Your AKB48 Experiences

Thanks for the great write-ups everyone [clap]
And glad you all had such good times [party]

luckyone's post was particularly interesting to read, not just because it was his first idol experience, but also because I haven't heard much about these kind of handshake events before. They sounds really good fun though compared to the theatre edition handshakes as you get that mini-live. The setlist sounds great, as does the few other setlists I've seen of these events. Are these setlists compiled anywhere? It would be interesting to see what they are. How do you go about choosing members at these events since you don't book a member/slot beforehand?

 

Members are usually they'll post a list of members appearing for that event in the AKB48 ameblog like so http://ameblo.jp/akihabara48/entry-11400238922.html

each line will be different, some will only have one girl (High Rank Senbatsu), two girls (Lower Rank Senbatsu/UG), 3 girls (Lower Ranking), or 5 (typically KKS)

 

NMB48 Team M Show
Idol no Yoake Stage
November 25, 2012 6:00PM

although the show was available on LOD, and was even free, i will still mention some stuff from the show so that others who have not seen (or are not planning on spending 2 hours to watch the LOD) can still follow with the review. and as usual, i will also mention some useful stuff that might come in handy when watching nmb shows.

and i will also be mentioning a lot about the old akb . skip this review if you find stuff like that boring.



miracle win

okay first thing’s first... this was probably the biggest surprise that i came across this year. i have been applying to all nmb shows that i was eligible for this year, and up until this point i was only lucky enough to win 3rd gen kenkyuusei shows. i only dared to apply with somebody else around 2-3 times this year, as i knew the odds got way smaller the moment you applied for renban (now called “group”) reservations. but just last week, me and my friends who are from the same company that i am working for tried to apply for a show.. a 3 people group email reservation . and since it was a team M show (since the BII show that day was exclusive for the mobile FC thingy i think), for me it was pretty much a given that we would lose as it defied all logic for them to let 3 people win and get tickets, when on the other hand i was applying alone for months and did not even win a cancel macchi.

but yeah, to my surprise that almost made me shout in the office, i got an email last thursday, november 22 that we fookin won the lottery for the team M show . it took all of my strength to contain myself and not shout and run around like a wild beast. my other 2 friends suffered the wrath of receiving emails containing bazillions of smileys though . and at least i was free to swear non-stop in my native language to let some pressure out in the office. perks for working in a foreign country!.

pre-concert stuff

Spoiler

so the fated day came. after scouring namba and the nearby places in a desperate attempt to find bracelet type glowsticks that i am so used to have when watching shows, i turned up at our meeting place empty handed. i told myself that i guess i had to accept the fact that those kind of glowsticks are unknown in this part of japan. :wah:

we got to the entrance to the stairs leading to the nmb theater at around 4:15pm, and they had already started giving out tickets. after getting a few laughs with the expected miscommunication that happened when i presented the print-out of the winning email containing 3 non-japanese names, we were allowed to proceed to the lobby to buy our tickets. although they had to check the print-out 2 more times before we got to the counter, or should i say table with 2 girls and a laptop (ugh), this time the verification of our non-japanese names finished without any problems. soon we had the tickets, which were pink btw lol, and a set of ID tags that said “group” and the number 8.



it was actually a nice feeling to be holding something... new. i have never won a group reservation before (well, we won legendary renban reservations but the tickets they gave us back in those days were just normal tickets with consecutive numbers), and its nice that i was at least able to experience this for a change.

so skipping to the entering the theater portion, first of all winners of group reservations did not line-up with people who won the normal type reservations and those with cancel macchis . when time came for us to line-up, we were instead just let into the lobby, and we just arranged ourselves according to girls -> group -> enpou ticket holders on the stairs going to the nmb theater.

and as we entered the door from the lobby, we had to line-up against the wall of nmb pictures while waiting for the door to the theater itself to be opened. at least i was able to stare at those pics for a decent amount of time. yuihan’s pic was placed in between BII and the kenkyuusei pictures, and she was “alone” as other pics were grouped by teams. and this was also the first time that i noticed that they had placards above the pictures for those girls who already graduated. wow. i wonder how big a space they would need for something like that if they did it with akb, and it probably be awesome to see rico’s name in the theater . anyways...

upon entering the theater, staff members were guiding those in front of us to where they should sit, but somehow the staff member ran off when it was our turn . i immediately noticed that the seats marked for “group” occupied 2 rows instead of 1, and i got confused (and a bit stubborn actually) when we were about to sit down at the second to the last row almost extreme right set of seats when the third to the last row of seats marked for group reservations were still open. as soon as the staff member got within range, i immediately asked him if we can instead occupy the seats in the 3rd to the last row, and when he said “sure” i almost jumped over the seats to get to the ones i wanted (instinct. lol). and when we were about to occupy those seats, the people who were seated in the middle portion of the row decided to leave. seeing as they didn’t leave anything to mark their place, and saw that they started to occupy other seats for some unknown reason, my friends and i grabbed the center seats for the 3rd to the last row. w00t!!

and when the other fans started to enter the theater, the staff members signalled us to remove the placards in the seats we were occupying, and later collected those. i didn’t catch what he said, but when i saw people removing placards, it was easy to fake that i understood stuff. hehe.

show review

Spoiler

this time, i tried my best not to make this another trip down memory lane. idol no yoake was a B4 stage, and something that i have seen live for maybe 10-15 times if i add up the team B and kenkyuusei performances back then. seeing the aitakatta stage with the now current BII became an insane nostalgiafest as it was B2, something that i didn’t want to happen with this team M show as this will probably be my only chance to see them knowing the insane schedule of nmb.

ofcourse i failed miserably.

and again, i did not watch any LODs or read any blogs related to the team M idol no yoake, so i had pretty much no idea on what was going to happen.

first stop, when the curtains opened i did not expect them to perform idol no yoake but instead jump to minasan mo goisshouni as that was what happened during the akb kenkyuusei version of the stage. seeing the girls play the instruments, and fuuchan battling to perform well in that 3 layered costume, the live performance of the song was as just as bad as i had remembered it to be XD. seeing the sax gave me chills though. after all, i still could not forget the mobile mail of haachan when she finally said goodbye to the instrument.

by the second song, minnasan mo goisshouni, my voice had almost faded and my throat was already hurting really bad from all the shouting that i was doing. i only knew fuuchan so most of the time it was her name that i was shouting, but at this point my eyes were already homing in on one of the members.. as if i had already spotted my target for this team. it really made me wonder why such a member would go totally unnoticed after i browsed team M profiles and pictures. so skipping a few songs to drive my point, here are some of her pics:

profile pic:



screenshots from the lod of that show:




her name is sae murase, goes by the nickname saeppi. even those screenshots of the LOD don’t do her justice as she just looks awesome in person. even my friends who were actually seeing an idol concert/show for the first time agreed that she was definitely grabbing our attention during the entire show.

so okay, fast forwarding to the unit songs since the mc was pretty much just their introductions with a couple of pretty good member bashing (something i was surprised to see). now zannen shoujo would have driven me insane and i would probably have screamed a big WTF in the theater (nobody can understand, so why not? right? hehe) had it not been for shoudou giving me a screenshot of the unit from one of the LODs when i asked him about fuuchan a few days before the show. still, when i saw the girls on stage, it felt like i was high on something since what i was seeing was far from the awesome barbie doll concept of the original costume and was more like a cross breed between the newer singles and tenshi no shippo. with fuuchan as center, i could not help but wish that she was instead wearing mayu’s costume. the girls did a really good job, though fan service was a bit lacking, and the osaka-ben (or kansai-ben as i can’t tell the difference between the two readily) version of the little speech in the middle did not have the same effect as the original. overall still one of the best songs of the stage, and was a really big opportunity for me to dance and lose my voice shouting fuuchan’s name.

then as saeppi entered for the kuchi utsushi chocolate song (as seen in the screenshots i posted above), i almost went nuts and was really really really happy that she was the one taking the center position for this incredible song. the costumes don’t really resemble any chocolate or make them look like chocolate(s?) compared to the original, but instead i somehow found them looking more like chocolate cake... with strawberry stripes and other yummy stuff . saeppi’s voice made the song totally different from ones i knew (yukirin’s wining version, miicha’s sexy version, and the legendary cindy version), but i was really begging for more sexiness from the girls as the song was calling for it, and i felt that the absence of the mirror which definitely added a lot to the seductive effect had to be complemented by something. somehow some of the steps were also different from the ones i remember, and it seems there was not much interaction among members (aka pushing and grabbing) during the song.

and i thought the best part of the show was over when kuchi utsushi ended, but what happened during kataomoi no taikakusen was definitely the highlight of the evening for me. the thing was, it wasn’t the 3 main girls for the song that blew my mind, it was one of the backdancers (and hooooraaaay for backdancers! just means they still have enough budget for extras XD) this girl made me swear in the theater over and over and over again:


(the backdancer)

HOW? WHAT? WHERE? WHAT IN THE HEAVENS IS GOING ON!!??? why is a girl who resembles my oshi dancing on stage?!?!?! and what is her name?!?!?!?!?!?!?

and the fact the i knew that backdancers never get introduced during the entire stage added to the insanity. here’s a video of her, and i guess i’ll stop dwelling on the fact that she resembles my oshi too much, but DAMN!! just DAYUM!!!

and as usual, the joker song of the stage (aka tengoku yarou) was still a mess and it felt like nmb needed to be pushed more when it comes to choosing cosplays for that song. and until now i still can’t understand why for the first time it felt like there was just too much headbanging in itoshiki natasha when the girls pretty much performed the same steps as the original. my respect for airi went up not during the song, but after the song, as the way she handled herself during the mc was just awesome. best costume for the trio goes to shimarena though... as it really looked like it was ready to burst (and no shimarena is not chubby or fat). my main concern about the song though is why the costumes seem to look like they are already falling apart. after all, i was expecting them to actually beef up the costumes since, you know, leopards and fur and stuff pretty much go with the territory.

the group songs that followed were pretty much a “hunt for fuuchan... oh wait that’s udon... and hey there saeppi” pattern. i will probably just skip going into details for the next songs.

jumping to post encore, this was when i felt a bit insulted as a team B fan. team M not performing B stars was totally okay. it would be insane if they forced them to sing B stars while substituting B for M. i mean, wasshoi B was easily tweaked to become another song, but with the entire B stars song having 40+ mentions of “B!”... that’s just downright insane if they wanted to tweak that.

what actually insulted me was during the first few seconds of yokosuka curve. i swear i heard something that was not in the correct pitch, with the first background english words coming out a few keys higher than it should. now i watched the LOD of this concert again to check, but it seems everything has been fixed in the LOD. so yeah, that kind of killed the momentum for me, but thankfully was not enough to prevent me from dancing to the rest of the song.

and i guess to compensate for the missing song, and to please the newer fan base who are more familiar with the singles, they performed nmb singles from zetsumetsu to kitagawa kenji except for virginity. i was half-expecting the crowd to go wild at this point, but naaah they stayed the same.

high five and post show stuff

when it came to the high five event after the show, first to leave the theater were guys who had their birthdays during that day (awesome!), then enpou, then girls reservation, and finally the group reservation before those who won via normal reservation. totally forgot again who did the little back massage on me, but what i can clearly remember is that my other friend who was before me on the line stood before saeppi. argh. but hey, at least saeppi somehow stared at me for a while when i gave her a high five.

conclusion, comments, rants

i guess i have to let this out asap.... the show felt like a PG version of the original show performed by team B. the toned down version of the zannen shoujo costume, the “where the heck is the chocolate” version of kuchi utsushi, the conservative version of the kataomoi no taikakusen costume, and to top everything is no less than the ultra-conservative costume of the back dancers to kataomoi. and not only that, even the dance moves felt toned down. and i am saying this even though i knew the original show was performed at a much higher level because it was after all the 4th stage of team B while this is technically the first official stage of team M. the difference or toning down of the movements were pretty evident in kuchi utsushi, in suki to ieba yokatta, and in yokosuka curve. i’m really led to believe that the stage has been tweaked to be, as my friend who saw the show with me would call it, more “family friendly”.

the mcs on the other hand were done pretty well. it didn’t feel forced or anything, and to be honest, i actually enjoyed all of the mcs.

what really puzzles me though was that somehow most of the group songs felt like the girls were all over the place. if i concentrated on one girl at a time, it was clear that they knew the songs pretty well and their performance was on a pretty high level, but somehow when looking at them as a whole it felt like something was off. it could have been because of our position in the theater, but the fact that our seats were pretty much dead center made me think otherwise. it could also be the lights, or maybe because of the music that felt like the dj kept increasing the volume until it reached a point in sobakasu no kisu that it began to disturb my concentration already.

but i guess my real rant would be on how i felt so “constricted” during the entire show. i witnessed one of the wotas in the row right in front of where i was getting scolded by a staff member for enjoying the show a lot more than the people around him. seriously, the guy was just waving his glowsticks livelier than most people in the theater. i have seen and DONE waaaaaaaaaaaaaaay crazier stuff, and had akb staff members scolded me in the akb theater... i … really don’t know what i would have done. point is, i believe nobody should be scolded for having fun in the theater, especially when the rate of winning a show for that team is 1 every 11 months.

then there’s the no clapping thing trend in the nmb theater. most of the time during the show i felt like my hands were tied, and the audience felt dead just because the simple act of participating by clapping is not being done in the theater. and especially in songs like suki to ieba yokatta.. it just kills the mood for me. there were a few moments where people would do fist pumps, but would quickly die as if people were actually afraid that staff members would scold them.

i really did not want this review to sound like all i want to do is bash on team M, but i guess my expectations were just a bit too high. don’t get me wrong, i loved the entire show and was so thankful that i had the opportunity to watch the team live. i even went crazy for 3 girls (fuuchan included btw), lost my voice, and almost got scolded the next day in the office because i couldn’t really speak without my throat hurting like hell. i really still need to look at the teams/girls for who they are, but its definitely something easier said/written down than actually being done.

 

AKB48 Handshake Event - Fujie Reina and Suzuki Mariya
Hong Kong
December 2 2012

This was my first ever handshake event I've attended, so naturally I was excited to see what it was all like, and I was glad that I could manage to attend one during my trip to HK this year.

Some fellow HK fans and I went over to Dragon Centre that evening, and there were already a lot of people at the main stage. There was this pre-handshake performance competition thing going on, with the local fan crowd cheering them on. Reinyan and Mariyanuu were already there acting as two of the judges. With everyone else focused on the competition proper, we managed to get into the handshake queue near the front, having prepaid our tickets beforehand at the AKB48 HK store. Funny thing happened: there was this kid, not knowing Japanese, asking us how to do the "rabu chuu nyuu~ " (Tano Shingo impersonation) thing so he could do it with Reinyan. Not once, but more than a few times he asked us, implicitly fairly nervous about the whole thing (much to his friends' laughter) in case he suddenly forgot what to say when it was time for him to shake hands. In the end though, he got to do it with Reinyan, in front of the cameras too.

Then my turn came. First was Mariyanuu: huge respect for her attempting to speak to me in Mandarin. All she said was pretty much "thank you for coming"; still, it was good considering she's off to Shanghai.
Next was Reinyan. Unfortunately, the security staff were too eager to push me away before I even got a chance to finish. Nevertheless, she's really pretty in person - something I never really noticed until now. I told her her G+ fashion pics were nice, in which she was kind enough to respond with a word of thanks as I gradually got pushed out by the staff. Oddly enough, my friend and I noticed the following fans after us got a slightly longer time with Reinyan, but that didn't really matter too much.

In the end, it was a small but great experience for me, having never really met any member in person before today, let alone for handshake events. If anything, this served as a good practice run before I attend a bigger handshake event in April next year.

(We got to the place a bit later, so the place was already packed and there were plenty of barricades throughout the entire shopping complex - given that I decided to travel light to HK, close-up shots weren't that feasible. Still, I did manage to get some decent, if slightly distant, shots.)

http://i.imgur.com/e2ZRg.jpg
http://i.imgur.com/THOVa.jpg
http://i.imgur.com/s3srN.jpg
http://i.imgur.com/oIkQJ.jpg
(Image thumbnails not working so URLs only for now)

 

not really an experience, but i wanted to share this for those who might be planning to watch an nmb show in the near future.

so today i got a cancel macchi # 119, and with that high a number i knew it was impossible to go in the nmb theater. the thing was, i was ready to watch a show even just via the monitors in the lobby, and when the line for the selling of tickets got cut off around 40 people before me (lol), i noticed a few really good changes when watching shows in the lobby.

ok first thing's first : you cannot enter the nmb48 lobby unless you have won at least a cancel macchi. and only those who have a cancel macchi and were not able to go in to the theater, or those who actually won tickets but arrived late, are allowed to stay in the lobby and watch the show via the monitor.

for the good news: the monitor is the same and the sound system is the same. its just a big mounted around 40-inch HDTV and the sounds come from the tv itself (no external speakers). before, when i used to watched shows on that monitor, the camera was stationary, mounted at a position near the last row of the audience where you can see the entire stage from that angle. now, they are showing the LOD version of the show with all the close-ups and varying camera angles... LIVE!!... and in f**ng HD!!! and i believe some of those cuts might not make it in the actual LOD since some had too much fan service.

but hey, its HD, its LIVE, the girls are performing in the theater which is right beside the lobby, the bass from the theater is leaking which makes the audio kind of better, and they actually synched the audio now with what is happening live (it used to be delayed by a second or 2.. was kind of annoying to hear the bass in advance), and most of all ITS FREE!!!

so if you guys are planning on watching an nmb show and get a pretty high number for the waitlisted/cancel macchi, at least you know there's still something good waiting for you at the lobby even if you don't get in.


some pics i took today:

 

Team KII - Ramune no Nomikata - 12/26/2012 (Afternoon Show)

My chances of seeing a show on this latest trip were looking dim. Couldn't get tickets to AKB48 Kouhaku, missed cancel machi for an AKB48 KKS show (had number 44 and they stopped at 43), had to deal with both girls-only and December birthday-only shows, and there were 5-7 days with no shows on tap.

Then on Christmas Eve I got an early present from Santa, winning ippan for Team KII on 12/26. If I had any doubts about my theater show luck - this erased it entirely. Not only was it a guaranteed seat, but as the final performance day of the year, it was likely to have nearly the full team present (and in this case only Shawako was unable to make the performance).

Not to mention this show was a last minute addition to the schedule, when they decided to add an afternoon performance to the last Team KII and Team E shows of the year. (and it was the last day that my rail pass was active for this trip). So the morning after Christmas, I caught the Shinkansen to Nagoya and got there shortly after noon.



It was a quick hop on the subway over to Sunshine Sakae, and I headed right up to the 2nd floor as the ticket office was already open. I found out for tickets you need to use the stairs behind the escalator, as there isn't a lot of room on the landing for people to line up. The line when I got there was pretty short, and their process is now identical to AKB's, you get a ticket with your name on it and no wristband.



Like the AKB48 Theater, you line up according to your ticket number using the placards on the floor, and then there is the standard entrance lottery. I was in the 100-109 group, and we ended up being the 4th group called. When entering the theater they check your ID again, and then it was time to figure out where to sit. The two middle rows were already occupied by enpou, girls, couples, and families. Since it was KII, there is no center section because of the runway, so I booked to the right where the second row was filling up. I ended up nearly in the middle of the 2nd row on the right section.

Let me talk a little bit about the theater. The seats are individual (not benches), and have plenty of legroom. There is a lot of open space on the sides of the seating area, and the theater ceiling is high giving a feeling of openness. Definitely a bit different from the tight confines of Donki in Akihabara. In addition, the seats are slightly tiered every few rows, and the stage itself is about 3 feet higher than the first row seats. There pretty much is not a bad view in the house.

The Show

Spoiler

When the overture came up I was a little surprised that the mix was not done. The intro bit and end were shouted, but not the three mixes we're all used too. And it's not that people didn't know it - they were shouted enough during the actual performance. Then out marched Team KII…

I have never experienced a "Wow - this is really happening!" moment in the theater. I've had it at events and concerts, but never in the theater. That first experience with AKB48 it was all unfamiliar territory, so it didn't really sink in until long after the show was over. This was completely different, because I had seen this new theater, seen the stage performed on LOD, and knew all the members. Not to mention that it's pretty much my favorite xxx48 team and stage at the moment, which meant that it was a pretty overwhelming experience.

Normally it's easy to look around and watch the entire stage, or follow a particular member during the show. But being so close to the stage and on the side, I ended up focusing on the members who were performing in front of me. Through some weird twist, Team KII is the only SKE team that I have never seen live (I saw Team S at Minogashita 2011, and again with Team E at Request Hour 2012). I spent most of the first set enjoying the experience of finally seeing members I knew in person.

Aside from my favorite members (in this case, Churi, Mieko, and Ogiso), there are other members who end up standing out for one reason or another. This time it was Ishida Anna, Iguchi Shiori, and Yamada Reika. Annya was simply incredible and I now understand why she was selected for a dual-team role. Igucchi stands out because she is so tall, but a good performer as well. Reichan stood out because I ended up getting a lot of attention from her throughout the show. (more on that in a bit).

The first set is a great progression - Kizashi is filled with a lot of precision movement, which then goes into the cute Koutei no Koinu. In my show, Goriso was the puppy. Disco Hokenshitsu was a different experience live… I actually started feeling nostalgic (yes, I was around during the disco era). They do use a glitter ball for that number, it's hard to tell from the LODs, but you can see the reflections on all the theater walls. Then it was the definitive Team KII song, Omatase Set List, and everyone seemed to kick it up to the next level for that number.

Being in the second row I had hoped for a little eye contact during the show. But halfway through the first set I realized I was getting a lot of looks, probably because everyone else was wearing dark colors, and there I was in a bright orange hawaiian shirt and baseball cap. As the show progressed it started paying off in spades as they realized I was a foreigner, and I started to get a variety of little waves and smiles from the various members. I kept catching Reichan looking at me, and got more than a couple waves/gestures from her. Annya and Meiko were also focusing on me regularly when they were nearby.

I love the MCs as much as the songs, and the ones for this performance were great. The first MC had a Christmas theme - though a lot of members ended up teasing Naruchan, the kenkyuusei filling in for Shawako. It was her first Team KII performance, so she was really thrilled to be there. The most epic moment of the MC came during Airin's intro. She went into a story of the new body cream she was using was leaving marks on the stage when she kneeled during Kizashi. She then demonstrated, and left even more marks, which caused everyone to explode in laughter (and ended up being a topic revisited throughout the performance).

The unit songs started with Cross, which was finally time where I could focus a bit more on Churi. Which ended up being fail as I got more and more distracted by Igucchi. Finland Miracle is a fun number, but it really can't compare to Manazashi Sayonara. Not only are Ogiso and Airin amazing to see live, but with the new theater, they are using the lifts to great effect. There is one point where they are on separate lifts on opposite ends of the stage, and then walk to the middle, with the lifts rising up to meet them. It does not feel like a 2 1/2 minute song live - seems much longer in person. Usotsuki na Dachou is another fun song, I ended up liking it more than I had in the past (probably because I was actively watching Annya and Reichan at this point to see what they would do). For Nice to Meet You, Airin ended up taking Shawako's spot.

After a brief MC, the next set began with Kodoku na Ballerina. Annya was in Shawako's spot, which is when I learned the one disadvantage to being near the front for a KII performance. Whenever someone goes out on the runway, unless you are at the very edge, it's hard to see through the audience. There is a part where the lead goes out there, and I missed part of her performance. The same would happen later during Akushu no Ai. Ima Kimi to Irareru Koto is a good anthem song, but as I said when I first heard it, it does not feel like an SKE song. They use the lifts for this one as well, which is definitely nice. I get the feeling they are still trying to figure out how to work these into the stages.

But that song leads into the epic Winning Ball - which got the entire audience going again after the more serious songs. Of course the entire song builds up the anticipation for the basket attempt (if you don't know, there is a basket mounted on the theater wall, and near the end one girl tries to bat a nerf ball into it). When the time came, the ball ended up flying past my nose by about 2 inches, hit the hand of the guy next to me, and rebounded onto the stage. I got a good look at it and realized it had been autographed by every single member of the team. If I had known that, I would have pulled a Bartman and grabbed it on the way past. Annya ended up throwing it out into the crowd before the end of the song.

The first part of the final MC was Mieko-focused, so I really enjoyed it. It was amusing that they placed her next to Igucchi, the tallest and shortest right next to each other. For the second part of the MC there was a lot of Naruchan talk. Now that she's been in the KII stage, she's performed with every team this year, so she was really happy. Of course KII wanted to know it they were the most fun to work with. The final song before the encore is Akushu no Ai. Since they do come down and give handshakes to a few audience members in this number, I was regretting not being in front row. But then it turns out they only do that for a few people around the runway now. The member on the right and left side stay up on the stage, so I didn't miss anything.

Encore call was the same as usual - though it felt much quieter than the AKB theater (may be due to the ceiling being much higher). The KII encore is not as exciting as some others. Bowling Ganbou is nice and it's fun that they use the video screen, but 16 Iro no Yume Crayon is pretty much a rehash of Wasshoi B. Ramune no Nomikata is a great end song though, probably one of the best that I've seen. Sadly, they no longer appear to use the actual Ramune bottles in the performance. But a nice touch is the bubbles that are projected on the theater walls during the number, to mimic the ones in the drink. That's another thing that you can't really see in the LOD (much like the starry sky in Yukirin's solo in B5).

Unlike other stages - the encore is not the end of the KII3 performance. They come out for a second encore, featuring an SKE single medley with Aozora Kataomoi, 1! 2! 3! 4! Yoroshiku!, Gomen ne, Summer, Banzai Venus, and finishing with Pareo no Emerald. It's a great set and features nearly every one of my favorite SKE48 songs. It's worth it just to hear Churi do her solo line from 1234 live and in person. This set also erased any doubt that what I was wearing had earned a bit more attention. At one point a member (I think Riho) looked me right in the eye, pointed at me, pointed to her costume (which is orange), and then back at me, smiled and waved.

Post Show

Spoiler

While we waited for the high-touch, they showed us the coupling song 'Darkness' from the new single. After which the staff came and spoke to the person at the end of each row. Unlike the AKB48 theater where the exit to the high-touch is somewhat disorganized, SKE has each row exit one at a time, starting from the back and working their way forward. Very organized and leads to less crowding.

This turns out to be wise, as the high-touch takes place in the photo hallway, which is a very confined space. There are no tables that the members have to lean over, instead there is just a rope and you are literally side to side with them. The line did get hung up a bit, so I had a bit more time at the beginning to say thanks to individual members without rushing past them.

For the most part it was a regular high-touch experience, I got a slightly bigger smile from some of the members, Churi, Mieko, and Reichan especially. I was nearly to the end of the line, when I suddenly and unexpectedly got fished.

When I was about 5 members away from Annya, she caught sight of me and suddenly got this very mischievous grin. When I got to her, she put her palm against mine, and instead of just a pat she kept her hand there and pushed back. She gave me a really big smile and a very big and pronounced 'Thank You' in English. She didn't take her hand away the entire time, and I literally froze on the spot. I'd probably still be there if the staff didn't give me that not-so gentle shove to keep moving. I heard her laughter in my ear as I went past and on to the remaining few members.

Caught… hook, line, and sinker.

Overall Thoughts and Impressions

All in all, it was a great first experience at the SKE48 theater. I not only got to see my favorite team and stage (with nearly everyone there), but I also got to see the brand new theater as well.

The theater itself is amazing, very well-designed and thought out. After seeing and experiencing it in person, I am beginning to think that a renewal of the AKB48 theater wouldn't be a terrible thing. Even though the theater is roomier, you don't lose that up-close and personal experience. In fact, having a raised stage with higher ceilings makes you feel like you are even closer. It also lets them do more with the lights, which is why I think it's brighter than the AKB48 theater. The only downside is that the lobby is much more of a confined space (though I can't base it on prior experience).

Team KII is as incredible to see in person as they are on TV or LODs. Of course, I think that's true of any team. But SKE48 seems to have an energy edge compared to AKB48. Then again, SKE48 doesn't have anywhere near the hectic schedule of performances and appearances, and all the teams have come off some significant downtime while the theater was rebuilt.

The only downside is that Shawako wasn't there. She has always been my SKE48 oshimen, so it would have been great to see her perform in person (as well as getting the high-touch opportunity). But Naruchan was great, and I think I'm going to keep an eye on her in the future. In an odd coincidence, it turns out that I had started following a Naruchan oshi on Twitter a few weeks early. He ended up going to the evening performance, so I got to experience that second show through his tweets. (He's a lucky guy, he ended up seeing 3 performances in 4 days).

It was a lot of fun and the perfect way to wrap up my xxx48 experience for this year. The only thing I want to know now… how long will it take to win another SKE48 show.

 

another akb experience of quality, thanks a lot Tensai.

By the way, did you get your AKB tattoo? I want a proof!

 

2/9 National Handshake event- UZA

Well, this is my second AKB48 event after endless ranting of not getting any theater nor RH or Kouhaku tickets during the 4 months I have been here

The venue was the Saitama Super Arena (or SSA).

I had two tickets for handshakes, because the third one I gave it to a friend that was coming to Japan and was dying to see AKB live (he is an active member in the spanish forums). Originally, I was planning to go with Tomomichan and Miichan, but none of them assisted to the handshake event. I arrived to the venue around 10:00 am, at 10:30 I met with my japanese friend I made in the last handshake event and at 11:00 we waited for my other friend in the door just to exchange our tickets. I had been before for another event (not AKB) to the SSA, so I knew even if we had high seats we would have a decent view, which turned out to be true and I can swear I was closer this time compared to the Seibu Dome handshake event I went in October.

The event started at 12:00, with the people screaming before and some crazy wotas practicing wotagei in the top seats of the venue. I was more prepared this time and I practiced the chants a little to not suck as last time. The setlist started with UZA, omg the effects were amazing, they used some fire canyons in the stage and green laser that covered all the venue. Then, they sang aitakatta, the best part of the performance was that takamina's mic was open all the time so it was practically a Takamina solo with back vocals After that, there was the MC. As in the last handshake event, the person that does the judge for the janken came back (I forgot his name, he moves his tongue REALLY fast), everyone was excited and the CM consisted on the continuation of the challenge in the first day of the RH between the new teams. It was a gesture guessing game, the captains from each team made a gesture while 4 members guessed what it was, some funny moments were when Mariko sucked at snowboard and it looked like she was dancing LOL and Yuko trying to imitate Aki-P and Acchan, both guessed correctly by the other members. I can't really remember if Umechan did something funny, but her team lost with the least points, being Yuko's team who won.

After that, they performed Juuryoku sympathy, it was really good and it looked really neatly performed. Mayuyu was center in that song. Afterwards, they performed First Rabbit, it was amazing! I love that song, the chants were really good. As in the last handshake event, they ended with Dareka no tameni... I love that song, but I would have liked to see Eien pressure or heavy rotation.

While I was waiting for my first handshake ticket, there was some sort of competition continued by the battle of teams in which they guessed an audience member name, favorite food and oshimen. The members that participated that I can remember were Juri, Tano, Susuzuran, Amina, Moeno, Myao, Nonaka, Mariyagi, abe and Harukyan.

For my first handshake I chose Fujie Reina and Takamina. I was really excited to meet her again, her line seemed to move fast, the slowest ones were tomochin and yuko's. It was pretty fast, I just told her I was supporting her always and she replied "sank kyu" LOL, and reinyan the same, she is really pretty though. I think I was dragged of too fast this time compared to october in Seibu dome. Takamina looked tired, and I know she took a rest later that day, I am really quite disappointed with management putting too much pressure, but hope she gets used to it, since it seems like it's killing her.

After that, I got back to my seat after the endless line to exchange my second ticket. Since the start of the event there was a big kind of like covered plataform in the center of the stage. We were wondering they were going to perform there, but it turned out to be a flour pool used later to have a fight between the teams (LOL it was hilarious) sadly, my ticket range was called again, so I hurried to get to the lane. I was thinking of going to takamina's lane, but instead I saw Ume chan and Mocchi's lane almost empty, so I decided to go there. When I was about to give them a handshake they didn't even checked my hands, which is weird since they are a little paranoid; Umechan was really surprised and told me "sank kyu"... afterwards, this was the BEST thing that it had ever happened to me before in the handshakes I have experienced. Mocchi hold my hands and she was EXTREMELY surprised and was really happy, she literally stared at me, she stopped for quite a few more seconds the lane and asked me where I was from. I told her I was from Mexico, and that she had replied me before in google+, she told me "oh that's right!" (I don't know how true is that though) she waved me while I was leaving and she totally ignored the person after me. I was about to cry, it was amazing! I am really considering to oshihen to her, she was extremely nice and I... really don't have words to explain how happy I am as I am writing this. I can't wait to shake hands with her again!

After that I left home with a grin in my face [nod]

I hope I can sleep tonight LOL

 

hahaha yes Mocchi is really amazing. I should do my write up from the theater show today... I was gonna go to that HS event too but I won tickets to KKS show.

-------------------------------------------------


20130209 - 1400 KKS 僕の太陽

My original plan today was to go to Saitama for the UZA HS event as I got some tickets from Tensai. but the day before (Friday), I received my winning ippan e-mail so I had to nix the plan to go to Saitama today.

Got to Donki around 1315 and got my ticket. My group was roughly around the 8th or 9th group to be called in, so majority of the better spots were taken. I ended up taking the seat behind the pillar to the right (facing the stage) though my left center view was block, it was still an interesting experience as it forces you to look at the girls infront of you. It was great when your favorite members kinda comes out of no where behind the pillar and into your line of sight.

I'm sure everyone knows the 僕の太陽 set list, so I'm not gonna cover it much.

This was I think Miichan's 4th KKS performance. On her first performance she wore a pretty short wig... today, her wig was as long as her hair used to be. I didn't feel Miichan's presence much in this performance, which is understandable due to her situation. Even with that, she still is a great performer no question about it.

A couple highlights from today's performance:

Naachan and Hirari during Lay Down... seriously from my angle it looked like they were making out HARD!!!

During Saho's MC, the girl behind her (i think it was either Kojimako or Ayanan) was mimicking her hand gestures and everyone in the theater was cracking up.

Miichan don't quite remember all of the other girls' names yet, and it shows during her MC.

愛しさのdefense is one of my favorite units in this stage, but Moe already performed アイドルなんて呼ばないで(she used to perform 愛しさ alot), the girls in this unit were Hikari, Mogichan, and Umetan. I prefer Mogichan and Umetan in Himawari as it fits their image/looks a lot better than in 愛しさ.

Saho's eien pressure center was pretty amazing.

There was this cute lady sitting on the center second row, who was doing the hand choreo to majority of the songs. It was cool seeing her do that from the corner of my eye.

All in all, it was another great show... gotta wait for the LOD to be available so I can grab it.

 

NMB48 Kenkyuusei Show (3rd and 4th Generations)
Seishun Girls
March 17, 2013 14:00




pre-show stuff

first off, winning the show was pretty much a combo breaker for me. the last show i was able to win was last november 2012. i have been applying for all the week-end shows ever since, and the most i was able to get was the insanely high cancel macchi last january, which was followed by week-end after week-end after week-end of no shows in the theater due to handshake events, etc.

seeing as this was a kenkyuusei show of nmb, i was prepared to be all "whoyou?!" in the theater as i was already expecting to know nobody from the girls. i did some research on the names posted for the attendees of the show, but i know better than to try to "know" the girls just by looking at their pictures.

i guess the killer point of the show was that it was seishun girls. team N did seishun girls before, but i wasn't able to win a show before they finished doing the stage last september. seishun girls was, ofcourse, originally K2, but the stage holds a special meaning to me since it was performed by B1 and it was during that time that i first went to the akihabara48 theater back in 2007. it won't exactly be a trip down memory lane since i already know that nmb is fond of customizing the stages until they pretty much feel so different from the original ones, and as long as i know that it was easy to respect nmb for what they are and not what i expect them to be.

still... kinjirareta.... seriously?!?!?! (more on this later)

anyways..

first i want to share some observations that i had before the show even began. people might find these useful when seeing nmb shows after all.

first of all, what in the world did they do to the wristbands. the procedure of lining up and buying the tickets was pretty much smooth sailing all the way, but when the staff member gave me my wristband, i wasn't able to stop myself from blurting out "chotto nanikore?!" (hey what in the world is this?!!) . a pic of the way they put on my wristband:



and when i was lining up waiting to enter the theater a bit later, i noticed that it wasn't only me who had this type of monstrosity on my wrist. it appears that everyone was given the same treatment (or at least most people). i know it isn't really something special, but after years of having wristbands put on the same way each time, and with us even having a technique to remove the wristband easily, they suddenly decide to change it. now i really have to remove this thing using scissors. :wah:

second, i noticed that just like the pink bands in the pillars of death in the akb theater, nmb has bands on the left wall/pillar inside the nmb theater placed to mark their yearly anniversary. the bands have the number of years printed on them clearly. what was disturbing is that they were adding the bands going down, with the band for the 2nd year anniversary located below the 1st year anniversary one. kind of sad as to how they seem to "go down" with that kind of pattern as opposed to the "going up" style of akb where takamina even had to stand on something last december. and judging from the space, they can only have about 8 bands fit in there before they reach the floor.

and lastly, now the rules for cheering for the girls inside the theater just crossed the "that's just too much" line. i already had a hard time trying to cheer for the girls without letting my hands go higher than my head as is written on the theater walls and reminded to the audience by theater staff before the shows start. now, staff members told us to keep our movements at chest level . SERIOUSLY?!?!?! if the rules get any stricter, they might just as well ban all forms of glowsticks and cheering for the girls and transform the entire theater to a big movie theater where people eat popcorn and drink soda while watching the girls in friggin silence opcorn:. even though i know that the nmb theater staff is trying to make the experience as family friendly as possible, i really just hope they don't go too far. its starting to kill the fun out of watching shows.


show review

after grabbing myself a seat at the 2nd row from the back at the aisle portion so i can have a bit of room to move around, by some miscommunication or whatever happened, the show started with the seat to my right being empty. ofcourse i was happy that i had a LOT of space to move around (aisle to the left, empty seat to the right), but at the same time i was kind of mad at the staff members for not properly utilizing resources. that one empty seat could have been given to someone who sacrificed a lot and lined-up for cancel macchi. and for the few times that i had the bad experience of having the line cut-off right in front of me, i just hope they fix these things.

ok so for the first 3 songs, seishun girls, beach sandal, and kimi ga hoshi ni naru made , all i could do was enjoy listening to the songs in a theater environment again while trying to familiarize myself with the members dancing on stage. right away 2 girls pretty much grabbed my attention, and they were naru (narumi koga) and aika nishimura. they already caught my attention from the very first song, and eventually i found out they were pretty much the double center for this group. i won't include a pic of these girls since they look waaaaaaay different compared to their profile pics (check lods if you want to verify), but all i can say is that they definitely have that x-factor. naru looked like a crossbreed of manatsu + yuririn + hana (gao) while aika has that miichan aura and can seriously just take my attention even if she just stood there doing nothing.

and during the mc, aside from the new exit style where the last girl to introduce herself on the row will say the name of the first girl in the row behind them before the entire row leaves, there was really nothing special. right now i don't even remember a single mc as it was still pretty much just introductions of their names etc. :dunno:

moving on to the unit songs, the moment blue rose played it was pretty much flashbacks for me. it really didn't help that takayama was in naruppe's position and from afar she resembled naruppe with her hairstyle and her figure . had a really really really good time losing my voice doing the mixes, cheering for narumi who was looking all awesome in that costume, while pretty much crazily pumping my fists in the air stopping midway just to respect the rules. if only they allowed us to just go all out on these songs i would have probably enjoyed it a lot more (and the lod camera guy will be taking footages of our fists instead of the girls ).

kinjirareta futari gave me the shock of my life. it started out normally, and my hands just moved on their own waving at the girls to the beat of the song. i was enjoying the entire performance until they reached the chorus and WHAT THE F***K THE GIRLS DIDN'T SWAY AT ALL!! i mean, i understood that they had to tame kuchiutsushi in team M, but ERASING the steps where the two girls would sway instead of just maybe toning it down (or better yet just LEAVE THOSE AS IS as they don't really do harm) was just too much for me. the first chorus left me open mouthed, confused, and crying out "WHYYYYYYYYYY?!?! :angry: " to the things that was going on on stage. seriously, just why?! its things like these that make me wish nmb NEVER did b3. they would probably kill the entire stage.

aaaaaaand ame no doubutsuen played and the tune just took over me. aika was wearing the mouse costume (no i still don't see that as an elephant btw), forgot who was wearing the penguin costume but with the costume stretching down at the back portion instead of the mini-skirt type of team b, a lot of accidents were avoided. what creeped me out though was the panda costume. ofcourse i would be concentrating on that costume as my oshi was in the panda position in b1, and seeing that the nmb version had a super-deformed-mutant-panda version instead of the old one... gave me shivers. the panda eyes on the hood looked like donuts glued on the costume , and no it wasn't cute at all. i made really good use of the space i had during this song as i was pretty much doing even the footwork while seated.

fast forwarding to virgin love as fushidara na natsu and don't disturb had me spending my time locking on to aika and not remembering who did the english portion ("you can shee zat za moon is at za fool" [rofl] ) but it was pretty much standard jap engrish. now for virgin love, this was when another member pretty much just shined. it was rina yamao, the 18 year old 4'10" girl XD. i was easily overlooking her in the previous songs, but during this song i could say it was pretty much hers. she just moved so naturally on stage that my eyes would pretty much return to her each time i tried to look at other members. international dateline (hizukehenswfaaaah XD. just joking. hizuke henkou sen) just made me want to cry. my going sentimental for this stage pretty much peaked during this song.

skipping to post encore, and the time for korogaru came after yakuzokuyo. the intro of the song was enough to set me to hyper mode INSTANTLY!!! if i had any voice left before korogaru, i was once again successful in losing everything during the song. the song still succeeds in raising the tension of the entire theater, though i must say it was far from the "through the roof" tension that i was used to years ago. so instead of "we are the team K", they did "we are the NMB" and did a thumbs up sign instead of the K sign... while there i was doing the B sign like crazy. i just hope nobody saw me.

and they followed the song with the new song by AKB for remembering the 3/11 disaster. not to disrespect the team, but i had my doubts if they could pull it off as the audience was pretty much hyper after korogaru, and they suddenly decide to just go with a sentimental song. they were still able to pull it off though, and i just sat there silent as i knew what i was feeling during the song was nothing compared to the painful memories that they might be remembering during that moment. it was all i could do to show respect.

and after the song, they now performed the single barrage of nmb starting with nagiichi, then kitagawa kenji i think, then... i forgot . i do remember they still performed seishun no laptime. no more akb songs this time.

and it was during the mc after that i suddenly realized.. wtf where's cinderella?! i would have been driven mad had they not performed the song, but fortunately half the team went off stage and returned wearing the cinderella costumes and moments later the song started. i really thought the song would kill me as this was my favorite song in B1, but when i saw the nmb version of cinderella, all i can say is "no". its totally different. it felt like it had no connection whatsoever with the ones i saw in b1. the steps are the same ofcourse, but the whole thing just felt different. and add to that the fact that they added electric guitars to the song.. just "NO" . it wasn't the cinderella that i knew and loved. but ofcourse i still enjoyed the performance of nmb. and there was too much fan service from one of the members. not sure if she was waving her skirt too fast or if it was a wardrobe malfunction, but as far as i can remember i never saw fan service in cinderella back in b1 even if the members had already gone wild. i guess its this new design of the skirt that they had that allowed it to fly a lot more freely. why in the world should i complain, right?

as we left the theater to do a high five with the girls and get our back massaged, i ended up in front of nagisa shibuya. i just breezed through the girls, stopping a bit only in front of aika, narumi, and takayama.
[cool]

pictures!!

wanted to share some pics i snapped that day. first, there's the nmb shop getting renovated:



then pics that i took at the lobby of and around the nmb theater:






conclusion

if i heard it right, this was only the 2nd week of the kenkyuusei shows for nmb. they still have some polishing to do, and i'm not so sure but somehow i didn't detect or feel prominent characters/traits in this batch. there was no "sexy" girl, no "leader" type, "boyish" type, etc. maybe those will surface in time and will help make the stage a lot better, but as of now everything felt like a mess. not in the dance quality btw, or the singing, as the girls were obviously trained well and practiced hard for this, but without the member traits that could enhance the songs themselves, it just feels all blurry. though i must commend the girls for having an above average mc in terms of natural reactions that makes the theater experience more enjoyable. thumbs up to the girls for a job well done.

 

For my 100th post, I wanted to share the story that changed me from a casual fan of AKB48 (after being a fan of J-pop in general since the mid 90's) to the more hardcore fan I am today. In the summer of 2010, AKB made a rare United States appearance at the Anime Expo in Los Angeles. As noted, I was only a casual follower of them at this point, but had debated going to the expo to see them since I live only 90 minutes away. However, as fate (or in this case, luck) would have it, my parents opted to chose that weekend to make their annual visit with me. Not wanting to drag them along on something they wouldn't be interested I decided to still take them down to Los Angeles to partake in some of the tourist attractions instead. The L.A. Zoo. A movie studio tour. And finally Griffith Observatory. They were happy with this, but my one concession was that we would stop at Little Tokyo for supper and to buy goods at the bookstore and market before heading back home.
While checking out the observatory we rounded a corner and in front of us was a gaggle of photographers and guys holding sun shields, shooting pictures of a few young Japanese ladies who looked sort of familiar to me. It took a second to register, but thankfully one of those ladies was Takamina, one of the more recognizable members to even a casual fan. Also present was Kojiharu and Miichan (although admittedly I only knew it was Miichan through later research). I had a little bit of a minor freak out (which my mother didn't get why I was getting excited). I wanted to approach them, but since they were working opted to just watch (and sneak a few pics with my cell phone cam). On the other side of the property, we found Yuko posing for pictures as well as some other girls. I later discovered that there were a total of 12 girls there that day (but we only saw six).
I excitedly talked about it for a while with my family and ultimately bought my first AKB48 album while at the bookstore in Little Tokyo, which was Kamikyokutachi, and listened to it the entire drive home. Missing out on the concert at the expo ended up giving me a much more personal experience in running into them in public. I still kind of regret not talking to any of them (today I totally would), but I will treasure that moment forever.
In the weeks that followed, I started researching the group and getting more and more into the music. I fell in love with Mariko and Yukirin and Chiyuu as my top three, but found many other members I enjoyed. Starting buying CDs, photos, magazines, books, DVDs,all kinds of various souvenirs, watching their videos and shows online, and finally made a trip to the holy place of Don Quijote in Akihabara in April 2012 (also fulfilling a life-long dream of mine to visit Tokyo). Unfortunately I failed to win tickets to a show during that trip, but will be trying again next year.
Finally presented from my personal collection are these three photos taken on that happy day!

 

This is very touching. At that time, AKB weren't the popular group we know so i don't know if you could approach them or not.

Anyway, i got the same thing during Japan expo in France, so i totally agree with you!

 

UZA HS Event - Makuhari Messe - 3/10/2013

This was the HS event that was never supposed to happen.

After having extremely poor luck with concert tickets last year, I decided to make 2013 the year of the HS. Unfortunately by the time I made my decision, I had already missed all the initial rounds for UZA. But I decided to try my luck with the 'last chance' rounds, which is basically left over or unpurchased tickets. I selected Yui, and then nine other lower-ranking members. When I won only the Yui tickets, I was faced with a tough decision. Fly to Japan for 20 seconds with Yui or stay home and regret it forever.

The things I do for my oshimen…

Thankfully, there was another 'last chance' round in January, and I managed to get a few tickets for other members (including another long shot - Yukirin).

I left San Francisco on Friday morning, getting into Tokyo on Saturday night and dead tired. Luckily my first ticket wasn't until the 2:00 time slot, so I was able to sleep in and get some valuable rest. I was a little concerned about getting to Makuhari Messe, but it ended up being relatively easy (except for a long hike through Tokyo Station). I followed the crowd from the station to the event hall - wasn't too hard. From all the stories and things I had seen, I thought the venue would be massive, but it was much smaller than I expected. It was past 2:30, so I decided to head right to my first official HS.

Spoiler for length

Spoiler

Oshima Ryoka

When I got there her line was practically empty, only a couple of people were in front of me. It took less than a minute to check in and move up to to the entrance of her booth. I waited for the other person to finish and went in.

Ryochan did a double-take as I came into the booth and said 'Konnichi wa'. She flashed me a huge grin and said 'Hello!'. Since it was my first official handshake - I'm pretty sure I had a bit of a 'deer in the headlights' look. Like the few times I've met members before, any knowledge of Japanese completely slipped my mind. I ended up introducing myself in English and telling her where I was from. She introduced herself in English, which was really cute. I told her I was a big fan, and had been cheering her on since she was KKS. Then my time was nearly up, so I congratulated her on the promotion and waved goodbye as I left.

I had over an hour to kill before my next slot - and it was pretty hot in the main event area. I headed upstairs and sat on a bench for a while, soaking in the people and the event.

Kashiwagi Yuki

Waited a bit into the next slot before queuing for Yukirin. The line was still long, but moved pretty fast. The best part of waiting was being able to catch glimpses of other members in their booths. Caught several glimpses of Yui, Miichan (wig and baseball hat), Reinyan, and Kasai. This time instead of having a staff member directing you into the booth, it was an OJS48.

When I entered her booth she gave me the classic Yukirin reaction. I thought she recognized me from the show, and said it was good to see her again. Which confused her, because she really was reacting to "Oh, someone from overseas" rather than "Oh, I remember you". I thanked her for being on the show and told her it was a lot of fun, but I could tell it wasn't clicking with her. I even tried naming the show, but to no avail. I thanked her again as I left, but she was already prepping for the next person.

It was nice to see her again, but I really began to re-evaluate and reset my expectations. Especially with senbatsu members. The good thing is that I was learning a lot. I had spent so much time thinking of things to say and how to say them in Japanese, that I wasn't really ready when the conversation went in another direction. Not to mention, when I get nervous I have a tendency to talk really fast. So I decided for my last three handshakes I was going to relax and let the girls do most of the talking.

But with no tickets in the next slot and facing a 30 minute break on top of that, I had over 2 hours of downtime. I spent some time checking out the goods area, picking up some things for myself and a friend. I wanted to buy the new National Tour DVD set, but decided to wait so I wouldn't have to lug it around. I then spent some time checking out the birthday committee area (filling out a card for Micha), and then grabbed a bite to eat at one of the cafe's on site.

Then about 20 minutes prior to the start of the 6th slot, I headed back down for my final round of tickets.

Sato Amina

I decided to visit Amina first, as I expected her lane to be somewhat busy. There were a lot of people hanging out in the immediate area, but once her gate opened only about a dozen people headed for it. While I was waiting to enter her booth, I could see her pretty clearly while the people in front were going through. She was wearing a huge red baseball hat, which looked a bit silly. Then I stepped into her booth, looked into those eyes, and I completely forgot about it.

I did a quick intro and said where I was from. She seemed very happy and thanked me for coming. I told her I was very much a fan of hers and really enjoyed seeing her perform in the theater. I got a 'Thank You Very Much'. It's funny - even when I speak Japanese, they reply in English. I told her that I hoped to see again soon, and waved bye as I walked out.

The walk back to the front ended up being the highlight of the day.

While I was heading out and checking Twitter, I noticed a girl who looked familiar walk past me on the other side of the barrier. I turned to look and realized it was Minarun heading to her lane. Then I turned back around and nearly ran into Suuchan. She was only a few feet in front of me, just standing in the walkway. From what I can tell, when they moved the barrier to let her into her booth, they moved the wrong one and blocked both of us. She couldn't get into her lane and I couldn't walk past her.

I stopped immediately because I had no idea what the protocol was. It took a while to sort out, so I ended up with a bonus ten seconds of seeing Suuchan up close… but it wasn't over. Once she got in her booth and I continued walking out, I found that I was walking alongside Moeno as she was heading out to her lane.

Now it was time for my last two handshakes of the trip.

Iwasa Misaki

I decided to end the day with Yui, so I headed over to see Wasamin first. When I got to Wasamin's lane, I was shocked to find it completely empty. There was absolutely nobody either waiting to have their tickets checked, or waiting to enter her booth. Compared to the lines I had seen earlier, it was pretty surprising. Needless to say it took less than 30 seconds to walk up, check in, and then do a quick hand check before walking into the booth.

The minute she saw me, she lit up and then did a mini-double take/pop. This is the second time I've seen her do this, and it's different from the double-takes I get from the other members. The same thing that happened in the hi-touch line last October, and I'm pretty certain now that for a moment she's thinking I'm Cristafari, and then realizes I'm not ^^; She grabbed my hands and gave me a big 'Hello' - and just like last March, I'm seriously in danger of oshihen'ing. I mentioned that I went to a mini-live for her first single, and congratulated her on the second. I got an 'arigatou' and a 'Thank You' in return, and then I was getting shuffled out. This ended up being the worst part, because there was nobody else waiting, so we ended up waving goodbye for probably another good 5 seconds, with me standing in the exit lane. (I think she would have walked me back up front if she could have gotten away with it)

Then it was time…

Yokoyama Yui

When I got over to Yui's line, it was only semi-crowded. I was using 2 tickets, so I knew I would be getting some decent time compared to Yukirin. While I was waiting they closed her curtain, made me a bit nervous that there was going to be a break, but after about a minute it opened up again. Of course the entire time I was starting to get more and more nervous. I've been waiting for this moment for 2 years, and now I was literally only a few feet away.

I entered her booth and took her hand, and said my name and where I was from. I got a 'wao' this time and she smiled even more. The cheek dimples popped at that point, and I started to lose my nerve a bit. I told her very slowly and clearly in Japanese that she was my oshimen and I had been supporting her for 2 years. She said thank you and asked "two years… hontou?" I explained that I had been following her since the the Not Yet debut and that her Macau Tower jump really impressed me. She said "Ah - did you watch it on YouTube?". I was like - "no, I have the DVDs… I bought them" (and probably sounded a bit defensive - because that's pretty much the assumption that most foreigners are streaming or torrenting things). Then they started motioning me out and we said our goodbyes. (in hindsight I probably had another 3-4 seconds of time).

On the way out of the hall I stopped by and made a donation to the charity fund, and did a little more shopping before catching the train back to Tokyo to pack for my flight back the next day.

Overall it was a really good first experience, and I wouldn't trade it for anything. While there was a lot of awkwardness, as not being able to speak or understand the language is a challenge, both the staff and the members were great. I'm not sure yet if I prefer these over a concert or theater show, that will come after the one in a couple of weeks where I have nearly 30 tickets spread over 20 members. However, the ease of getting tickets and actually meeting members in person make this an experience I recommend everyone try at least once. I'd definitely recommend going for a wide variety of members. Wasamin and Ryochan were great and there wasn't the same time pressure as with senbatsu members. While you're still only getting 10 seconds, it seems much longer when they don't have 100 people standing in line behind you.

Looking forward to seeing the reports of other S48 members from the 'Eien Pressure' HS event, and I'll be posting one of my own in a few weeks too.

 

Since I'm in Japan right now for most of April, I thought I'd give a report on the 48-group events I've gone to so far throughout this trip. These event reports are abridged and slightly edited versions of my blog entries.

AKB48 Kenkyuusei "Pajama Drive" Stage - Tuesday 2nd April 2013.
(spoilered for length reasons)

Spoiler

This would be the first time ever entering the AKB48 Theater and watching a stage performance - AKB48 Kenkyuusei performing Pajama Drive (B3). To be quite honest, I was happy that I actually won a show, considering how hard (and of normal circumstance) it is to not win any.

The email stated to collect my ticket at 4:30pm. When the time came to go and collect my ticket, I went up to 8/F at Don Quixote, where the escalator was open and proceeded to the front lobby desk. Told them my winning application number, showed them my ID (passport), paid the show cost (2000Y) and got my ticket. Now I've already been to the AKB48 theater lobby before this trip, but it was my first time entering those doors into the theater proper. Because I had an hour or so before I could enter into the theater, I grabbed a quick bite to eat and then proceeded straight back to the theater.

Despite being a Kenkyuusei show, it was a full house as you'd expect. Observing the people, I'd figure around 80% male and 20% female. A surprisingly diverse range of age groups, with most being around 20-30 years old. A few salarymen straight from work, parents and kids and middle-aged were also there. As for foreigners, I noticed a few Chinese nationals too, two of which also got Enpou. No Super Enpou winners, so those front row seats were taken by the Ippan applicants.

I'm sure you know the process by now, but if not, they got us to line up according to ticket number and category. Generally the special groups (female, family/couples, Enpou, Super Enpou) enter first as they (we) have reserved seats. Soon enough, it was Enpou's turn to enter the theater, and upon entering, it was great just being there and absorbing the theater spirit. Realising that it was only 7 years ago that current (and ex-) top-notch senbatsu members like Acchan, Takamina, Kojiharu etc. stood on that gleaming wooden stage just right in front of your very eyes. From the two pillars and the seven pink tapes, to the revolving stage doors and blinds and the blue MC light behind you. Everything looked so remarkably familiar from the various TV shows and LODs, yet I got to see it all in person. As for me, because I won Enpou, I sat in the very back, just in front of the standing room crowd. Not that it was an issue - far from it, as the seat rows are raised and also you get to really experience the wota crowd behind you cheering and MIXing.

Then the kage-ana and the overture came. Glow stick in hand, I was ready. The moment I've long been waiting for finally coming into fruition. As soon as Shonichi opened, I knew I was in for something special. And it really was indeed. You can watch as many, or as few, LODs as you like on a screen, but nothing ever can replace seeing the members perform their hardest on stage, with blaring music, a few dozen stage lights and an enthusiastic crowd MIXing in front and behind you. Oh, and you finally get to turn your head and choose where to look, instead of letting the DMM LOD camera dictate that for you.

Setlist was the same B3 as we all (should) know and love. Without going through each and every little minute detail - I'm sure it'll be uploaded somewhere on the Internet - I'll just pick a few points of interest:

• Saki Kitazawa had to be taken out during the first MC (according to her Google+ post after the show, she cited anaemia as the reason), before she even got to be introduced. She came back later for the unit songs though.
• Favourite songs? Of course, there were well-known classic unit songs like Junjou Shugi, Temodemo Namida and Pajama Drive, which were great, but what really struck a chord were seeing Kagami no Naka Jeanne D'Arc, Inochi no Tsukaimichi and particularly Suifu wa Arashi ni Yume wo Miru. The Kenkyuusei really do these songs justice, it's incredible - even more so seeing it live.
• You may have screamed and shouted with glowsticks in front of your computer countless of times, but being with the crowd as one doing the KKS rendition of the classic Wasshoi! B (here titled as "Let's Go! Kenkyuusei") is simply irreplaceable.
• Everyone will be asking me, "Who's your favourite member?" Now I'm only a Kenkyuusei noob, but I'll just say this: Yurina Takashima's funny, Nana Okada's an incredibly sharp performer, Mogi Shinobu's cool and Miyu Omori's solid (especially during Jeanne D'Arc). But if there was one I had to pick, it has to be Miki Nishino. A blend of fierce performance on stage and a bubbly character - what's not to like?
• They sang Tenohira ga Kataru Koto (short ver.) at the end, and then showed the PV.
• At the end of the show, we got a high touch. It was kind of cute when some of them tried to clasp hold my hand as I passed through.

Countless numbers of people would have seen more stage performances in person than I have. But I think that it'll be the first stage that they have ever seen live that they will remember the most. As someone who rarely gets the chance to come to Japan, let alone win a show, it's sort of a blessing to be able to have this opportunity to watch a stage live. That evening will stick in my memory for a long time to come and, as far as my personal fandom life is concerned, a historic moment, making my entire fandom just all that more complete.

I never really cared too much about Kenkyuusei before that day, but if that didn't make me a Kenkyuusei fan by now (or at least going to start to pay more attention to them) I don't know what else will. Their rock-solid rendition of the classic B3 gave me a million smiles and almost made my eyes wet with happiness. If you ever intend to apply for a show here whilst in Japan, don't deny yourself the opportunity to see them perform "just because they're Kenkyuusei". You will be pleasantly surprised.

 

damn. If a kenkyuusei stage do this for you, i can't imagine if you lived the day 3 of Tokyo dome. The DVD only gave me chill down my spine.

I will definitively do HS and Concert. I swear to my life i will.

 

Continuation from my previous post.

EDIT 3: Added AKB48 29th Single HS event report.

Minami Takahashi Solo Single "Jane Doe" Guerilla Live @ Shinjuku - Wednesday 3rd April 2013.

Spoiler

Originally, I went to Shinjuku for other reasons like shopping and exploring around generally. When I arrived at Shinjuku JR station, upon exiting, I noticed a very familiar backdrop on a constructed mini-stage. It was of Takahashi's "Jane Doe". Judging also by the amount of staff, security and crowds starting to gather, I presumed this whole thing was related to Takamina's debut solo single. Turns out it was a guerrilla live. What a pleasant surprise. Because I seemingly arrived earlier before the crowds really started to become packed, I managed to get a fairly good position up front. (Of course, my height does help...).

And, after waiting for around half an hour, she finally arrived on stage, dressed in her Jane Doe outfit. Yes, she really is... short. (Sorry, Takamina fans XD). She performed Jane Doe, abridged, of which her performance live was okay - nothing really out of tune and generally fairly aggressive. Ambience aided by a front-row trio of wota (guessing they're Takamina oshi) who MIXed and wotagei-ed during the song; everyone else were just your casual fans and observers wanting to enjoy this special impromptu live. Of course, for me, it was great seeing her in person for once.

Soon afterwards, there was a bit of Q&A by the MC and then they brought out a birthday cake for her, since hers was coming up in a few days time. So they got us to congratulate and cheer for her, which was a nice gesture. Not long after that, she left the stage and that was the guerrilla live finished. A short, but enjoyable moment. Definitely felt lucky to have caught seeing her live. Now I can finally say I've watched the soukantoku performing live in person.

NMB48 2013 West Japan Spring Concert Tour @ Osaka, Orix Theater - Thursday 4th April 2013.

Spoiler

I was in Osaka the whole day before the concert. So earlier in the morning, I rocked up to the concert hall and bought some concert goods. Then I spent the day exploring Osaka before returning to the concert hall later that day.

When I arrived at first, I was greeted with a humongous line into the complex, but it turned out that it was for the goods. The actual concert entrance queue was much shorter and with multiple entry points. After a painless ID check, and stuffing my bags into a coin locker, I went upstairs to where I'd be sitting. Very high up, in fact. The view wasn't too bad but, with the benefit of hindsight as I realised later on during the concert, binoculars would have been a good idea. Nevertheless, the view wasn't too bad; since it was the front row of a section of seats, I could see the whole of the stage and still make out a few members' faces without my view being blocked by a giant wota's head.

At the beginning, they were screening the HA! extended MV on the stage monitor. When I came in, it was the latter half, so I got to see the cheesy-as, slow-mo death sequence. A few people sitting next to me (one Momoka-oshi and the other one a Milky-oshi) started to initiate a conversation with me. Seems that I must be the only (or at least one of the very few) foreigners attending this concert, judging by their remarkable surprise when I told them I was from Australia.

Then the concert started, the familiar sound of the overture and wota crowd MIX filling the entire hall with energy and excitement. Even just being a part of the wota crowd was amazing - a truly high tension experience that not even concert discs, Blu-ray/4K/whatever, can replicate. Glowsticks everywhere, excitable wota screaming members' names. Young and old, male and female, kids and elderly. All part of the fun as one.

In case you haven't been following the concert updates on Google+ or Twitter, or you've simply forgot, here is the setlist:

Some summary notes:

• It was great seeing the members live (despite not having binoculars) as well as watching some real classic NMB48 songs live. NMB48 songs really do work much better with an energetic crowd and in person. Even if it was a mainly singles and album songs setlist, the whole night was incredibly lively.
• Junjou U-19 was stunning to watch, what with that electrifying blend of aggressive choreography and insane light work. They also unfurled banners for Teppen Tottande!, played the moving video clips during 12月31日 (the ones you saw during the MV) and shot out a sea of gold ribbons everywhere for Seishun no Laptime. Exhilarating stuff, and 12月31日 was just beautiful - as if you're wrapped in the sound and emotion of the moment.
• All the members looked great, even from afar. Momoka (during MC2) and Maachun (during performance and at the end) were indeed hilarious. A couple of obaa-chan jokes towards Nana (Sayanee seemed to make the most of them) here and there, and they got us to do a Mexican wave during MC2.
• Final word of the evening goes to Milky: 一緒にちゃぷちゃぷしよう~. As you'd expect from her.

In all, a wonderful and exciting concert experience. NMB48 sure know how to rev up the crowd, and all the wota were out in full force. If I had the chance, I would definitely not pass up another opportunity to go.

SKE48 Team KII 3rd "Ramune no Nomikata" Stage - Friday 5th April 2013.

Spoiler

I was back in Nagoya after dumping my luggage in Tokyo. Today, I was finally able to enter through those locked gates and experience the recently renovated SKE48 theater.

Upon arriving at Sunshine Sakae, you enter some rear stairs behind the escalator in order to pick up your winning ticket. After paying the ticket fare, I explored the theater for a bit. The lobby area was certainly smaller than the AKB48 theater, but also cleaner, fresher and, subjectively speaking, better looking interior decor. Giant screens displaying random member videos and real-time updates of members' Google+ posts, as well as the Guinness World Records certificate proudly hanging on the wall. Even the security guard was a nice and friendly bloke. Strangely, they had great looking washrooms, too.

Because I still had time before the concert, I bought a few small things from the SKE48 shop and went to have a look around the Sakae area for a bit.

5:30pm came, and it was time for me to head back to the theater. Today, I won using regular Ippan, so when I could enter (and where I would sit) depended entirely on luck. Today's audience makeup was similar to Tuesday's AKB48 Kenkyuusei show, although I didn't really notice any other foreigners. There was also a fairly vocal Riho Abiru wota who kept shouting her name (constantly and incessantly) during the show and led most of the member calls/encore.

My queue entered fairly early, so I managed to get a decent seat. Inside the theater, it was every bit as I imagined and saw from LODs (and other media). Certainly more spacious, too; unlike in the AKB48 theater where I felt a bit cramped at times, I had enough space to feel comfortable here. The screens were newer, too, and fixed (unlike the projector screen in the AKB48 theater). One thing they should have done during the renovation work though: elevate all the seating rows like in the AKB48 theater, not just every three. My view was partially blocked by another person's head, but it was a minor issue. The best thing about the theater? The central front stage platform, and the members really do make full use of it, coming up really (and scarily) close to you during certain songs, like in Kizashi, Nice to meet you and Akushuu no Ai. Whereas in Orix Theater yesterday (for NMB48) they were like stick figures, here the members were larger than life and you could almost see every bit of detail.

Enough about the theater itself. Today's Ramune no Nomikata setlist highlights:

• No Churi, Airin nor Annya tonight. Center for Cross was Seira, Neesan subbed in for Airin in Manzashi Sayonara and Shiori (Iguchi) likewise for Annya in Usotsuki na Dachou. Post-Shawako, Reika became the ballerina. Mikitty was general center for the entire stage performance.
• Standard KII 3rd Stage setlist tonight, so expect the default Manatsu finger-pointing everywhere during Finland Miracle. Performances were top notch across the board, as you'd expect from SKE48. Especially during the final singles medley, where (if you've seen a KII 3rd stage before) they perform Aozora Kataomoi, Gomen ne SUMMER, 1! 2! 3! 4! Yoroshiku, Banzai Venus and Pareo wa Emerald strung together.
• It was great seeing some of the KII members live (Neesan really is short, and Shiori Ogiso's face really is small). Kenkyuusei Mikichan (Miki Hioki) was also there, looking like Miorin as usual. Speaking of the former two, Ogiso mistakenly forgot Neesan's age. "28", she said. Laughter and embarrassment followed.
• Mikitty still has work to do in one very important area if she wants to be a good Churi replacement: being able to hit the ball properly (in Winning Ball). She failed to do so tonight, the ball ended up going nowhere and everyone crying out "awwww". Funny points aside, incredibly sharp performance from her tonight.
• Today's handshakes (in Akushuu no Ai) were from Manatsu on the left and... (because I sat on the left side where Manatsu was and I didn't notice the other side) someone else.
• Just like (I'm guessing) nearly every 48-group theater performance of late, they performed Tenohira ga Kataru Koto at the end and showed the MV.
• High touch again today. Of particular note and memorable was the only girl in the crowd of lively members saying ありがとう! that, well, wasn't. All she did was smile gently without saying a word. Thanks, Manatsu. Nice legs, too.

To sum it up, a great and memorable performance from all involved. I did prefer the crowd in the AKB48 theater, but the typically awesome SKE48 choreographic skills and highly entertaining MCs more than made up for it.

AKB48 29th Single "Eien Pressure" Theatre Edition Handshake Event @ Makuhari Messe - Sunday 7th April 2013.

Spoiler

Today was a special day for me as a fan. The day I finally get to meet, greet, handshake and talk to some of the 48-group members of my choosing. It was the AKB48 29th single "Eien Pressure" handshake event at Makuhari Messe.

Arrived in Tokyo Station early to meet some friends who would be going over to the event site with us. Train took half-an-hour to get there and immediately, the trains were packed. Around 40% leaving for Tokyo Disneyland (which was on the way) and the other 60% for the AKB48 event, like us. I've been to the Makuhari area before last time I was in Japan (but not for events); nevertheless, most of the crowd was heading into the direction of Makuhari Messe.

Already, the exhibition center was starting to become packed with people, young and old, both genders, kids, families and elderly alike. Casual fans and hardcore wota gathering in the same place. The total event space was large, of course, but getting from one end of the hall to the other wasn't too much of a walk. Lanes and other areas were clearly marked, and there were plenty of information signs and projector overheads littered everywhere to make sure you were updated with any lane or member changes.

On the screens hung around the event space, apart from displaying information and lane/member change updates, they looped Eien Pressure, Tenohira ga Kataru Koto and the forthcoming NO NAME single MVs. So much, that it's nearly pressuring me to buy the latter. They also aired a few promo clips from various media on sale in the shop (e.g. SKE48 Harucon 2012 concert, AKB48 Minogashita 2, etc.).

Enough about the surrounds. Let's get down to business meeting members. Today, I had 16 members planned that I had already applied for (and won) to meet. I'll summarise what happened for each one:

For each member, I introduced myself as having come from Australia. The numerical rating reflects the degree of reaction to that. (Rating from 1-5 in 0.5 increments - from total apathy (1) to overexcited ecstasy (5), with (3) being just normal surprise). I'll add a few more comments as well. Unless otherwise specified, I attempted to speak in (my broken) Japanese, which may/may not have influenced the reactions.

Rina Hirata (9am). AKB48 Kenkyuusei. Tickets = 2.
Reaction rating: 3.5.
As I purposely intended this to be my so-called "warmup handshake", the entire conversation was in English. She liked my accent apparently, to quote her (then again, my friend who went for her immediately after mine told me she said exactly the same thing). Also commented on her great performance on Tuesday, to which she seemed grateful. Asked her how she found Japan so far. She found life a bit difficult to adjust at first but she's doing fine now.
One thing I found funny - the ushers spoke in English. Absolutely did not expect a "time's up!" in completely understandable English from the ushers.

Miyu Omori (9am). AKB48 Kenkyuusei. Tickets = 1.
Reaction rating: 3.5.
First thing that struck me about her: cute, fairly large, ribbon filled with what appeared to be different coloured balls. A sweet, fairly friendly girl to talk to, and fairly surprised to see someone from overseas come to her lane. Also complimented on her performance on Tuesday; she acknowledged the gratitude given.

Mayu Watanabe (9am). AKB48 Team A. Tickets = 1.
Reaction rating: 2.
Ah, Mayuyu, my current AKB48 oshimen (and overall ex-). This has been a long time coming, and I really wanted to meet her once in my fandom life. When I saw her, she really was that cute girl who has grown up and, looking pretty in pink, refined as she matured. Very soft hands, too. Didn't quite notice the fuss where people online thought she cut her hair - appeared normal to me. Unfortunately, she's also notable for having not much reaction during handshakes (although not to the same infamous levels as Paruru), unless you like anime or Takarazuka. And even then, trying the latter, it wasn't really that enough to make her more excitable, although that was me partly stuffing my lines up. Still a nice experience overall - I mean, it is Mayuyu after all, and I did expect such a (lack of) reaction beforehand. Just expect her to be a bit of a quiet person, but you should already know that she isn't the most sociable of members.

Yuka Tano (10:30am). AKB48 Team A. Tickets = 1.
Reaction rating: 3.
I heard she was pretty amiable so I went for a ticket. First impressions were of a fairly short girl in a white jumper top with a blue-reddish looking skirt. In any case, she definitely was amiable and in fairly high spirits when I talked to her. Commented on her going to Singapore's Tokyo Auto Salon (in a few days), to which she seemed pretty happy about.

Minami Minegishi (10:30am). AKB48 Kenkyuusei. Tickets = 1.
Reaction rating: 3.5.
I thought this was going to turn out awkward. Actually, despite me completely stumbling on what I was going to say later regarding no3b (and then getting ushered out because time was up) - for some reason, it couldn't come out properly (but at least Miichan kindly apologised; for what I don't know) - it turned out better than expected. Now about the wig: it was twin tailed, braided today and slightly dark brown, with a blue baseball cap placed over it. When I told her I came from Australia, the first thing she said? (quote) "Ooh! Koala!" That made me giggle with glee inside. Glad she's still alive and doing well in Kenkyuusei though.

Akari Suda (12pm & 2pm). SKE48 Team S. Tickets = 5 (divided into 3 & 2 respectively).
Reaction rating: 4.
If you've been following me on Twitter or elsewhere during the day, you'll know exactly what happened and what I'm going to say about this. It's hard to describe love in words. I mean, I could throw a dozen different adjectives out there, but you'd get the point anyway.
Put it simply, it was the best moment of the entire handshake event, let alone my whole life as a fan. Immediately before it was my turn, I had my first real look at her in person, my heart racing out of nervousness at a pace like never before. She's every bit as cute and pretty as I've seen and heard her in countless media - today she was wearing twin tails, a white top with art prints and a pretty looking pink gingham skirt - and those handshake reports I've read I can truly attest to in person. "Legendary" springs to mind. Except I got a bit more than that...

Before I flew overseas, I wrote her a fan letter and sent her a small gift (a koala - or was it a kangaroo, my memory fails me - keychain), not knowing whether she'd receive it or how she'll react to what I wrote. As soon as I told her I was from Australia, to my complete surprise and awe, she got all excited, as if a lightbulb just lit up in her head, and told me she's read my letter and got my gift. I didn't even need to ask her about that. That moment was the happiest I've ever was, not even just as a fan, and "happiest" didn't even come close to how I was feeling at the moment. Then she proceeded to comment and compliment on how good my Japanese handwriting was. (Actually, that was my first time writing in Japanese and if you've ever seen how I write Chinese, it's pretty horrid... in my opinion. Still, it was nice to get a personal compliment. Even better if it's straight from your oshimen's mouth.). Hand grip was pretty firm, even until the end of my first 30 seconds with her. Left me slightly shaken at what just happened, out of incredible happiness, as if it was all just a dream. Except it was real.

I later went back to see her again in the afternoon. This time, it was a simpler affair. The cute thing was, I asked her to (well, figuratively speaking, but you all should know what it means) "fish me". Except my Japanese didn't quite come out right (this happened similarly during the noon slot earlier). Fortunately, she was kind enough to help me correct my Japanese, trying to see what I was getting at. I got a cute little wink, and she grinned and smiled. That was mainly all (I was a little starstruck and lost for words - I only managed a "kawaii"), and again, she sent me off, firm grip notwithstanding and popping her head around the partitions.

And is there any wonder why she is my oshimen? Hands down, I was not at all disappointed. In fact, the entire affair exceeded my (admittedly fairly high) expectations. Excuse the cliche and cheesiness, but it was like falling in love all over again. To be quite honest, today wasn't so much about her fishing (in fact, I didn't notice a lot of it), but it was her warm heartedness that won me over completely (again).

Momoka Kinoshita (4pm). NMB48 Team M. Tickets = 1.
Reaction rating: 3.
Whilst nearly everyone else stood up to shake hands, Momoka, being the short-haired boss-like member that she is, and wearing a seifuku, sat down after her rest break, with a "I'm ready for these handshakes. Bring it on" body language. Given that she hadn't applied yet at the time, I asked her whether she was indeed going to apply for the forthcoming AKB48 elections. To which she said she was undecided. (For reference, she did comment on this in her most recent Google+ post during the day). Unlike previous reports, I wouldn't call her "crazy loud", but "gangster-like" comes close.

Airi Furukawa (4pm). SKE48 Team KII. Tickets = 1.
Reaction rating: 3.5.
We were informed via her Google+ that she was going to wear a short-haired wig. She did, but she also explicitly said "it wasn't danso", so that option was taken out. Decked out in a black Rolling Stones tee, she's a pretty chill and rather friendly person to talk to even though her with the wig on looked, well, a little funny. You can definitely feel the otaku vibes from her. Most of my conversation revolved around her more recent blog posts, and she looked surprised that even someone from overseas would keep up with her (sometimes wacky) Google+ and blog posts. Left a positive impression on me and I wouldn't have minded going for more in the future.

Yuria Kizaki (4pm). SKE48 Team S. Tickets = 1.
Reaction rating: 3.5.
Surprisingly good. I was informed of a slightly "salty" (see Paruru for reference) reaction beforehand, but I didn't see that at all from her today. Went for the casual look with a grey art-print tee and short shorts. Fairly lively girl. I asked her about how her (infamous) times tables were going. Told me she was working on them and was pretty confident about it, even going so far as to give me an "OK!" sign. Overall, I liked that handshake with Yuria Peace.

Mayu Ogasawara (4pm, rescheduled). NMB48 Team N. Tickets = 1.
Reaction rating: N/A (I'll cut her some slack).
I originally was supposed to have her for the 2pm slot. Unfortunately, we were informed she didn't feel too well so her 2pm slot was cancelled, leaving us to go to her 4pm (and onwards) slots instead (assuming she felt alright to continue) which, unsurprisingly, turned out to be packed. Unsurprisingly, she looked a bit pale and frail when I met her, not saying too much but still trying to be friendly. Hope she gets better soon.

Aoi Motomura (5:30pm). HKT48 Team H. Tickets = 1.
Reaction rating: 3.5.
Because of the Maachun incident (see above), I had no time to take a rest break and went straight for my group of HKT48 handshakes. Fortunately, Aoitan was better than expected. Pretty small (although that could be said for half of the HKT48 girls anyway) but also fairly cute. I didn't know what to say to her, so I just asked her to do her catchphrase. Which, for lack of words, was also cute.

Anna Murashige (5:30pm). HKT48 Team H. Tickets = 1.
Reaction rating: 3.
Minor funny thing happened before my handshake. Aoitan played around with Aanya as she was free (and there were no partitions nor curtains - more on that later) with no handshakes at the moment. Actually, Aanya was less crazy and loud than I thought. Today, she was wearing glasses. Unfortunately, I had a bit of a mental blank so I didn't exactly know what to say to her. I just fell back to complimenting on their Suki! Suki! Skip! release performance. Fortunately, she was pretty grateful about it.

Sakura Miyawaki (cancelled). HKT48 Team H. Tickets = 1.
Yes, her lane slot (my one) was cancelled, again due to her not feeling well. Unlike Maachun earlier, however, administration wouldn't let us transfer to her final evening slot for the day. Which meant I missed out on handshaking with her. Oh well, I do have a two-shot event next week with her anyway. Also gave me a much needed dinner and rest break. Especially for my legs, which were crying out for a rest.

Rie Kitahara (7pm). AKB48 Team K / SKE48 Team S. Tickets = 1.
Reaction rating: 3.
Pretty simple handshake. One fashion highlight was her fairly large necklace accessory. Put a fair bit amount of makeup too. Otherwise, all I did (apart from the intros) was comment on her future drama TV series and that summed it up. Good to see Kitarie though, which was my main aim anyway.

Akane Takayanagi (7pm). SKE48 Team KII. Tickets = 2.
Reaction rating: 2.5.
Churi sure has a strange fashion sense, wearing a super bright fluoro yellow ribbon and corresponding fluoro and black PJ set. Hard not to miss her amongst the sea of white, beige and black (i.e. the other SKE48 members near her lane). What I didn't quite expect was the slightly short and direct answers, leaving me a bit abruptly confused as to what to say next. Don't think either my poor Japanese, nor the time (evenings are when they start to get tired) helped. Not even a topic about her birds stroke her feathers, so to speak, although at least she said they were in good spirits. Whilst I wouldn't go so far as to say "I was disappointed", for two tickets it was a tad surprising to be honest.

Yuki Kashiwagi (8:30pm). AKB48 Team B. Tickets = 1.
Reaction rating: 3.5.
First impression of this popular senbatsu member? "Man, she really has a big nose...". I was a bit surprised to find out how fast my time went, as it definitely felt less than the usual 10 seconds. Perhaps a combination of her popularity (leading to lengthy queues implying faster turnover) and the time (final slot, which was already delayed by a bit). Which meant I only had time to intro myself. Fortunately, Yukirin appeared to still be rather lively, despite the late hours, even managing to squeeze in a compliment about my Japanese skills. Despite the time hitch, it was still a nice handshake with Yukirin, and I was quite satisfied with it.

That was all for the members I applied to meet. But because of the nature of how the lanes and overall event were structured, I also got a glimpse of other members. Some notable highlights below:

• The list of members I got to see: Karen Iwata, Marina Kobayashi, Ryoka Oshima (tiny!), Yuka Nakanishi (ikemen-looking as usual), Masana Oya, Jurina Matsui, Rena Matsui (complete with her recently cut hair), Kanon Kimoto (too much makeup!), Manatsu Mukaida, Yuko Oshima, Yui Yokoyama, some NMB48 girls, some HKT48 girls (more on those latter two below later), Haruna Kojima (tall), Nao Furuhata (I got to witness the famous Nao handshake jump, even from afar!), Kaori Matsumura, Rina Matsumoto, Miki Yakata, Suzuran Yamauchi, Mina Oba and Ayaka Umeda.
• They were trialling removing partitions and privacy curtains normally in place for members, but these were mainly for less popular members - for example, most of the NMB48 Team M/BII, AKB48/SKE48 Kenkyuusei and HKT48 (bar Sakura and Sasshi) occupied these trial lanes. Made for some interesting scenes and interactions between members:

1. Karen doing I don't even know what she's doing flailing her arms and flirting with Marinchan in the next lane.
2. HKT48 girls were hilarious. Apart from the aforementioned Aoitan and Aanya, you could also see glimpses where Cinnamon hugging Mio. As I was lining up for Aanya, Aoitan waved at us too when she was free. Moreover, the guy lining behind me was trying to grab Cinnamon's attention, which he did but the interactions were more of Cinnamon trying to play around with him. Also saw Natsu, Haruppi, Nao (wearing maid cosplay) and Meru.

• Speaking of HKT48, if Aanya was a tad docile than her usual self, Chori seemed to have replaced her role. Loud throughout, and decisively hilarious - you could hear her "arigatou"s from far away in another lane. The best instance was when these five foreigners sporting tuxedos came into her lane.
  
  Laughter in our lane ensued as we watched what all the fuss was about.
• From the live reports I've heard, someone had 100 tickets for Jurina and used them all at once. When this happened, her lane suddenly became a little empty with people starting to even sit down whilst waiting, the privacy curtain closed and the staff clearly not bothering to rigorously keep track of time second-by-second. They even had to extend her lane's closing time for that slot because of this.
• Yuko sure knows how to create a good handshake environment. Saw some smoke wafting out of her little partitioned area. Turns out it was air freshener and perfume.
• The NMB48 girls (Shuu, Haru, Airi, Shimarena) were playing with the clothes trolley, and riding on it on the way to their following time slots. Shuu really is small.
• Near the beginning of the final evening time slot, Takamina came out of her lane and, along with the background crowd (mainly of Takamina fans and her birthday committee), Yuasa and Togasaki took photos of her posing with them. Everyone was then congratulating her for her birthday the next day.

If you didn't already guess by now, today's event was easily one of the highlights of my entire trip to Japan. Not only was it an eye-opening and amazing experience but it was also, personally, a learning and humbling one. So many different types of people congregated into this one giant hall for the sole purpose of meeting and greeting the girls, and with varying levels of dedication. From a foreigner's point of view, it was great seeing the Japanese wota in action. Heck, judging by the number of times I kept fumbling my lines in (broken) Japanese, they already have a massive head start anyway by way of language skills.

And of course, the girls themselves. Every one of them was great, however sugary or salty, warm or cold, they may have been towards me. Members that I was familiar with on screen and in print for so long; now, they're just (literally) right there in front and around me in person - from senbatsu to kenkyuusei. Idols, then, you can truly meet. Even if you don't actually get to handshake with some of them, you may even see glimpses of them in action, or off-duty and just being themselves.

Sad thing is, for me, this may have been the only chance I got to meet and see them in person, at least not for a long time. It's not often I get the opportunity to have this much time to travel overseas (or even just to Japan). I will definitely treasure this day as making my personal fandom life even more complete and real. More than just idols I follow through a screen, but girls that I have actually met and talked to.

Finally, who did I choose as the "MVP" for the day? I think you all know the answer to that question...

 

HKT48 2-shot Photo Event @ Marine Messe, Fukuoka - 14th April 2013

(spoilered for length)

Spoiler

(if you want to see what the actual pictures turned out to be like, go check either my Twitter feed or, if you know me personally enough, my Facebook - I'm not publicly putting out my face here on this forum for privacy reasons...)

Today was actually my first time attending a 2-shot event, HKT48 or otherwise, so I was pretty excited.

Unfortunately, the morning started off with a little hitch that threatened my entire day. Just like the AKB48 handshake events, you pass through an ID check for each member's lane before taking a photo with that member. One difference, however, is with the ID check requirements. There is no receipt that you need to bring along (in fact, you're not even given a receipt in the delivery mail), so it is just your photo ID (again, my passport) and the tickets. This time, though, the tickets have your delivery address printed on it. And it was this little detail that caused problems.

When I went to line up for my first member in the morning, surprisingly, the security staff was questioning my ID and would not let me through. The issue was that they were put off and confused as to why I have a Japanese delivery address when I showed them an Australian passport. At first, I tried the "well, the AKB48 handshake event was fine with regards to ID so why not this? (after all, the same company, Chara-Ani, organises both events)" argument but they didn't buy it. So they told me to go to the main Chara-Ani support booth off to the side of the venue. When I got there though and asked the staff at Chara-Ani what the issue was with my ID, they checked it out and said it was fine. No issues whatsoever, so I went back to the lane and told the staff that Chara-Ani checked it and was okay with my ID. In the end, I managed to get through and back into the queue, lining up for my first member. To avoid any further issues that day, I later went back to the booth after my first member and got my tickets formally validated (stamped) and explicitly approved by Chara-Ani. In fact, a few other overseas fans (judging by how recognisably familiar their language to me was, Hong Kong fans to be exact) also had similar issues that day.

There actually was no real issue; like the AKB48 handshake events, Chara-Ani only technically requires the photo ID holder to match the name on the ticket. The address itself is not really necessary for validation (unless you somehow did not bring a photo ID - which should not apply for most foreigners going to these events anyway). Having a quick peek at the security staff's ID check guide though, for some odd reason, they highlighted the ticket's address as requiring validation (when Chara-Ani does not really specify this as a necessary requirement on their website, for any handshake/2-shot event). The only conclusion left is that the staff were less experienced than the ones at the AKB48 event.

That theme continued throughout the rest of the day. You notice this difference through various elements: their attire (suits and business dresses for the security attendants, green and black overcoats for the rest of the organisation staff at AKB48; casual, young hires wearing nothing but a black vest for HKT48) and, according to various members' Google+ posts after the event, inconsistent application of the rules. Some lanes were a little lax with regards to what poses one could make with the member, others were stricter (for example, no touching). Needless to say, the entire organisation and professionalism of the security staff that day was left somewhat wanting. Probably attested to the difference between AKB48 holding larger events for a longer period of time, and HKT48 having only just started holding these sorts of events.

One thing that they did provide during the event that was not only popularly visited, but also incredibly necessary, was a free phone charging booth. Which essentially consisted of a bunch of tables with lots of power ports attached to them. The area got fairly crowded, but most people just left their phones there to charge while heading off somewhere else.

The process, like normal handshake events, was simple. You line up, pass the ID check and, ensuring your phone is in camera mode, hand it to the staff. Whilst in the lane booth, you get a fairly short handshake and conversation with the member while you (or both) pick a pose (restrictions on poses notwithstanding) and the staff takes a photo. Afterwards, you check whether the photo is okay (i.e. not blurred) and if it is, you're escorted out.

So what about the members themselves? Today, I was to take photos with six members. Short comments as follows:

Chiyori Nakanishi. Team H. 9am.
Being the comedian and variety stalwart that she is, she was loud, lively and fairly eccentric. Given that this was Chori, I asked her to do her (infamous) Yosui Inoue gag pose, which she did. (As for me, I just did some horribly silly face...). In terms of comedic value, definitely one of my more unique photos of the day.

Haruka Kodama. Team H. 10:30am.
Haruppi seemed a little reserved today, but still nice and obliging enough. Picked a more cutesy (and generic) love heart pose. For some strange reason though, when I checked the photo, she didn't look too impressed. Oh well.

Haruka Wakatabe. Team H. 2pm.
The surprise of the day. When I went into the booth, as soon as I told her (as I did for the other members that day) I was from Australia, she seemed a lot more surprised and genuinely curious. Attempted to start a fairly meaningful conversation too, but I was feeling a bit worried that the impatient staff might begin to snap (in fact, I really wanted to talk a bit more with her). Someone on Twitter asked me to do a funny pose with her (Dragon Ball's Fusion Dance, to be specific). To be quite honest, I was thinking whether Wakaharu would even know about it but as soon as I showed her how to pose, she seemed happily accepting enough. Thus resulted in a quirky, yet unique (and definitely fun) photo.

Yuki Shimono. Team H. 3:30pm.
Cinnamon was certainly nice, welcoming, happy and cute enough. Tried an even more cutesy (and girly) pose with her. Needless to say, she looked cute but as for me, well... try imagining guys acting girly and you get the idea.

Anna Murashige. Team H. 5:30pm.
Aanya was in her usual self - that is, not her loud, crazy self (refer to my handshake event post above and you get the idea). Still very active and welcoming though. When asked for a pose, I just did what the majority of people would have chosen: her mentaiko gag pose. Except mine turned out to be a little crooked. Must be the angled arms.

Sakura Miyawaki. Team H. 5:30pm.
Missed out on her last Sunday, so it was great that I finally got to meet her today. Expressed a bit more surprise that I came from Australia (relative to other members) and she was fairly lively otherwise. Also awfully came rather close to me when it came to take the photo, the staff not caring too much about it either. Another thing to note: her handshake was rather firm and tight. Pretty great experience with Sakura.

I also managed to line up for the manager's (Mitsuru Ozaki) booth and, after introducing myself and saying a few words, got a photo with him. Good to have a picture with the general/theatre manager for completeness' sake.

Did I enjoy the day today? Aside from that morning's scare, I definitely enjoyed it. Two-shot events are rare in this day and age in this fandom (if I could have gone to the 1830m photo event and got a photo with Akarin, I would've been over the moon for example), so this was something quite special. Still, even if it was just HKT48, it was another memorable fandom event nevertheless. Certainly, photos are something you can physically "take home" with you to reminisce over, too.

 

Ex-AKB Kenkyuusei Sano Yuriko's New Group
Lovely Doll Weekly Theater Show
April 30, 2013
Sofmap 1 Idol Event Space


Note: for those who don't know yuririn, you can find her thread here, or just google 佐野友里子


pre-show adventures

before i left for akihabara last april 30, i decided to check online if any of the ex-akb members have any events scheduled in akihabara. i checked chiru, kaorin, erepyon, etc and it seems i didn't have any luck at all. i decided to then check yuririn's group to see if they had a show, and to my surprise they were doing a kind of weekly live event which luckily falls on that day for the week. took note of the time and rushed to akihabara to get my long overdue quality time in the holy land of otakus.

at around 4:00pm i decided to go and check if i could buy tickets to the event. the 7th floor was closed so i asked staff members at the 6th floor if they could help me get some tickets. staff members told me that i should ask those at the 2nd floor since those at the 6th floor only organize events for their own floor - a.k.a. paid gravure shoots. headed straight to the 2nd floor and asked a staff member behind the counter if i could still buy tickets, and he said that i can still do so after showing me that i will be getting ticket #129. i asked him how much, and when he said 1000 yen i took out my wallet without any hesitation and paid for the ticket.

and then was the surprise part. i got a ticket, then a kind of event stub, and then a reservation slip . it turns out, the 1000 yen i paid for was not for a ticket, but for a reservation of the upcoming new single of the group, and when you reserve for a copy you can automatically join the live event. this was when i was really thankful that i could already read a decent number of kanjis and know a good amount of idol terms. i noticed that it was written on the slip that if i had 1 stub, i could shake the hands of all the members. 2 stubs would get me a polaroid shot with 1 member, and 3 stubs would get me a pic with ALL the members of the group. i quickly told the staff member to get me another copy since i wanted the 2shot, and he promptly obliged. suddenly, i was no longer only seeing the girls perform on stage, now i was going to take a picture with yuririn!!

since i had enough time before i the start of the event, i strolled around akihabara for about an hour and returned to the building. i remembered that i wanted to buy their 2nd single since that was the single that informed me that yuririn was still in the idol business, and relieved me of so much fear that she might go to the same path as eririn. after all, those 2 girls were practically a combo back then. when i bought the 2nd single of the group, the staff told me that the 2nd single did not come with any ticket for the live event, and i told him it was okay since i already have one. but to my surprise, he called my attention a minute later and gave me another stub . WTF?!?! 3 stubs!!! now i was going to take a pic with ALL the members of the group! hahaha. i was sooooo not prepared for this.


pre-show and show review

entrance to the event hall, which was actually located 1 floor higher and can only be accessed by a special elevator, was done in groups of 10. bags were not allowed unless you were willing to have your bag thoroughly inspected by staff members. coin lockers were set to "free" mode so people who wanted to use them can to do so without hesitation (free = pay the amount of 100 yen or 500 yen, and when you get back your bag afterwards, the coin you put in gets returned also).

now the live event itself was pretty much the same as the idol events i have gone to in the past, way before akb existed. fans knew everybody, people had set positions on where to dance and where to cheer, there were designated cheer "leaders" and even encore leaders. the performance itself was awesome, and each member had ample time to shine on stage.

first thing i noticed about yuririn was how much she had grown . she was no longer the frail, skinny girl that i knew before. she has matured a lot, and it pretty much showed on her curves and overall appearance. as expected, when my favorite song (the only song i know actually) played, yuririn just owned the song with insane sways and just plain being sexy on stage... pretty much her strong point ever since her akb days. although in the cuteness factor i could say she could easily be beaten by the youngest member of the group, and dance moves and stage presence she will definitely lose to the leader of the group, that sexiness factor in yuririn that i had known and liked about her was definitely still there.

and as expected, they had enough songs to last an hour of performance inclusive of encore. at the end of the performance their manager suddenly announces his "graduation" as manager of the group . lol. and after around 10 to 15 minutes of preparation, they started with the remaining events - handshake and 2shots. the order of things was everyone who wanted to shake hands with the members would go first, then people who wanted to take pictures with the entire team, then lastly those who wanted individual 2shots. the system went smooth, and there was no trouble whatsoever.

now another thing i noticed was during the pic with the entire team, you could choose a girl to be beside you in the pic, or the manager if you wanted XD. i was expecting only a few people to pick yuririn to be beside them in the team picture since she only joined around october last year if i remember correctly (please correct me if i'm wrong). turns out, out of all those who took pictures with the entire team, only 2 chose girls aside from yuririn... and that was pretty much a big "ouch" to the older members. not so sure how the other girls were dealing with what was happening, but i'm pretty sure its not all good even if everyone was smiling the whole time. when my turn came, i asked for yuririn, and she immediately told me "heart pose?" to which i guess i couldn't say no anymore.

there was no talk time during the picture taking, but after the images started appearing on the polaroid pics we were holding it was time for yuririn (or the member you want) to sign them. this was when the talk time was insane. i'd say about around a good minute since she was signing the whole thing, asking our name, and kind of decorating it a bit. i seriously had NOTHING to say to her, so the conversation ended up this way:

(everything was in japanese btw)

me: glad to finally meet you (note: didn't go with "hisashiburi" as i didn't want to bring up akb)
yuririn: really? thank you very much
me: i'm actually not from around here.

* and miscommunication happened. i think it was how i said it that made her interpret it as "i just came from overseas" *

yuririn: really? you just came from overseas? where from?
me: ummmm... (long pause. and after finally giving up trying to correct stuff)... i'm from <insert country>.
yuririn: wow! its my first time to meet someone from overseas. you can actually follow our group from there?
me: ofcourse. and its been a while since i wanted to attend an event
yuririn: and since its golden week you came here? thank you so much.
me: as expected, the event was awesome.

* finishes signing and stuff *

yuririn: please see us again okay?
me: when i get the chance again, i will definitely attend another live event.
yuririn: (while shaking my hands) thank you so much. take care in going back to your country.

me: ummmm... (rofl). okay. XD

and that was it. i left the place after a few more minutes of staring at the girls taking pics and signing stuff on stage.


picture with the team

and now the pic:




conclusion

never thought my last vacation day would turn out really well. at least i have a really good memory of this little trip back to tokyo of mine. i just really wish they had more live events.. like here in osaka maybe?

 

2 Weeks ago and a week ago I went to an AKB48 concert and a HKT48 handshake, but I've been a bit busy these 2 weeks (and this week )to write about it, so for now I want to tell everyone my "surprise" AKB-related experience.

5/7- Meiji Chocolate ice cream press conference release, guest- Kintaro

So, on Wednesday I was going back from school, but suddenly I decided to stop for a haircut at Shinjuku. The hair salon is located near the East side, so I went there and suddenly I realized there was a stage with a lot of cameras, but I was quite in a hurry so I didn't put a lot of attention. I was kind of thinking "What if an AKB member showed up?", so after I got my haircut I went to see again... surprise... I recognized the uniform, but it wasn't an AKB member, it was Kintaro! I was so excited, literally, I saw her 5 meters away from me. I was kind of bummed they didn't let me to take pictures, but I had free ice cream (if anyone comes to Japan, try the new Meiji chocolate ice cream, it is really good) [rock]. There wasn't a lot of people, so I had quite a good view. It was quite short, but Kintaro imitated Acchan while promoting meiji, you know... her imitation to Acchan's sousenkyo speech, but changing the words. It was a pleasant surprise