Okay, it's been a while, but I'll try to be thourough nevertheless. This means that you're in for a frikin book today. Let's begin!
First off, I'm gonna say that today's post will be about atmosphere. There are two, maybe three instances of atmosphere that I want to talk about in particular, and I'll put those at the end. In the meantime, everything else.
Firstly, on the familly front, this past approximate month, I've seen some scuffles between me and my host father, Phillippe. A couple times, he accused me of thinking only of myself and speaking a high-falutin French that alienated people because it gave off the impression that I have a fat head. This really put me into a funk for like a day or two, but I was able to pull myself out it due partially to a conversatoin I had with Mrs. Claude Parietti, with whom I spent some time the day she went with me to get my CIRE, my extended visa. That's right, folks; I'm official now. It took like a couple months, and I'm pretty sure I was in the country illegally for like a week or two, but I finally got my lisence to live here in Belgium for a year. To give you an idea of how small Petis-Avin, the third twon I'll be living in, is, know that my reception of my CIRE was delayed because town's police officer, who had to make a house call to affirm its legitimacy, was on vacation. It's WAAAAAY out there. But I don't have to contend with that just yet. We'll see later. But, really, I can understand where Phillippe was coming from; I'm a bit more introverted than, I think, most Belgians, so it's their world that has to answer to mine, not the other way around. Because I know where I'm coming from and I can actually take care of myself reasonably well on an intellectuo-cultural level, that was construed as being hermetic and selfish. He was right, in a way; it's true that I was abit confused for a long time because the idea of "adaptation" is rather foreign to me. It's a comcept that I just didn't adhere to in the US. I always put having my own identity first: I saw many people who determined their own identities by the people they hung around, and I didn't like what I saw. These are people who don't really know who they are, so they ask other people adn get their answer there. I think that that is a terrible idea because it means that you yourself are not a complete person. I rejected this idea and forged my own path. Here, I was just at a loss as to what to do in terms of adaptation because I already had such a firm idea of who I was that I was afraid to just scrap it and start agian, as it seemed to me I would have to do. I've since realized that trying to do that would be a very bad idea more or less for reasons I've already elaborated: I already know who I am. I simply have no need of Belgians telling me who I have to be. Basically, I just forgot how awesome I am (the word "awesome," by the way, has no decent translaiton into French). But, now that I've figured it out again, things are going much smoother all around. I've earned Philippe's acceptance, too. When I offered to pick up some dishes and a small soiree here at the house, he seemed convinced that I was an alright guy after all. Bottom line: everything is cool (especailly me, heh heh). I should also put my thanks out to this guy from the Rotary. I went to my monthly meeting in October, and the Rotarian who gave my a ride told me to bring my trumpet and play a bit for the Rotary. That's what I did. I tried playing Characteristic Study 13 from the Arbans Book, but that wasn't practised up enough and I jsut wasn't practised enough, so that didn't work. So, I reverted to my sure-fire plan: "I Can't get Started." That was a big enough hit. so this guy whose name I don't remember and probably never knew came up to me after the meeting and said to me, "You know, you're someone really extrordinary." He seemed to think that my playing had a lot of soul. Of course, everyone loves flattery, so I listened to him, and basically he just decried the sorry state of Belgian youth today. He theorized that in Belgium, there's a lot of pressure to be average, so if a student is really interested or talented, he might hide it to be more palatable. He estimates that, twenty or so years ago, in a class of twenty university students, you might have five bad ones. But today, in a class of twenty, you might have five or eight good ones. He thinks that everybody just stuffs his head into an ipod or whatnot, fools around on the internet all day, and don't really care. I have to admit, I have not seen any true Nerds here. Nobody seems to like School. By School, I mean the courses and the course material. I don't see anybody who's really interested in math or science or even literature or like ANYTHING. In every single one of my calsses, I can't tell that there are any students who are really engaged in the material. This is a far cry from my central experience, surrounded by Russell Jonses and Michael Gondas. It's also true that this may be due in part to the lack of extra-curriculars. People are less involved in their school in general, so the courses are less interesting as a result. But that seems like a bit of a stretch. But it is true. When I described the extent of American Extra-Curriculars to a classmate of mine, he said, "It sounds like students in the Unides States are really involved in their school. Here, it's just something you do on the weekdays." That seems to be the case. School is, in fact, going slowly. Slower and slower, it seems. Especially math. It just sucks. I understand the material like four times faster than the rest of my peers. I make this statement based on observation. When I understand something, my classmates are still telling the teacher they don't understand. Sometimes, it seems like they don't understand even when there's nothing not to understand! It's not that great. It's pretty bad, actually. So talking with this Rotary guy really helped me out. He let me know that yes, I am still awesome, even if I'm in Belgium where everybody's different. Thank you, Rotary guy. I hope I learn and remember your name.
Now for the atmosphere. Let's get the least pleasant thing out of the way first. My school took a trip to Malines and Breendonk, which were a Nazi deportation camp and "welcome camp," respectively. Breendonk wasn't that big, but it was so vicious, it got ranked worse than some concentration camps post-war. It was a camp for political prisoners and other dissidents, not really an extermination camp or concentration camp.But, the treatment was really bad. The camp was run principally by two Flemish SS with a vendetta against society because they were guys that never went to school and were kind of looked down on by everybody. Naturally, when the Nazis come along and say, "You are now part of the highest elite there is," they snap up the oppourtunity and lay it on thick to the others now under their control. I'm glad to have gone there--There's no Breendonk in the US--even though it's not the most pleasant thing I'll have done in Belgium. As the tour continued on, it occured to me that when you go into some thing thing Breendonk, you better pick your thoughts carefully, because in the end you won't be able to hold on to very many.
Next order of business! I went to see a small, free Opera concert in Liege. It was a "get the public interested in Opera" publicly sponsired event, so I figured I'd check it out. It's only a twenty-minute train ride away. What I didn't know was that it was a 45-minute/1 hour walk from the train station to the Opera house. So the walking took a bit longer than I bargained for, but it was really nice out and I like the city, so it was actually really great. That's the atmosphere in this case: the atmosphere of Liege. First of all, the big cities in Belgium don't feel to me like big cities. There's a lot of activity and animation, but the city doesn't feel like it's imposing itself on me like it did for New York or Chicago sometimes or even Paris. When I walk around the city, I feel really free and light. One major difference is that the buildings in Belgium arent as tall as the buildings in the US. That gives me less of a feeling that the sky is weighing down on me. Also, in Leige, there are lots of paintings on the walls, and I love that. There's a lot of Graffiti, true (and honestly, I love it. It's great), but also there are murals and some stores that have painings on their facades or the barrieres that they pull down after closing time. There's also this one really great mural that I'm gonna have to try to bag some pictures of the next time I'm in the vicinity. The Opera itself was okay. I'm not a big fan of Opera; the style feels a bit agressive to me. That vibrato starts to wear on you after not too long. Still, there was some good music (they sang some American show tune, I don't remember which, as a finale). Walking back was an absolute pleasure. The word "brisk" doesn't translate, and it's a shame. That dayu was just so pleasant. Like many big towns, Liege has a river running through it, and my path took me right over and alongside it. That was great. Just walking along the Meuse in Liege and a day so great as that one was. Ahhhhhh....Magnificent.
Next! Boy, we're getting to the good ones. On the 25th on October, I went to an Otaku Convention in Liege. FAN FREAKING TASTIC! That thing really got my Otaku Juices flowing. It started for me, really, at the Station here at Huy, where ther ewas a girl with cosplay-like clothes and Cat Ears (yes, Nekomimi if you want it that way). I had my Google map, but I figured that my surest way to the convention would be to follow the Cosplay chick, so I did. I was wrong. She took a huge detour because she had to drop off a suitcase at a friend's house. But oh well, we got to talking and we made it there eventually. That was when the real fun began. The convention took place on two floors. The first floor was labeled "Traditional Japanese Culture," and had Oragami, a Martial Arts mat, Shogi and Go stations, Bonsai and Ikebana, and surely some stuff I'm forgetting. That was cool. I played a game of Shogi. I like it, but it's crazy. I guess that's one of the reasons I like it. Argh, I even made arrangements with my host mother to lend me her camera, and I FORGOT it! I really regret that. There was this awesome oragami Icarus that was just out of this world. It was Icarus at the pinnacle of his flight, right before he fell, so he had only one wing. It was a real piece of work. It blew me away, that one did. But the real deal was the second floor, which was labled "Contemporary Japanese Culture," which actualyl meant "Otaku Culture." Ah...I feel great just thinking about it. One of the most impressive things I saw there was the huge market they had. They had people selling all types of crazy crap. People were selling swords, cosplay accessories, dolls, posters, DVDs, books, figurines, all types of crazy crap. I think the funniest thing I saw was a poster of Haruhi dressed up like a Santa-Bunny Girl. It was just such a ridiculous conglomeration of moe-types that it made me laugh. I didn't buy it, though it was too expensive. It was like twenty euros. It was a nice cloth roll-down poster, but I didn't have that kind of money to burn. I did end up buying six posters, though. (Regular glossy-paper types: CardCaptor Sakura X 2, Lucky Star X 2, Gode Geass X 1, Haruhi X 1. I would have gotten one of their Shakugan no Shana posters, but they didn't have any good ones. Just Shana in un-Shana-like posistions. Nothing erotic, they just seemed to promote a side of Shana that's not really there. I want a poster of Shana kicking butt like she usually does!) Besides that, I also bought a Tsukasa doll. Let me tell you, this thing is awesome. I don't even know why, but it's just absolutely great to have this Tsukasa doll sitting on my desk. I freakin love this thing. Here is a picture of my winnings for the day. So there was the market. There was also a huge room devoted to video games. Yes, I spent some time in there. they had some old consoles. they had an SNK console there, or it was some insides of an SNK arcade cabinet, or something, on which I played some competitive Puzzle Bobble. I won some, I lost some. I lost more than I won, but I won some. They also had a Super Famicom that was playing some Dragonball Z fighting game all in Japanese, a Sega Genesis (Sega Mega Drive here in Europe) playing a Streets of Rage game that I played co-operatively with some kid, and a SEGA MASTER SYSTEM playing some Sonic game. I didn't have the chance to play that one, it was always occupied. I saw some people playing Streets of Rage like it was a fighting game instead of a co-operative beat-'em-up, and that was pretty funny. Friendly fire in beat-'em-ups is always risky. Oh, that's right, they had an NES playing Castlevania. Didn't get on that one. But guess what? THEY HAD A KING OF FIGHTERS XI CABINET! I jumped on that one. Problem was, there wer eno movelists. I was totally lost without the movelists. So that one turned out to be kind of a bust. Too bad. I'll get back to Purdue some day. I also played some Street fighter, but I don't know which Street Fighter it was. There was no Cammy; I think it was either some Street fighter II without Cammy or a "Street Fighter vs." something. I shot some Hadoken, I pulled off some Shoryuken. I never really figured out what the inpust sequence was for the Shoryuken, but I did some anyway. They aslo had a DDR machine, a "DJ Hero" station (complete with turntable controller!), a "Guitar Hero" station and some dance arcade game station. There was some other stuff, too, that I didn't pay attention to. I think they had some Tekken stations, but I really don't care about Tekken. Also on the second floor, there was a screening room where they were showing Anime all day long, a room where various competitions and expositions were held (I saw part of an exposition of the current wave of Japanese Pop Idols, which I didn't care about, and a competion based around opening themes. I didn't recognise any of them, but they weren't from any anime I knew, so I don't really feel bad about that). There were also a few tabletop roleplaying tables set up. Yes, I saw some Runequest books. No, I didn't see any D&D books. The star of the show appeared to be a system called "BESM," or "Big Eyes, Small Mouth," which is a system that seems to be basesd off of anime, but other than that I know nothing of and intend to resaerch. I saw some character templates lying on a table for a Neon Genesis Evangelion campaign setting, which seemed like a really stupid idea. Two-foldedly stupid: It seemed to take place in a post-Evangelion-anime world, which is not very sensical for SPOILER reasons, and also seemed to posit offspring between some of the main characters. This is descending into the realm of Fan-Fiction, which I am against on principle. And in actuallity, too, really. I saved what was probably the most monentous room for me for last: the Cosplay Chamber. I actually spent a couple hours watching the individual and group cosplay events. Probably the stupidest thing to dress up as, not necessarily the worst costume, was the Dark Magician Girl. Come on! I don't know why anyone would want to be the Dark Magician Girl. That was just a bad idea. Her costume was fine, though. The way it went, in the individual event, each person would get introduced by the MC, then come up on stage and do a little routine with music. I think the best costumes I saw were some Saint Seiya stuff that was really elaborate and a Yoshimitsu from Soul Calibur III costume. The only problem with Yoshimitsu is that a couple parts of his costume fell off. But that's okay, really. They weren't any major parts of his costume, but it was noticable. He came up on stage and had this epic music playing while he did some martial-arts lookin things, and then at the end it collapsed into Carmelldansen. There were two acts that collapsed into Carmelldansen; the other one was the Vocaloid act in the group category. Another notable solo cosplay was an Ikki from Air Gear. That was cool because he actaully had roller blades on and skated around the stage. In the group category, the group would just put on a little skit based around their cosplay. That was cool, I guess. There were better and worse. the Yu-gi-oh group kept dropping their cards. Ther ewas a Hellsing group that I thought was really good. But I don't actualyl know Hellsing. At any rate, there was a small "Catwalk" section after that where people would just come up on stage for thirty seconds to show of their cosplay. That was nice and all. Still, it was great. My first first-hand experience with Cosplay. I should also mention the ambient cosplay; just walking around, you'd see peope in Cosplay. That was great, to jsut see these cosplayer walking around, belonging in the crowd. Amazing! I wouldn't want to do a convention like this every day, but definitely again. I jsut loved it. It was awesome.
Hope I didn't bore you. Too bad if I did. Final article! Yesterday, a guy named Serge from the Rotary took me to a Jam session with some people he knew in Liege. Well, first, we went over to his place and played an bit with another kid named Theophile, who was on the alto sax. That was actually not that pleasant. All three of us (Serge on clarinet) would be playing at the same time, but not the same thing. It was really chaos. Occasionally Serge woudl pick up the String Bass sitting in the corner and pluck a few notes, but he doesn't actually know hoe to play bass, so he was just plunking some notes at random, which is not what I'm used to the bass doing. I'm used to Sam Peters, who knows what he's doing. But after that, we went to Liege and played in a small ensemble of two guitars (one acting as piano, the other as a horn), a bass, and drums. We added singers as was necessary (there were three) and trumpet when possible. And sometimes when it wasn't, too. Sometimes I had a lead sheet, sometimes I knew the tune, and sometimes I didn't but I played anyway, guessing. I didn't guess too badly all the time, though. Let me tell you, that was amazing. I felt soo alive after that. I didn't know how much I missed it. We wer ejust at some guy's place, and it was a real hole in the wall, to tell the truth. I took a look around a few times, and I realized that I was in a mythic Jazz setting: we were jsut a bunch af guys gathered together for the love of the music, in some seedy hole in the wall somewhere, there was booz, there were cigarettes, and there was a good time. It was really pretty amazing. The music was pretty good, too. I think that the other guys were professionels. At the very least, this bassist wasn't playing notes at random. I can't describe that atmosphere. It's such a great feeling. I feel alvie again. I got compliments, too. One of the guitarists told me "you play with feeling," and "tu transmets." I can't ask for a greater compiment than that. Knowing that my music connected with somebody, I feel like my music was a success. Oh, man that was great. out of this world.
HEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEwack, Campers! Some stuff has happened since I spoke to you last! First, though, I'm going to tell you about something that happened before I spoke to you last because I forgot to talk about it last time even though I got a specific request to talk about it. This is the proof, I will talk about something if you request it. At any rate, that thing is Halloween! Apparently, Halloween is a relatively new developement here in Belgium. The real deal is All Saints' Day, "Toussaint" in French. I got the first week of November off for Toussaint; it's an annual vacation, like Christmas vacation. I didn't see anybody really celebrating All Saints' Day, though. They just took a holiday. Anyway, things are done a bit differently for Haloween here. first of all, it's more blatantly a children's event here in Belgium. I Trick-Or-Treated every year until last year, I think, so that makes it 9 or 10 yeaers straight, right up until my sixteenth year. My seventeenth, I played a tabletop RPG and went see Hamlet instead. Also, it's organized. I actually participated in Halloween in the capacity of a Scout. The Scouts were called on to be the advance guard of the Trick-Or-Treaters, which were numerous. Maybe thirty to forty children, who were mostly dressed up as various somethings. We, the scouts, who were about six in total and all a few heads higher than the Trick-Or-Treaters, walked in front of the horde carrying Tiki torches, the purpose being to provide the forwardmost extent to which the Trick-Or-Treaters could go. This was the theory; in reality, the kids, all eager for candy, frequently broke ranks and dashed to the participating candy donors, who were all waiting outside of their houses with bags of candy (see also ZOMG ZERG RUSH). Every once in a while there would be some kind of spectacle for all to see; for example, there was a really interesting circus-type act involving what appeared to be two sheets tied to a tree branch; a woman, the principal performer, climbed these sheets and did various acrobatic stunts, akin to what a trapeze artist or a tightrope walker might do, with the intent to thrill the crowd by making them think she was in danger. Suddenly falling and then catching yourself does that type of thing. She was accompanied by a live accordioninst. I have to say, it was pretty cool. Based on the people I talked with, Halloween is about fifteen or sixteen years old here in Belgium and is really just an excuse to throw a neighborhood party. Having the whole block go out Trick-Or-Treating at the same time was kind of wierd for me. It gives off less of a "the spirits are wandering" vibe, and, I suppose, is indicitive of the generally more-collecitve-than-individualistic Belgian culture. Also, peopel kept on trying to get, us, the torch bearers, to walk in a straight line. I was holding a torch, trying to walk in a straight line, and all of everybody was preceded by a car with a speaker on the top of it (think Ecto-1) that was constantly blaring music. Given I had something to hold, a beat, and people to walk in a straight line with: I marched. And it made me sad because it was an absolutely horrible straight line, and I know I can't blame anyone for not knowing how to march because there are no obvious marching bands in Belgium (there aren't really any American football fields, anyway), but it still made me very sad because I know that back in the states we could have managed a much better straight line than the crap-fest we had over here. Ultimately, I just missed the marching band a whole, whole lot. By the way, if anybody knows of any videos of Central's marching show this year that are on the internet anywhere, please drop me a line about them. I know fron Band Camp that Central has a really cool show this year and is capable of marching it well, and I'd rally like to see it if possible. Peace to all the marchers out there. You're doing good work.
But now is the present. Before that, though, the Saturday before last (the seventh), I went to the "Ralley de Condroz," which is a car race. I did that one also as a Scout. The activities included were sitting next to the big podium which served as pit stop (I think) and the cars drove right past for hours on end while having nothing to do and sitting in a building and opening the door for people only if they had ID and turning them away if all they wanted was to use the toilet. All in all, I found the experience unfulfilling, so I didn't go back on Sunday. I think people sat next to the podium because they were waiting for the result dossiers to come in so they could run them over to the building people were sitting in, which served as some sort of general administration outpost for the race's staff. The most interesting thing taht hapened was when I was walking back home with my host sister Emma, who is also a Scout. The thing is, there's this big, well-lit facade that blares out "MIRAGE Salle des Jeux" like all the time, and we walked right past it. I was famillier with this facade; every time I walk past it, I think it's an arcade, but then I always see the neon dice and playing cards, which remind me that it's actually a casino. I remaked upon this to Emma. This eventually got us into a discussion about video games. What I discovered was that Emma's brain is hard-wired to reject video games. It's almost exactly like I imagine somebody thinking of comic books at the height of the "Seduction of the Innocent" phenomenon, which I know has still not entirely dissipated. I happened to have my DS on me with Fire Emblem in the GBA slot. I figured I might at least try to show her a game that wasn't entirely stupid and required thinking. I figured that Fire Emblem was a good place to start because it visibly resembles Chess. So that's where I started: I asked her, "So what do you think of Chess?" She said, "Well, I think it's a game that makes you think." So I said, "Well, look here. The blue troops are mine, and the red troops are my enemy. I have to give my troops orders and make them fight." I gave an order and had some troops fight. Then, she said, "Oh, I don't like it already. It makes me think too much of Video Games." Response: WHAT THE ------- CRAP? She reacted to a video game like to a video of a rape, as though waht it was was an inherently a bad thing and even try to watch it was an unpleasant experience. If this is the kind of ---- video games are up against, there's no confronting it, we jsut have to fight a war of attrition until unthinking disdain for video games dies out of its own accord. All we can do is make games that are just so good that no one can deny their inherent artistic value. In short: we need more Earthbounds and more The World Ends With Yous. Beating Earthbound is still the highest up on my "emotional response to video games" list. And it has a magnificent moral that is delivered so wonderfully! It's not even spelled out like it is in The World Ends With You. The World Ends With You has an exellent story, tells it admirably, has killer gameplay, and uses the procedural rhetoric inherent in Video Games to great effect, but I will admit that it preaches a bit much. Earthbound strikes it rich. Its story, granted, is not terribly rich or original, but I maintain that's beside the point. I really want to talk about this right now, so I'm going to, just beware that there are SPOILERS about the end of Earthbound that I would recommend people that have not experienced it not read. If you're rather convinced that you'll never experience it anyway, than please read this so I can tell you about how awesome video games can be in a way that basically only video games can be.
History lesson! In order to properly understand the importance of Earthbound, you have to understand the cultural milleu that it was released in, which is to way that 90's SNES RPG nerd culture. In the 90's on the SNES, RPGs (I guess I should specify for those uninitiated that might happen to be reading this: SNES= Super Nintendo Entertainment System, Nintendo's second-generation home console, and RPG= role Playing Game, a subgenre of Video Game) were based around a few principals: length, story, and level hunting. A good RPG was percieved to be one that was long and had an involving story to go along with it. Level hunting was simply a ubitquitous, expected convention; the player would spend hours fighting waves of nearly identical random encounters in order to cull from them the precious Experience Points needed to get finally big and bad enough to proceed to the next area. this was epitomized in SquareSoft's (now SquarEnix) "Final Fantasy" franchise, which had three iterations on the SNES. In order to be able to beat the final boss of Final Fantasy IV, I've heard reports of like ten to twenty hours of level hunting IN THE FINAL DUNGEON required to be able to finally have even a chance at defeating the endboss (Zeromus, for those intersted). Enter Earthbound, a game jointly produced by Ape and HAL studios and published by Nintendo, directed by one Shigesato Itoi. Now, Itoi-sensei was previously known in Japan for his work as a journalist, writing up discussions he'd have with various people from construction workers to corporate executives on sundry topics, mostly philosophy-of-life type questions. All things accounted for, his presence in the Video Game industry seems kind of unprecedented both given his personal life story and the history of the Video Game industry, unless I'm missing something. But I think that Itoi-sensei really brought something new and awesome to the industry with his personal background. Now, to the meat of the matter. Earthbound begins much like any other game: a messangeer from the future is sent to the past to inform a boy of a prophecy of some "Chosen Ones," four of them to be exact, of which he beleives said boy to be one. Boy must go on quest to defeat Big Bad (Giygas, in this case). The first point where Earthbound diverges from its contemporaries is its setting; it's begins in a suburban setting (there's even a sign that says it: "South to the Suburbd of Onett"), where the boy fights street punks and the mayor's personal corrupt cops. This is a far cry from the medieval/steampunk fantasy settings that were so dominant at the time, and having the characters fight with baseball bats instead of swords gave the game a very unique flavor, at once making it feel less impossible and more applicable to today's society. (Side note: it's generally accepted that Earthbound's suberban setting is based on the Japanese perception of the US; the place itself is named "Eagleland," which most people interpret as referencing the american Bald Eagle.) The ordinary townspeople don't even seem to be aware that the people they're talking to are out to save the world; in fact, they sometimes threaten you to, say, stay away from their girl, or criticize how you look. In every other game, the conflict is on a fairly epic scale; bringing Earthbound, indeed, down to earth, gives it an incredible ambiance and lets the player connect far more with the people in the game than in others, where the townsfolk serve mostly to provide scenery, shopkeepers, and hints as to what to do and where to go. At any rate, the boy goes on the quest, picks up the other chosen three on the way, and finds himself in front Giygas. Giygas is no longer just someone who's evil, he IS EVIL. The words "evil" and "giygas" are now synonymous. You start fighting him. It doesn't take too long before you realize that your attacks aren't working. You can swing your bat all you want, but you won't put a dent in the guy. In order to defeat Giygas, the player needs to use the "pray" command, which is practically useless at any point in the game besides the final boss fight, and so the player has probably forgotten about it and doesn't want to use it and just uses it because he or she has tried everything else and it didn't work. When the player uses the "pray" command, the girl (who's the only character that can use it) prays for somebody to help them, and every time the command is used, somebody different that you've met during your quest goes starts thinking about you and praying for your safety. This hurts Giygas. Eventually, her prayers go out to the darkness until they reach the player, who, as the game says, "prayed for [them], having never even met the children." (The player is asked to input his or her name a couple of times during the game, being told that it's for the high score list.) This is the coup de grace. Giygas is vanquished, the Chosen Ones are victorious, yay.
But WHY is this so awesome? First of all, because it's not obvious. Analysis is necessary. The game doesn't spell its morale out for you, but counts on the wisdom of the player to assemble its meaning. This is what most works considered as "great works of literature" so, with Shakespeare being a notable exeption. He like always tells you what the morale is, even though some readers might disagree with him. So let's analyse: the critical moment is the final boss fight. That's the apex, the climax, the culmination of the whole game. And it causes us to examine the mentality if the typical RPG player. He's done his quest (it will typically be a male, though there are documented exceptions), he's arrived at the final boss, and he discovers that all of his levels and equipment and experience points are totally useless. As much as he might hit him, Giygas won't go down. Seeign as this is the case, what good was the quest? The quest in as RPG is typically the story of how a group of rag-tag warriors grows to be strong and powerful enough to kill the big bad. In Earthbound, the point would seem to be to grow strong and powerful enough to be totally impotent when the chips are down for good. BUT THIS IS NOT THE CASE! In Earthbound, the quest very much has a purpose! the purpose is to craft the bonds between the main party and all the other people in that world! It's people all around the world, wishing for the safety of a few wayward children that once crossed their path, that has the power to defeat Evil, which remember, Giygas is. And those bonds could not have been crafted in these children from diverse backgrounds had not come together and gone on this quest to meet them. That is the true message of Earthbound: that weapons are not the instruments that will bring about Evil's ultimate end, but people wishing for people that maybe they've never even met before (remember the player?). It's ultimately just people caring about other people that will destroy Evil. It might sound a bit corny to see it put down like that, but Earthbound is able to send it home elegantly enough that it doesn't seem silly at all. That's why Earthbound is so awesome, and is proof that Video Games can be art. Because Earthbound totally is.
Allright, done with Earthbound. Next thing! These past two days, Saturday and Sunday, were the Student Rally at my school! I signed up for a team; for the past two weeks we prepared two models, a play, a dance, and studied a general knowledge packet that all shared the common theme of--get this--the United States before and during the War Between the States! Naturally, I was my team's secret weapon, even if it wasn't all that secret. All in all, each team had to make a model totem pole and teepee, dance a dance and put on a play, and take a group test. The test was probably the dumbest part. Everyone was given a thick packet to study in its entirety. Most of the stuff was really boring and wasn't even a story, just "and it was like this." I found it very hard to read. Also, they didn't ask so much about the politics and history surrounding the War Between the States, which is what I was prepared for, but just random stuff like identifying photographs that had all been deformed through Photoshop and stuff on, say, quilting. Yes, one of the requirements was to be able to construct a particular quilt pattern from memory given the individual blocks. All that said, it was basically impossible to study for without having participated before. I feel like next year, I could prepare myself much better. Too bad I won't be here next year. BUT! I did play the lead role in the play, and that was really where I focused my attention, not on studying, which I assumed I had in the bag becaue I got a 4 on my AP US History exam. And, in all honesty, it was not Central-quality theater. I was used to Central, which has a quality theater program. This is true. Their plays are always well done. This was a play written by a student and perforemd by students with almost no coaching. It was a melodrama about an American Indien who gets kidnapped and raised by cowboys, then the cowboys try to get him to kill some indiens to prove that he's not one himself but a true blue cowboy, and he discovers that he was kidnapped and the cowboys killed his parents, so he deserts the cowboys and takes his white girlfriend with him to live with the indiens until some coyboys show up trying to take the girl back and the girl winds up dead. I was the indien. I questioned his motivations sometimes; for instance, after being raised by cowboys all his life, he has more moral qualms than I'd expect him to about killing indiens, and he goes to an indien wise man for guidance. I think that he wouldn't have problems until he actually was pointing a gun at the people, where, by the way, he finds his long-lost brother. I figure the brother would be the thing that really makes him decide not to go through with it. Also, I think that the indiens, especially the main indien's brother, would be slower than they were to accept the main one's girlfriend, especailly since white people just killed his whole tribe. This is what makes it a melodrama. The characters' reactions are all way exaggerated and unrealistic. This, I suppose, is nevertheless consistant with the theme is the United States Before and During the War Between the States, as theater melodramas were extremely popular in the 1800s. Still, it's decidedly pro-indien slant is not acurate to the period. Whatever. Bottom line, I got lots of compliments on my acting. People seemed to really like the job I did. People that I never met before have gone out of their way to tell me that I did a good job in the play. That's nice. Still, we didn't place in the top three in the play. I guess my stellar performance couldn't make up for everyone else. Oh yeah! There was also like a quiz show portion of the competition, and I totally dominated the round I was in. My buzzer was an aluminum pot that I hit with a wooden spoon to activate. And I did well. My team placed second overall in the Quiz Show category. There was also an Athletic Competition, which was really like a bunch of carnival games with a vaguely western theme. There was a bow-shooting competition, a light-gun shooting competition, a throw-the-hula-hoop-onto-a-stick ccompetition that was framed as lasooing cattle, stuff like that. All in all, it was a great time and I'm really glad I did it. Especailly the preparations, working with everybody was really good and it just got me to interacct with more people than I normally would have. And having some goal to work towards with them is what I need, I can't do it without something to do. So bottom line, it was really fun. I was kind of dissapointed that my team was so ready to cheat, though. Everytime I said, "But isn't that against the rules?" they'd respond, "Oh, c'est pas grave." Their primary excuse seemed to be that everyone else was doing it, so it was fine if they did it, too. Also, they seemed much more content on winning once the events started. During the preparations, they seemed a bit lackadaisacal about it, but they got all serious once they were actually in the room, taking the test. This is the opposite of what it ought to be. Prepare yourselves the best possible, and then enjoy the game while you're playing it! Maxwell Maltz talks about this specifically, using the example of gambling. If you're going to be serioud, do it while your placing your bet and you have the time to figure odds or whatever, because once the roulette wheel starts turning, it's out of your hands and you might as well enjoy it. This goes of any type of performance or audidtion, by the way. I'll make it offical "advice from Kevin." Be serious while you're getting ready, then just let loose at the moment of.
Anyway! My team (which was called "West Side Crew" [really, it was "West Side Crew," in English], so I taught everyone the overlapping-index-and-ring-finger "West Side" signal) won second place overall. This means that we get to ahve a little party tomorrow after school. And tomorrow is only like an hour and a half away, so I'd better upload and sign off. Stay cool, y'all.
So I want to write this up while it's freshest in my memory. Today was a big party known as "le St. Nicholas des Rhetos." "Rheto" is short for "rhetoricien," and designates the last year of school before the University level, because apparently in antiquity, the students studied Rhetoric their last year. Apparently, Huy is the only town that has a "st Nicholas" at the high school level. The party wasa appropriated from University students. The deal is that the Rhetos skip school and go get wasted instead. I went, but came home early and now am writing this. So I'm skipping school right now. This is, more or less, taking advantage of what Joey the Dutch kid calls being a "free student." But really, I'm going to be punished by the school, like everybody else that went there, so it's not really additional liberty, but it is a liberty I would not have taken in the US. So, I gather there are three stages for St Nicholas: Stage 1: Everybody gets together in some parking lot somewhere. Everybody throws various food products at each other, particulary eggs and flour. Eggs and flour are the tradition apparently, but it's since expanded to include ketchup, mayonaise, and various other vile brews and cocktails. I should mention, I guess, that there is a traditional style of dress for the occasion, a white lab coat called a "tablier" in French. Each student draws a big character on the back of it, and then everybody else draws and writes stuff on it, much like a yearbook in the states. I put Konata-sama on the back of mine. Disney characters were popular, as wer looney tunes. I saw a few typical comics, too. I saw one Babar. There were a few DBZ tabliers, as well as one Sakura and one Onizuka, who was flippin the bird. So everybody starts drinking and getting eggy and floury at this parking lot, then Stage 2: Parade. there was a big float where somebody dressed up as St Nicholas, I guess, and kind of danced around while music themuped behind him, and as the float advanced, so did the huge mob of students behind it. Stuff coninued to get flung and drunk, not necessarily in that order. I was immesely reminded during this parade of a couplet from Carmina Burana: "Quero mihi similes/Et adiungor pravis," which I saw translated as "I search for those who are like me,/and join the wretches." There's an expression in English that sums up what everybody was perfectly: messed up. People were drunk and covered in at least one layer of grime, and they were having a blast parading themselves throughout the town and showing off how messed up and shameless of it they were. I also realized during the parade that the tablier served an important practical function: if a person was so messed up you couldn't tell who it was by looking at his or her face, you could use the tablier with its distinct character on the back to tell you who it was. The whole ordeal gave me an idea for a peice of music: "March of the Wretches." Someday, perhaps, I can write it for concert band, along with "Cannibals' Dance." Finally, Stage 3: the parade ends in an open-air enclosure and everybody continues to get wasted. I satyed up until Stage 3, but after a while if standing around in this gated-off parking lot with everybody going nuts around me, I decided to walk back up to the house.
I have to qualify myself a bit: I have nothing against the people who managed to have fun getting wasted. How they have fun is their business, and I can't do anything about it. I call them (us, really) wretches, but that's just because they were the very image; extremely filthy and pretty drunk and also unrepentant. But I don't hold it against them. Whatever, go get smashed. I'm not the one who has to wake up tomorrow, you are. It's just that that's not my scene. I miss Smash Bros. I miss it so bad. But it's not Smash Bros itself that I miss, really, but the environment it produced among the folks I tended to hang aroud back home. Smash Bros. gave us something decent to do with ourselves. It gave us as excuse to party. And it was, I dare say, productive, because it engendered society and interaction between the participants in and out of game and managed to be cool! I jsut can't see how oblliterating reality with booze and thundering music is fun. The phase I've been usin to describe why I don't like being drunk has recently been "Je veux être mon propre maître." I want to be my own master. I don't want to get carried away by a good time. I want to walk arm in arm with a good time. I want to sit down and have a discussion with a good time. I don't want to submit myself to a good time and give him free liscense to alter my thoughts and actions. One of the foremost principals of my personal philosophy is that life is inherently good. That means that existance as it is is valuable and should be experienced as it is. I don't need drugs (alchohol is a drug; don't you remember Health class?) to make me appreciate it. At any rate, thank you to al the nerds back home who stayed home and played video games with me, and thanks to all you nerd who came to my combination birthday/going away/Hachiko-chan's going away party. It's good to have memories like those to fall back on to remind me that sanity does exist in this world. I miss Smash Bros. In summary, there's this St. Nicholas thing here is Huy, and I'm happy to have gone so I can get a feeling for what the Belgians do to have fun, but ultimately I wasn't that into it, and I miss playing video games with other people. Speaking of "getting a feeling," if I hear that stupid "I got a feeling" song again, I'm gonna flip. It's on the radio like fifteen times a day, it has very little musical merit, and people keep singing it and along to it. In principle, I don't have anyhting against singing along, but this one jsut really ticks me off. It just like, "Oh, you have a feeling, do you? And, uh, what is that feeling again? I didn't quite catch it...How good is tonight going to be? A good, good night? Really? Would you care to repeat that? What kind of night?" This song is just so stupid it makes me want to hit somebody. Probably the guy who made that song. It's even auto-tuned. He didn't need to auto-tune that thing. But after this moring, I can see why it's so popular; it really captures the "let's forget about everything" aspect of partying that Belgians seem to enjoy. I'm just not into it. Not the partying or the song.
In other news, I went to a supper hosted by Colin, my host brother,'s rugby team a couple nights ago. The most notable thing here is that there was about a two-hour pause in between the appetizer and the main course. In the US, people would have started complaining and blamed it on poor organization, but in this case it was just totally normal. People enjoy sitting around and doign nothing. I was hungry. It made me remember an event I went to early on here in my stay in Belgium, which was a block-type party I went to. It was "Five Continents"-themed, so there were five stations, at each of which was a game. But when peopel arrived at each station, they didn't play the game, they milled around for like an hour before finalyl getting down to business and playing the game. This is what I mean when I say that doing nothing is Belgium's national passtime. There's an image in the US of two friends witting around and saying, "whadda you wanna do?" "I dunno, whadda you wanna do?" "I dunno, whadda you wanna do?" That never happens here in Belgium, as far as I can tell. There's just far less an emphasis on "doing" something. In the US, it's true, stuff is generally organized around doing stuff. If somebody asks, "Hey, wanna come over tonight?" a common response is, "Sure, whatcha gonna do?" There's no doing here in Belgium. If you come over, then...you're over. Great! But don't expect to do anything. This is just profoundly different from the way I like to be.
God, I miss Smash Bros.
