That American Guy

Yes, I’m talking about that American guy. You have probably seen him if you watch animes or play video games even a bit, you will know who I am talking about. This guy has been all over the place and no one seems to have noticed him yet! I’m sure he has a name. What I’m curious is, about his origins; how he came into existence (not biologically; I mean, on screen). WHO is this mystery man who keeps popping up in almost any place a manga artist can imagine? So this time we focus our night vision on ‘That American Guy’.

So basically, he is this blue-eyed hyperactive blonde guy with a spikey haircut, geometric facial features and wears clothes that say out loud – AMERICA.

And if you still don’t know who we are talking about, then let me bring him to light. You have seen him as Guile from Street Fighter working in the American Air Force.

You have seen him as Lt.Surge in Pokemon as a gym leader of Vermillion Town.

You have also seen him as the ‘Typical American Consumer’ (who somehow resembles and sounds like Brad Pitt) in Yakitate Japan.

 

So who exactly is this guy? Was he a poor American kid from a trailer park, who got so frustrated of the normal life he was living, that he decided to pack his belongings and get away from the chaos and go to the land of the rising sun, to blend into the culture and become a legend? He became the face of America for the Japanese anime and manga culture! Here we uncover the mystery!


<All this crap was written before I asked the gods. Now you shall witness the power of the internet>


A deeper search over our target lead to the following context on remote section of a distant article on wikipedia. He uses the name Brad Kidd/Kid (ブラッド・キッド, Buraddo Kiddo) as he plays a character in Yakitate Japan (obviously pretending to be fooling around when actually undercover)



"A supporting character who was Kuroyanagi's classmate in college and the president of a major detective agency in America. The character is a parody of the do-it-all American Brad Pitt. Kidd is used in many instances in the manga and anime as a sort of deus ex machina in reactions or flashbacks from a masseuse to an attorney or the head of a private investigation firm."

 

Interestingly, this guy used to work in a detective agency! Further investigation leads deeper into this guy's history. Our special search division found out that he used to work in the military before becoming a gym leader in Vermilion city. Here is another extract that describes his nature as a gym leader -



"Lt. Surge is known as The Lightning American. Apparently, he is or was an American soldier who fought in at least one war, during which Electric-type Pokémon saved his life. As a member of the army, Surge was a strict CO, and was rather cautious. He was a pilot as well, and used Electric-type Pokémon to power his planes, a practice that in at least one occasion saved his life. Also, Surge saved the life of one of the Trainers in his gym who was in the army at the same time."


As Guile from Street Fighter, we managed to find out his past after disowning Raichu and his gym. Now he took up hand-to-hand combat! However, I have a hunch that he still has a pokemon hidden somewhere between fights that uses the move sonicboom for him, as he takes credits as if its his own move. Following is what we found out about him as Guile -



"A Major in the United States Air Force, he leaves his country and family to enter the World Warrior tournament to avenge the death of his friend Charlie, who was killed by M. Bison, the tournament's sponsor, sometime before the events of the game. In his ending, he defeats Bison, but is dissuaded from killing him by his wife Jane and their daughter Amy. Guile spares Bison and returns home to be a family man."

In the US Air Force, it seems, he was promoted from Lieutenant to Major before he had to leave to take revenge on some guy/animal called Mr.Bison. But failed due to domestic issues, as explained above.



At in his forties now, frustrated with his life, wife and dreams, he decided to work upon his childhood dream of working with mangas again. The last we saw of him was in an anime called Gintama. Following is a quote by him working as as a mangaka in Gintama. (be careful, he will try to sell you cheap stuff on TV)

 

And thus was the life of our 'not-so-popular' celebrity who managed to play unimportant roles in the popular culture of Japan. So why did I write this article on him? Pity. Yes, such characters deserve attention. This character IS important. Can you imagine life without this guy? I mean come on! If it weren't for him, who would have Ash defeated to get his badge? Who would have played all those humiliating roles in Yakitate Japan as an Austrian?

Hats off to you, my American friend. You might have failed in your life in becoming a lead role but you have inspired the likes of me T_T THANK YOU

- Nem >_<"

*still sobbing*

The Levels of Awesomeness

Its been a long long time since I've written anything here (credits to my 'epic fail' exams) But now that they are over, I finally got time..............................to play MMOs!!!

But now that I've played enough of Ragnarok (and am waiting as Iris is downloading), its about time I update my blog!

So the other day I was thinking about rating things in terms of awesomeness (clearly inspired by St.Barney Stinson). When stating something that's awesome, its kind of tough to indicate exactly HOW awesome the awesome thing is. That was when I realized that awesomeness needs to be standardized.

Now let me illustrate the levels of awesomeness with a few examples that everyone can understand. 

Light years away from Awesome -

This picture doesn't need words to make it funnier.

Hungry Fat Guy

Not that Awesome - 

I personally believe that old people should play video games and have some fun in life. After all they deserve some quality time. But when they kick your ass at it, it suddenly seems like a bad idea.

Gamer Granny 

Almost Awesome - 

They would have been Awesome if only they had the auto-aim feature that some fps games have XD

M4A1

Awesome -

This spot used to belong to Vampires and Werewolves until someone came up with a whole range of crazy books and made them look stupid.

Zombies

Uber Awesome - 

In life or in death, 'this guy' has made a huge impact on anyone and everyone he came across. Uber awesome is something that that affects and changes a huge population.

This Guy

Epic Awesome -

Back in the day, Pens were mightier than Swords. Lately, things have changed.

We have a clear winner!

That's it for now. I hope you guys had fun reading this :D

I'll be posting a bit more frequently now, so see ya then.

Nem, signing off XD

Travelling in Space and Time

What had been really bugging my mind lately, was punctuality. Discovery is born from Necessity and THIS is where I began my search for the legendary technique of teleportation. So there was this guy called Dhalsim who was rumored to have a lead role in some game called Street Fighter; as the rumors went, he could teleport. I wonder if he was related to Mahatma Gandhi, somehow. After doing some research on this game, I finally got to see the legendary technique in action! The Yoga Teleport!!!

Further research showed that it was a series of motions he did that made him teleport. The motions were,
 
Front + Down + Front + Low Punch - Mid Punch - High Punch

There were two major challenges I faced. ‘How can I do 3 punches at the same time when I have only 2 hand?’ One solution would be to use the Third Arm Sash but that must be heavily guarded. The solution was offered by a being that somehow resembled a human. Legend has it that this creature has sacrificed most part of its brain in order to obtain exponential mastery of that game called Street Fighter. The being preferred to be called Hak. The Solution offered was in a cryptic code which I managed to decipher, “aree!!! woh teeno ke liye ek hi button assign kar. Usse ekhi button se teeno dabjate hai!!!” It translates as, “assign one button for all three. That way when you hit one, all three are pressed” This creature’s idea was brilliant; I guess its sacrifice was not wasted after all.

The other problem I faced with Yoga Teleport was that no matter how cool the effects were, it was embarrassing to do the combo in public. Worst Case Scenario being a repeated combo failure in public! You have to take a step, crouch, and take another step and then punch; nothing happens so you do that again, only to be dumbstruck by nothingness. Obnoxious, purely obnoxious.

So in the sanctuary and solitude of my bedroom, I tried this combo. Contemplating possible locations where I can accidentally teleport to was a scary thing to do. It ranged from a crashing air plane to the deepest ocean, possibly even a random planet! But the risk was worth the experiment. If this worked, it would be a scientific breakthrough.

But it didn’t.  -_-

That was when I realized what Dhalsim had and I didn’t. Powers! YOGA POWERS!!! It was hard to believe what I was looking for was right there! So I decided to cultivate my yoga powers and attempt Yoga Teleport again.

It happens very often that a man searches for a thing and finds another. The biggest (idiotic) example was Christopher Columbus. We all know he found something he wasn’t looking for. Now he knew, if he returned home without productive reports, the queen would be pissed off at him and would have said gibberish like, “off with his head!” which the people would have taken seriously and would have ACTUALLY beheaded him. So he made a plan; a selfish plan that would save him from the queen’s wrath but keep the rest of the world confused, for eternity about the true identity of the Indians. Now it might have been an idiotic mistake back then (and even now). But if he hadn’t done that one mistake of going to the wrong place, we wouldn’t be enjoying franchised junk food, Superhero comic books, Alien abductions, suing companies for an extra cookie in the jar, South Park and other things of that actually matter to this world.

The only form of yoga cultivation I could think of was Meditation. So tired of the repetitive forward-crouch-forward-tripunch, I looked at the watch. Meekly, it beeped 14:22. I sat down and started meditating. After a while, when I opened my eyes, the clock beeped 14:42! I had time travelled 20 minutes in the future! O_O

Conclusion 1 – Discovery of the new world was not a mistake. Now I can take Dhalsim there and sue him for fraudulent display of inexistent powers. Thank you Columbus, you weren’t a douche after all.
Conclusion 2 - OMG! I can time travel! (Only in the future though) -_-“

The Real Conclusion –

If we look to it that way, we are constantly travelling forward in time. Second by second, minute by minute we are ‘time travelling’ towards the future! Although, this isn’t the ‘time travel’ science fiction movies have shown us. However, conceptually speaking, even as you read this, you are travelling forward in time. (or as generally said, time is moving forward)

-    Nem,
Signing off
^_^

Anti-Punctuality

Over time, I have come to believe that getting late is no longer the virtue of an uncivilized loser who has a tussle with the watch. Some of the coolest people I've known are renowned for being late. (eg - Hatake Kakashi) Besides, punctuality is the virtue of the bored. Late-coming has now become an Art. Some would prefer to call it a Science since it involves precisely calculated time amounts allocated for specific tasks which can be multitasked and skillfully executed, promoting balance and optimized throughput of the available time, thereby blah, blah and blah is blahed to blah..... Getting back to human speech, being late needs lots of predicting power, innovative skills and shamelessness.

Being in college, professors don’t really mind if you enter class even a minute before the lecture end. However, if they know you by name, they might ask for a reason. (A simple solution to this problem would be to either change your name or change your college, whichever seems more convenient) But when asked, you need to have a reason that sounds true but everyone knows it’s not, it should be entertaining but not rude, you shouldn’t be too ashamed nor too shame-deprived. Display of weakness will only tempt them to bully you more but if you are too ‘shame-deprived’ (the sugar coated version of ‘shameless’) they might still agro you for acting cocky. This is the reason why it is a combination of Science and Art and needs perfect balance between the two! If messed up, the professors might threaten to use the most powerful offensive spell known to professor-kind; Parental Summoning!

Attack - Parental Summoning
Description - The almighty professords summons the target's creator(s) and infuriate them by breaking the Student-Professor Omerta. Even in the professord circle, this technique is considered as taboo and only resorted to if and only if nothing else works.
Damage - 1000 [x2] (if both parents are summoned) + 50 [xN] (where N is the number of people that know of this drama)
Effects - Allowance Cut-off, Domestic violence, Domestic Eerie Silence, Loss of Reputation points, Loss of acoustic defense equipments (iPods, MP3 players or anything that one can listen to during a long parent driven lecture, Possible loss of deprivation of basic needs (internet) and other unknown added effects.

Hence you must always have a witty excuse up your sleeve that will entertain the almighty ‘professords’ without offending anything or anyone pertaining to them. So keep them smiling lest they shall make you frown.

Nem,
signing off ^_^

Journey to the epic Grilled Chicken Mayonaisse Roll

Finally, got sometime to update about recent happenings. Its been a long long week for me; psychologically, I mean.

So there I was waiting for 'it' to arrive. Patience was the key and I was scarce on that resource. I wasn't fully prepared; in fact, not prepared at all. But just wanted to get over with it. Looking around in that closed chamber, all I saw was nothingness. The time when I would reach into full blown insanity, where I would be drawing happy-happy landscape pictures (that includes a smiley sun) with my sister's crayons on the walls, didn't seem far away. Yes, it was exam despair. Although it was only a (stupid annoying) Unit test, that didn't matter much, I ended up taking it a bit seriously. Of course, I didn't study for most of it. But I took the pressure and deeply messed up three subjects out of five! x_x


Now since that stupid test was over, I decided to have a little celebration! (yes, I'm such a bored person that I just need a reason to celebrate something, no matter how trivial it is) We had been to the Elephanta caves a few months ago; those caves are a one-hour boat ride away from the tip of Mumbai. The caves were just like most other Indian sculptures with lots of stories, depictions and nudity. But the more important part was that before leaving for these islands we were looking for a Subway joint to fill in on our empty stomachs. We got there only to find that the place had shifted to another location and that's when we found out this place JUST as awesome (or maybe even better) than Subway. Can't really compare those two because what they sell are completely different things. But on that day, what we ate there at the Modern Juice Centre (I know the name is lame) was so freaking awesome that to celebrate my exam's end, I decided to travel that epic distance, JUST to eat that epic roll filled with all the chickeny-mayonnaisey awesomeness!

You know, there are some things in life that don't require much efforts and then there are things that need lots of blood, sweat and tears. This story is about the later ones. Efforts are made almost everywhere. What really matters is 'what were those efforts made for?' That object of desire is what makes the journey worthwhile or just a waste of time. This Roll we are talking about was definitely worth the 33km travel, from one tip of the city, to another!

So there I was, sitting with my friends, on the steel chairs places on the streets of, what seemed like, Little Dubai! Yes! A mini Arabia amidst the chaos of Mumbai! Its was(and still is and shall remain forever, touch wood) a few blocks away from the Taj Hotel, along the coast. None of us had breakfast that day for space was dedicated to a single food item, the Grilled Chicken Mayonnaise Roll! After the tiring train journey in a over crowded train compartment, we had finally arrived there.

What happened after that was obvious. Good times. Of course I will not describe the Roll, putting that holy taste and feel in words would be like an insult to its epic awesomeness!

and THAT'S what I've been upto lately
Friendly neighborhood Nem, signing off.
cya :)