up girls, some even in a yukata. They started lining up so I do the same. I was trying to make myself look small because I was playing everything by ear. They started calling out everyone who hit for Kento so the line thinned a little bit. I got to the registration desk and the staffer who looked so much like Maki Kawase took my paper confirmation and ID. After looking through her sheet, Nobu’s, she politely corrected me that “Sakuraba-san isn’t until...” she said a time but in my flustered and frankly, embarrassed state, it took me a while to figure it out. She even referred to another staffer behind her for the correct time. I apologized and made my way out but then she pointed to a nearby bench, gesturing for me to stay there instead of going back up.

That was when I started panic tweeting HAHAHAHA. If you don’t want to read further, then please just click on this Twitter Thread instead. Thanks! But if you want Stephen King-level of detail, keep reading. XD

Watching those little kids do scales and random dances calmed me down. Miss Staff-san (let’s just call her that) kept tabs on me, glancing at me from time to time and whenever we’d meet eyes, she’d smile. That kept me grounded. Also, talking to my mutuals who were humoring me was a huge help. I managed to laugh and distract myself. When I started seeing a new batch of girls lining up with Haruto pin badges and an excess of purple on their person, I followed. When Miss Staff-san saw me up next, she gave me a huge smile and a thumbs up. I went up to register and.. my name was easiest to find since it was the only one in the Roman alphabet. I was number 50 in a list that I think went up to 75.

We were herded into an honest to goodness dance practice studio. You know, with all the mirrors and low ceilings. Picture samples of the poses were on the wall, as done by Reo and Haruto. Pose A was your generic “double peace” sign. Pose B was doing an “Asian squat” and the photo was taken from above. Pose C would have you back-to-back with the member. Then there’s the special pose. Haruto teased that he was inspired by Jojo’s Bizarre Adventure. Hello, Pose C. Haruto Sakuraba is 6′2″ and I am a hobbit. Nope. Plus I’m very basic when it comes to poses. Ask Ino hahaha.

As the room filled, it drove home that I was the only foreigner there. Normally, it wouldn’t have mattered to me but at that moment, I was under a lot of pressure, my earlier faux pas still had me embarrassed, plus my severe lack of Japanese speaking skill was getting to me. I know, it’s all in my head; obviously I overcame it but if you have anxiety, you know how stressful that can be. I tried keeping myself small, trying to blend in. All the while, I kept seeing Miss Staff-san in my periphery and that calmed me down somewhat.

Then they lined us up according to the number on the ticket. I know what 50 is in Japanese so I just kept my ears open for that. I dropped off my fan letters before I could forget (Nobu got one too, handwritten in English but with a typed up translation sheet) then we were led to another, larger dance studio area. At the opposite end of the room were room dividers. They had My dear Summer on loop but I was so in my head that I didn’t even suffer from earworm. I just kept updating Twitter. More for personal sanity than anything ahahhaa.

Haruto took his time with fans. I noticed Reo’s line went by much faster. By the time he was almost done (his started a bit later than ours), I think Haruto’s only on his 20th fan. I calmed down enough to get my bearings back and I was glad to know that I wasn’t the only one losing her mind. The other girls were talking amongst themselves about the back-to-back pose and what they want to say to him. He seemed so friendly, if the laughter and chatting we were hearing from behind the dividers were any indication, and all of us wanted to make a good impression. Giiirl, I wasn’t even sure if the boy spoke a lick of English! XD

Then. It was my turn.

The staffer asked me which pose I want to do and being the boring person that I am, I chose A pose. Another staffer took my purse but all I saw was Haruto up close in his TFG get up.

Haruto: ありがとうございます Me: OMG Hi! 海外 fan です! *Haruto’s eyebrows disappear into his fringe. Staff takes pic* Haruto: Ah double peace. Er so... Me: I'm from California. Los Angeles. Haruto: Ah, California. So you don't speak Japanese? Me: A little bit. Your English is good. Haruto: Aaah, not so much. I try. So when did you get to Japan? Me: Sunday? I'm here for Anisama and to see you! Haruto: Ah thank you so much. Staff: Next! ありがとうございました *Haruto hands me the cheki. we bow at each other* Haruto: ありがとうございました. Bye-bye! Me: ありがとうございました.

I mean, the whole thing couldn’t have been more than 30 seconds but it felt so much longer. His final ありがとうございました has a bit of emphasis as if trying to teach me. Oh you! I knew at least that much.

Then was I was leaving the booth, I heard the staffers go, "Whoa... I didn't know you can do that!" And he was all "Ay-yah... hehe." GUYS. GUYSSSS!!!! I couldn’t stop smiling... from the moment I just had to the moment he just had to... ALL OF IT! And as I left the venue, Miss Staff-san was right there waiting for me at the door. When she was my delicately holding the cheki in my hand, she patted me on the shoulder and said “ よくやった!” I never thanked anyone that profusely in my life. (Honestly, her kindness made me tear up.)

I have no flippin’ idea how I kept it together in there. It was a total Yuri On Ice moment where Yuuri just let everything go at that moment and let it all out on the ice when it mattered. I said pretty much everything I wanted to say which wasn’t much. All I wanted to do is to let him know that he has overseas fans. And to test how good his English skills are.

And let me tell you, it was more than okay. There was absolutely no hesitation in his words. He kept eye contact and oh lawd, his SMILE up close? I don’t know how I’m still here telling you all this. Now every time I hear his voice, I hear it in English ahahaha. (I know he spoke Chinese at a radio show but I wasn’t able to catch that and they haven’t put up the archive at all. Pfft.)

What made me so happy was he ended up impressing not only me but the staff too!!! He even took control of the conversation. The staffers were like "What's going on?" smiling at him as we talked. I'm sofkng proud.

(I should mention that this is technically my 8th time seeing Haruto in person. I saw Tokyo no Jin seven times in May. I figured that would help me a bit with the stress but nope. Although, I cannot wait for everyone to see the TnJ BD and experience his take on Bokuto. You’ll understand this admiration all the more lmao.)

So there it is. If you’re still with me, thank you. I hope I didn’t come across as annoying. I was - am - just so excited that I was able to do this and I wanted to share my experience. Haruto is such a precious sweetheart. I wish him the best of everything.

#sakuraba haruto #haruto sakuraba #TFG #桜庭大翔 #this is my 200th post!

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eating-rocks · 7 years

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Alphabet Tag Thing!

Rules: Answer the questions in a new post and tag 10 blogs you’d like to get to know better!

Tagged-ish by @theinsanefox (I’ve seen so many do this now and I don’t feel like waiting for it to reach one of my mutuals)

a: age - 19 (a few months away from turning 20, though, butI’m still really young)

b: birthplace - Southern Sweden

c: current time - 06:10 am (I sound like a productive member of society being up so early, but I never really fell asleep)

d: drink you had last - Juice

e: easiest person to talk to - my mom

f: favorite song - Currently “Get Mine”- G-eazy, “Fuck You”- Lily Allen or “Kattliv”- JOY, depending on mood

g: grossest memory - Oh, god. I’m not easily grossed out, my favourite tv programs as a child were not so very censored veterinary programs. But something that almost gives my goose bumps when I think about it because it was so horrible, is when I had shingles and needed disinfect and apply ointment to the blisters so they would heal better. Some textures that feels similar makes me really nauseous

h: hogwarts house - Slytherin

i: in love? - Lol, duh. Sana (my cat) is the love of my life

j: jealous of people - I’m too tired to go around and envy people. I obviously get envious occasionally, but I try to turn that into ambition instead

k: killed someone - Well wouldn’t you like to know (I haven’t, I swear)

l: love at first sight or should I walk by again? - First of all, has this pick up line ever made sense? Second of all, I don’t think you can be in love with someone you don’t know

m: middle name - Sofie and Elisabet

n: number of siblings - 0

o: one wish - To be free from all my pain, illnesses and anxiety

p: person you called last - my mom

q: question you are always asked - “Did you make that??”, often followed by “I could never do that” and I hate it

r: reason to smile - Uh... Sana?

s: song you sang last - Dunno, I have a terrible singing voice and lung problems, so I don’t sing very often

t: time you woke up - Around 2 am, but I hadn’t slept for many hours so it was more of a nap

u: underwear color - Some weird pink-ish colour

v: vacation destination - My bed, lol. I haven’t slept in it in weeks because it’s plucked apart (long story)

w: worst habit - Putting something aside and forgetting about it, often it’s a dirty mug or plate that I forget to bring out to the kitchen or some paper that ends up with more paper on top until it’s lost

x: x-rays - My god, where do we even start? I’ve x-rayed my foot 4 times ( 2 times for a twisted ankle, once because a horse decided to stand on it (also, I thought it was a good idea to wear converse when taking it for a walk, instead of borrowing a pair of boots when I didn’t have any), and once because I’m an idiot and dropped-ish a pan on my foot), knee 2 times (one time for Schlatter disease and once after I fell with my bike), thumb because it got smashed between two mops (also a long story), lungs because I couldn’t breath and they thought it could be fluid in the airways (turned out to be walking pneumonia), lung scintigraphy (same occasion, but to check for blood clots this time), and CT-scan because I’d had a almost constant headache for 2-3 months.

I think that’s all of them, my body’s pretty fucked up at this point

y: your favourite food - Don’t really have one, I like most foods. But if I had to pick one, I’d say sushi without raw fish i.e veggie-or slightly grilled sushi

z: zodiac sign - Aires tagging:

@tameholly @pluttskutt @inquisitorsmabari @zevranamor @ok-panduh @dreadhobo @charcoalvoid @myfavoritebisexual @triceratops-tricerabottoms @aly-the-gamer

#tag meme #about me

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