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Post by MATTHEW FUYU CHANG on Aug 15, 2012 10:20:23 GMT -5
Normally, Matthew looked upon summer vacations as a bittersweet thing. One goes through a lot in a year, especially when they go to school away from family and have no one but peers and staff to rely on for company, so it's no surprise that they would start considering those closest to them family. In the years past, Matt would be a little sad mixed in with the excitement -- it's hard saying goodbye to friends for a long period of time, especially when he spent almost every moment with them otherwise. Throw in the fact that his mother had shipped him and Sandra off to Japan every single summer to spend time with family made it a little harder -- he wouldn't even be on the same continent, let alone in the same country. But this year...this year was ending up a little different because for the first time, Matthew was just excited. Considering his current state of heartbreak, getting away from his apartment, Maple Hollow, everything familiar -- it would probably do him some good.
He had left Canada earlier, as his semester ended earlier than Sandra's and their mother considered it a waste to spend all that money on a plane ticket and not have them go for the longest time they could, so he had been in Japan for two weeks already by the time Sandra came knocking on his aunt's home in Tokyo. In those two weeks, Matthew had barely gotten over his jetlag, slipped so much in using his Japanese that he mistakenly called himself a girl while he was playing soccer with some of the guys he became friends with in years past who, in typical guy fashion, hadn't let him live down since, spilled all of his heartbreak woes to the same group of guys during a rowdy session of drunken karaoke, and was scouted by an up and coming butler cafe opening in Akihabara and would have taken the job if he hadn't remembered that he was going back to Canada in a month and a half. He also cut his hand on a tambourine. Sometimes, these things just happen.
So, Sandra had been here for about a week and a half now, in which they went karaoke with a group of friends, the sole reason why there was now a video of Matthew singing some Japanese song she liked and putting all his feelings into it, too. It could prove to be potentially embarrassing except that, upon viewing it, it was actually pretty okay, save for the sultry walking towards the camera and, uh, ridiculous panting (but it was part of the song, he swears!). Both Sandra's friends and Matthew's were okay with hanging out with each other, since mixing guys and girls was always a good idea, so all in all, it was a fun trip so far. He's been trying to take his friends' advice -- get over her, man, you look pathetic -- but he...all right, he was a little heartbroken, but in the end, if Claire wanted to be crazy and insist on breaking up because a month and a half was too long of an absence, well, then that sucked for her. Going through a break-up didn't look good on anybody, though, this he was sure of.
Regardless, this day was a new day, though it was already pretty jam packed. It was just a him and Sandra day today, because today was the day the birthday gift he got her would finally be put into use -- concert tickets to her favorite artist. (Best brother award? You betcha.) Matthew hadn't really expected her to take him, but Sandra was so tiny that he didn't trust her to find her way out of the mess, or worse yet, fall asleep and then get trampled to death, so he readily accepted the fact that he'd probably be the only guy in a crowd of about fifty-five thousand. But first -- the AKB48 store.
Harajuku was an interesting place, if interesting was a synonym for 'eye-searing' and 'motley'. He didn't know why the AKB48 store was even located here, but as he pushed around the hordes of boys and men to get a look at the photos on sale, he figured that no matter where they placed it, it would always be this crowded. It took forty minutes of pushing and shoving just for a look at the walls when Matthew just remembered his favorite girl wouldn't even have things on sale because she failed to rank in the last election, and so really, he just sweated it out with a bunch of geeks for nothing. He heaved a deep breath once he got out of there, leaning against the world-famous Takeshita-dori sign just to get himself centered again. "Christ, you'd think that people have to work or something!" Matthew griped, feeling totally legit -- it was a Tuesday, what the hell. He glanced up at Sandra, who seemed to have acquired a crepe from somewhere in the time he was stuck in there -- not surprising, since apparently, Harajuku was the place to go for crepes. "Do you want to stick around here or head over to the dome? You can get concert goods and if we have time to kill, go rollerskating at the rink or something."
[/color] He'd have his revenge on the AKB store another day. Just wait. [ dude idek just go with it and please don't match word count i'll die kthx ][/justify][/color][/font][/blockquote][/blockquote] |
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Post by SANDRA HARU CHANG on Aug 19, 2012 17:36:38 GMT -5
Canada would always be home and Sandra knew it. It was where her life was -- man, she spent half her time in a city called Maple Hollow. There was no way she could be any more Canadian, she was pretty sure... save for maybe going to every single NHL game she could get to. (That would just be ridiculous though, considering the Canucks wouldn't play for every game, duh, and it wasn't like she cared about much else.) Whatever the case, national pride and love of hockey and maple syrup and all that aside, Sandra wasn't going to deny that she still really loved going to Japan. It was a pretty neat annual thing for the family to do, especially as they'd gotten older and didn't need their parents (if they were there) or aunt or other relatives to babysit and coddle them or anything when they wanted to go and do things. They still spent a good deal of time with said relatives of course, considering that was the whole purpose of the trip and they were staying at their aunt's house -- but luckily there was also time for friends and karaoke and eating all the things and exploring this place their mom had grown up in.
Basically, Sandra loved these trips a heck of a lot, though when her dad had shown up at the apartment to take her back home (where she'd then take the plane to Tokyo) she'd admittedly been a little sad at the prospect of leaving the Hollow, with her friends and her boyfriend and all the things she liked about the place. Japan was like a different world, which made sense, all things considered, but it was definitely a world that Sandra liked. Thus far she'd had fun convincing her brother to be a total badass in karaoke... and there were a few other things they'd done too, but this particular thing stuck out in her mind because one of Matthew's friends had recorded it and, snickering, told her a few days after the fact that he'd managed to go and send it to nearly all of Matthew's email contacts. She didn't know when he'd realize this, really, but it was definitely pretty hilarious amidst the almost sympathy that she felt for her brother. Still, the fact that it was hilarious pretty much won out, especially when she considered things -- at least if he was sulking or getting pissy over the video, he wouldn't be sulking over his now-ex-girlfriend, and that had to be a step-up.
Without their friends (and said friends' occasionally mildly cruel humour), however, today was just a day for the two of them. Matt had shown her the concert tickets he'd gotten when she'd arrived, pretty much, and Sandra may have made some embarrassing flaily, screaming noises that caused her relatives mild alarm until she managed to pull herself together enough to explain to them in her barely passable Japanese why she had the best brother ever. Nobody needed to know about all her excitement though, but she'd figured that since Matthew had gotten to see her screaming like a crazed fangirl, she wanted to see him doing more or less the same, and this was how they'd wound up in Harajuku -- Matt in the AKB48 store no doubt creeping on what's-her-face, Sandra munching on a crepe she'd managed to sneak away to get. There was no way she was actually heading into the store. Matthew returned sooner than she'd expected though, and she raised her eyebrows at him as he leaned over, looking a little bit annoyed or flustered or something.
"Not when there's AKB to buy!" she said like this was totally obvious and he should have seen it coming. It was mostly a front though -- she was just as surprised if not more to see that the place was so packed on a random Tuesday. What, had the girls themselves shown up in person or something? She highly doubted that Matthew would still be standing there and not rushing back into the store preparing his best, most romantic Japanese pick-up lines if that were the case. "Anyway, that was quick. You didn't get anything?" She'd been expecting him to have a ton by the time he came back, or possibly that she'd have to go in and dig her way through the crowd of mildly creepy men to tear her brother away from the place or something. Okay... okay, she made Matthew sound way weirder than he really was, but it was his own fault for liking AKB48, of all things. Then again, it wasn't like she could talk. Sandra was about to suggest they could just do whatever Matt wanted, but then her eyes lit up at his next words... and really, there was no going back. Concert goods and rollerskating were being tossed into the mix?"Let's head to the dome! And hopefully there's time for rollerskating later, but if they run out of t-shirts at the concert..." Well, Sandra would have a few choice words about that.
(ughhhh my bad, so much for not almost matching.  i hope it's enough to go off of though, we can defs shrink a lot, lol)
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Post by MATTHEW FUYU CHANG on Aug 29, 2012 20:42:48 GMT -5
He almost said the words 'There is always AKB to buy,' but that just sounded really creepy and really, Matthew didn't want to further jeopardize his reputation as it is. True, he didn't know anybody in Japan that would judge him -- his friends had just as geeky interests, so they had no right to talk, but who knows who Sandra would talk to once they got back to Tokyo? Probably that silly boyfriend of hers. Bah. Love. Whatever. All he knew today was AKB and even they failed him, so really, what was the friggin' point? Where the hell was the nearest crepe stand? He needed to eat his feelings, quite frankly.
He sagged, though, as he watched the crowd inside the store clamor and claw their way to the displays for photos and the like. Bunch of savages, really. He turned on his heel and went further into the crowd of teenagers and young adults alike, making his way to his favorite crepe stand, trusting Sandra to follow her unless she got distracted by one of the shops. (He didn't think so, but you never really knew with Sandra...) He ordered his favorite -- bananas and strawberries with Nutella, extra powdered sugar (looking like a cokehead be damned, really) -- and he checked his watch. It was still relatively early, but the Dome would be pretty backed up...but he also knew that the goods line opened a few hours ago already, so hopefully the line wasn't crazy long. Definitely had enough time for rollerskatiing.
"Yeah, there should be enough time to do a healthy amount of both. Just...let me finish my crepe first." As much as being defeated in the grand scheme of being a geek goes, he was pretty pissed, but he didn't want to spoil this day for Sandra, considering she nearly screamed his head off when he first presented the tickets to her to begin with. (Seriously, best brother award right here thank you!) Besides, Harajuku would always be here, and the AKB store would always be here so long as they kept selling, so he wasn't too worried about not being able to get stuff later on. Scarfing down his crepe -- he was hungry, apparently? Who knew? -- they hopped on the metro and took the tran to the closest station, proceeding on foot, and Matthew could tell that he was approaching the concert arena when droves of people -- mostly girls -- began flocking here and there, bags of stuff in their hands, some cosplaying.
"I have a feeling you may have to be all 'elbows out' for this one,"
[/color] Matthew remarked as he peered at the Dome in the distance and the sea of people around it -- fifty-five thousand people was something not to be trifled with, for sure.[/justify][/color][/font][/blockquote][/blockquote] |
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Post by SANDRA HARU CHANG on Sept 24, 2012 17:34:06 GMT -5
Matthew looked almost so sad for a second that Sandra would have felt bad -- okay, not quite, but almost -- but he didn't actually say anything. Well, that was typical enough anyway, but before she had the chance to say anything (which would have been very typical too) Matt had turned and gone off through the crowd again, and she sighed. Since he didn't seem to be entering the AKB store again she decided that it was safe to follow -- seriously, she had her questionable interests too but AKB48 was not something she wanted to delve into at this or any future point in life, even if some of their things really were very catchy... Er, but regardless, she followed after him in the crowd, glad that her brother was taller and bigger and could therefore sort of make a path for her if she followed close enough behind. It turned out he was getting a crepe too, and she just waited patiently outside, nibbling on her own crepe as she did so until he came back. "Yeah yeah, take your time," she said, in no rush -- okay, truth be told she kind of was in a rush but more of an excited one than anything else, her heart all accelerated and eyes all lit up and the like, at the thought of the concert. Ooh, concert. Now that she thought about it, she was really excited.
This was why she kind of sort of sped up as they approached the Dome, wanting to get there faster, dang it. It also explained the look of determination on her face when she heard her brother's words. "You're going first. Distract the fangirls! I need to buy all the Massu stuff!" Massu was, after all, her favourite member. "Put on a funny hat and do the Chankapaana dance for them or something! Need to get at the concert goods..." Sandra had decided that hse would treat this with no less seriousness than a top-security CIA mission, though unfortunately she didn't have maps of the Dome and surrounding area to a radius of five kilometres, nor had she managed to steal a key to the band members' dressing rooms. No, that would be creepy. Heh. In all seriousness, though, she did want to get at the concert goods so that she could spend her entire month's worth of spending money on random things that she'd never need. Really though, was food that important? Nope, it wasn't! Well, she'd stashed aside literally just enough money to survive for the rest of the few weeks she'd be in Japan, and as for the rest it was with her now. This was probably the highlight. Sandra was excited! With no further comment she grabbed onto her brother's wrist and dragged him along behind her off in what looked like the right direction -- at least, all the girls seemed to be swarming over there in a massive congregation, so this seemed right. "Mattiiiiiie," she whined. "You're slowing me doooown."
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Post by MATTHEW FUYU CHANG on Oct 1, 2012 18:35:36 GMT -5
[ FOR THE RECORD, ANY OOC-NESS IS EXPLAINED BY MATT BEING IN A COMPLETELY DIFFERENT COUNTRY, HE WOULD NEVER DO THIS IN CANADA omg i'm so embarrassed on his behalf sob ]
There were a few things he enjoyed about being in Japan, frankly. Not only was it half his motherland, but he also enjoyed his fair share of jpop and anime, and not to mention the tech geek in him would go insane anytime he came within ten kilometres of Akihabara. There was also the fact that the food was delicious, seeing as there was a healthy mix of American and Japanese cuisine alike, and he couldn't be proper comic fan without appreciating the Japanese counterpart of manga. However, if he was honest with himself, the fact that he only came once a year was a major draw for him, too, because then it meant that he had no one to impress, no one he had to pander to in order to maintain an image. To put it plainly, he could do whatever he wanted without worrying about the repercussions, and for someone like Matt who tried his best to carefully maintain and keep his reputation intact, having this month and half to do whatever he wanted was a really, really great feeling. However, he wasn't sure this would bode well for Sandra, but then again, Sandra didn't really seem to care what people thought of her regardless of where she was. Which...well, that would only bode her well at this point.
"Yo, don't even worry, I got this,"
Matthew muttered to her as she dragged him along towards the queue for the line, the completely anonymity of the entire situation making him far braver than anything back in Canada could ever make him feel. It certainly was an empowering thing -- now he sort of understood why people on the internet could be such trolls. He didn't hatch his master plan just yet, though -- he had to wait for the perfect opportunity and for enough people to be around that it would work so Sandra could slip ahead. There was a certain art to acting like a fool, Matthew reasoned. So he waited in line with her for a few moments, the fact that he was the only male within a thirty-ft radius just bolstering his mood -- because he already had a lot of attention on him for being at least a head and a half taller than the typical Japanese girl in addition to being a male at a boyband's concert. No wonder Justin Bieber tried so hard to sway male listeners for his second album.
As the time drew closer, he reached into his small backpack and took out a his mini-speaker and plugged it into his phone. He pulled out his sunglasses -- they weren't quite the right ones but they would do for the job at hand, he reasoned, slipping them on, running his fingers through his hair so it was at least a little brushed back and out of his face. For a moment, he had a brief of panic -- did he really want to do this? Make a total fool of himself for the sake of his sister's urge to buy goods with a guy's face that looked suspiciously like one of her friends back at school? The question really was -- what are the chances of him getting arrested? He couldn't imagine causing that big of a disturbance, and it'd be easy enough to explain either way.
"Okay...just wait here. Wait, give me a ticket, I'll meet you inside so I don't embarrass you after the fact,"
[/color] Matthew said when a fresh wave of fans crowded around them again at the goods table. He tucked the ticket into his backpocket and darted away. It would help if he had a more thought out plan, but really...he didn't. All he knew was that he had to make a scene. As he walked to the center of the area, he turned on his little speaker and started the music. "OPPAN GANGNAM STYLE."[/color] Well...you can probably figure out the rest.[/justify][/color][/font][/blockquote][/blockquote] |
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Post by SANDRA HARU CHANG on Oct 7, 2012 1:50:04 GMT -5
Truth be told, Sandra didn't know what to expect when Matthew told her that he "got this", but she did know that when Matt was away from people who knew him well enough to judge him, he could be a little ridiculous. Their past years in Japan had proven that, and just this year there was already evidence of that floating around on the internet courtesy of one of his Japanese friends at karaoke the other day. Really, back in Canada she couldn't have expected her brother to be a very good distraction at all, but hey... this was Tokyo now, and Tokyo was a very different world from Maple Hollow and even from their hometown of Vancouver. "You'd better," was all she said in response, oddly set and serious for a girl who was usually lousy at any expression but happy. The line was actually pretty organized and everything, which she supposed she should have expected somehow when compared to things back at home, but even so, there was a girl a few people in front of her who looked like she might be eyeing those Massu things too, and though they probably had plenty, Sandra wasn't taking her chances. She needed her brother's distraction.
Okay, also, she just wanted him to have fun with whatever he was doing in Japan, because she was tired of all his moping about Claire. It seemed that he had a plan somehow, anyway, because he had a speaker and sunglasses and this was definitely shaping up to be a very interesting plan. She wanted to ask but felt that it'd be better to find out for herself in a few minutes when he did whatever it was. "I think you're underestimating how much it takes to embarrass me," she pointed out, but she pulled out one of the tickets she'd been holding onto for both of them and handed it over to her brother without complaint. "Good luck, agent," she said with as much seriousness and authority as she could muster, "I'll meet you inside. Try to stay alive." Sandra didn't think the fangirls were really that crazy (they weren't at a k-pop concert, after all) but whatever Matthew was planning, it was probably going to be big.
She wasn't sure if "surprised" was the word she'd use when she heard the music start playing and saw, through a small but thickening crowd of people, her brother in the middle dancing along like some kind of freak. Had Gangnam Style blown up in Japan the way it had elsewhere? She didn't know anything for sure, but she did know that there were a couple of girls who joined in, and the rest were swarming around, some of them even leaving behind spots in line, which she could only be happy about as she skipped ahead (sorry girls, but if they'd rather watch her brother being a dork than buy concert goods with Massu's face, well, that was their loss). "Heyyyyy, sexy ladayyy," she sang along anyway, resisting the urge to break into the dance too only because she was trying not to draw attention in order to keep her new spot in line.
It was a little while later that, with her pockets empty of any money at all but with a bag now stuffed with goods (overwhelmingly of her favourite band member but okay, she'd tossed in a couple things of the others too to keep it all fair) she actually made her way inside. Phew. Looking up prices for things and taking the extra time to budget and manage her money had paid off -- it was incredible how much effort she'd been willing to expend on this but not on homework, ever. Hey, homework didn't get her Massu's face, now did it? Just inside the door, she found her brother with a small gaggle of girls behind him still pointing and giggling. "I think you got your own fangirls doing that," she told him as she walked up, waving at the girls. "But thanks! I got lots of stuff! All the stuff," she emphasized, waving around a newly-purchased deck of playing cards with the members' faces. Okay, she was a little bit obsessed, but she was allowed, and he'd only encouraged this behaviour by buying her the tickets in the first place. "And and and posters. So don't be alarmed if I start building a shrine in my closet at home."
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i hope it's enough to go off of though, we can defs shrink a lot, lol)
