#the year i lived in japan

[turrondeluxe]

Ronin Mikey and turtle babies AU!!!

[agisleepy]

My sister managed to work her VPN and recorded it for me🥰

So here it is for everyone's hearing pleasure, enjoy!❤️

If you can please support the original release (plz don't send styx after me Yana)

Google Drive link

[absolutebl]

I Cannot Reach You - Kimi ni wa Todokanai REVIEWED

This image perfectly captures how I feel about this show. You ready? I wasn't.

I Cannot Reach You

AKA I Can't Reach You AKA Kimi ni wa Todokanai

Japan 2023 - 8 eps 20 ea approx 2.5 hours

Themes, main tropes & archetypes: friends to lovers, tsundere/sunshine, self acceptance, self worth, high school BL, live action yaoi, soft romance, kindness

Rating? 10/10

Yeah, it happened again in 2023.

Adapted from a manga.

The moment I finished binging this show I was thinking about writing about it and re-watching it. This is a sure sign that I adored a piece of media. 

This is a wonderful BL.

Truly well executed, with smooth filming and lovely acting, both of a simplistic style that felt slightly more Korean than it did Japanese. It reminded me a little bit of Seven Days and a little bit of Takara and Amagi, and since these are my two favorite high school JBLs obviously I was bound to adore ICRY.

But what it reminded me of more than anything was Cherry Blossoms After Winter.

Odd for JBL and KBL to be so closely linked. 

Like CBAW show, ICRY is classic live action yaoi.

Like the MOST classic of CLASSIC.

All the JBL tropes. I mean look at that image above? It's rooftop assignation, kabedon, and a handhold ALL AT ONCE.

There was also multiple runnings of the gays, surprise kisses (one on a bridge), and shoulder leans.

There is even a “seme looses control to desire” scene which leads to dub con. There is an abject apology after but still - you’ve been warned. 

The premise is: smart sporty hot (and hella gay) Yamato has a long standing crush on his silly sunshine sweetheart bestie, Kakeru. Yamato is also stiff, self isolated, shy, and has only ever really managed to get along with Kakeru. I love this kind of pining seme so damn much, it probably biased me. 

Unlike most uke, Kakeru starts to slowly figure out that his best friend is in love with him by ep 2 (let the chaos bisexual identity crisis commence).

So do some of the friends around them.

The story thus revolves around Yamato trying to unsuccessfully suppress his desire, and Kakeru trying to figure out if he can return Yamato‘s affection.

This biggest barrier is actually Kakeru's feelings of inadequacy and unworthiness (when compared to Yamato). But this is tempered by his genuine kindness which forces him into act with integrity around his dear friend's love and strive to fix everything (even himself) to prove worthy of it - whether he can ultimately return it or not.

Kakeru's struggles are pitted against Yamato‘s repressed need that keeps bubbling over and figuratively (sometimes literally) attacking Kakeru with romantic, emotional, and physical intensity. 

Quick pitch:

This classic friends-to-lovers BL is everything Japan does best. Angsty. Emo. Aching. Driven by real thirst. Yamato is deeply in love with his childhood bestie, Kakeru, and has been for ages, unable to hide his ungainly damaging high school need. He wants Kakeru in every way possible and it oozes off of the screen. Kakeru is silly and a little simple, but not frenetic or overly camp about it. He is earnest, and genuinely wants to keep Yamato in his life which means giving a romance (and gayness) a fair chance. We watch him realize his affection and what form it can take in a truly authentic way. This show was impossibly kind to both of its lead characters and I felt almost honored that I got to watch something so lovely and rare play out on my screen.

I’m not gonna lie, I dithered over whether to give this a 10/10 and nearly didn’t. But there is nothing wrong with it AS A BL.

And it's so GOOD to ALL of its characters and they are so good to each other. It's quiet, and because of that and its goodness, it will get overlooked, but I LOVED IT.

It's not one of those that BL outsiders will get and you must like Japan's style to enjoy it. But I'm in it. It's for me.

What am I hung up over? Even the kisses are good.

10/10

I CAN'T RECOMMEND IT HIGHLY ENOUGH

Welcome to a very elite club. I gotta change all my best of lists now.

I am sorry to tell you how difficult this show is to get hold of. It deserves a much wider distribution. As of Nov 2023 I do not know where to legally find it internationally with eng subs. Please check the comments for updates.

It's on Netflix in some countries!

Try to find it, you won't regret it.

(source)

[cobaltfluff]

"Being in the snow with my lover like this immerses me in a special feeling. I like it."

[angy-grrr]

i have an issue I see with ppl trying to make shippers "understand" their ship could not become canon, and I dont think many would expect it.

Why are we pretending being in your late 30s is being middle age? Dont get me wrong, being a middle aged person doesn't have to mean anything about someone, but its just- not middle age literally.

I dont really understand bringing that up anyways, iit feels wrong to me to believe just ppl in their teens and 20s could ever do anything pro LGBT+ in general... I find it insulting, as if this is a new thing or impossible to believe older people could believe in queerness in a positive light or be queer themselves. The main reason in the west, and im assuming other parts of the world, there arent as many or as visible is, well, because people were dying because of the AIDS crisis + the isolation from being older and every single public space made for or just young queers or cishet older adults.

I get the point, but if I remember correctly every time I see someone trying to do that (of course im believing they have the best intentions in mind), they have to bring up how this is a Japanese middle aged man as a good enough reason.

I don't really mind about what others want to believe or how much they care in terms of shipping -if you prefer to be casual and not paying that much attention to what's canon or not, good for you! Many ppl are also like that and its completely valid, here in this side of Tumblr might seem like all of us believe and theorize about their endgame potential bc we are the ones that usually make more posts or longer content. But I dont like those assumptions about queerness being tied to young westerners, and I wanted to rant a little bit.

Again, I dont believe that was the intention in any of those posts, and im not trying to call out anyone, just rant.

[ghosttotheparty]

i hate summer. i hate heat. i hate humidity. i hate bright sunlight. i hate summer. i am dying.

[alwayshappyhoursomewhere]

2023.10.07 Stéphane Lambiel and Shoma Uno during Japan Open/Carnival on Ice practice (JO/CaOI ig) reunited at last ;;

[josyuss]

inverted middle finger 200%

[steelthroat]

I am pretty responsible when it comes to money... someone could also use the word "stingy"

However:

Snacks

Little stupid but actually useful gadgets that ALSO look cool/nice

Museums/art related stuff

Make me act... unwisely

[kojiarakiartworks]

October 1985 JAPAN TOKYO SHIMOKITAZAWA

That's me sitting there playing the guitar and singing :) It's a long time ago^^;

© KOJI ARAKI Art Works

Daily life and every small thing is the gate to the universe ：）

[seonghwasblr]

SVT coming to Europe for the first time ever in 9 years (not counting Gastonbury, cause that was sold out a year before they were announced, so carats didn't get a chance to go) and it's not even going to be ot13 should be a crime.. AND IT'S BECAUSE OF A SCHEDULE?!

[caimitos]

saw a post about projecting your ethnicity onto a character and started missing vespa ilkay. so so bad

[historicity-was-already-taken]

Me, opening chapter 4 with Operation Barbarossa

[themetallicnemesis]

Doodles for a tang shen swap au

[gojoest]

https://www.tumblr.com/chuluoyi/751595718601490432/hi-anon-who-has-lived-in-japan-for-15-years

Okay seriously what is going on here??

i got the exact same ask last night and chose to ignore it bc it makes 0 sense

it’s a quite obvious cry of desperation. he is confirmed dead im sorry and if he were to somehow miraculously come back from the dead, which is impossible bc that’s jjk and not some other shonen where miracles and power of friendship exist, it would ruin the tragedy of his death and the aftermath of it. ppl should let it be already it’s super annoying………

[glittering-under-the-glass]

My sister mentioned at the dinner that one of her former classmate who moved to the US (we’re all hungarians) just had her prom.

And it suddenly hit me that America is like, a real place. A real place with real people living in it, doing things like prom and going to the University of Georgia.

Like it’s not something made up for the movies and for the social media.

Wild.