Brendan's blog

わたしは おんがく（Jazz と R&B）と ゲーム が すき です。 わたしは Nintendo の Pokémon が すき です。 My mom was pretty influential in shaping my early music tastes. She exposed me to a lot of the music that she listened to growing up in the 70s. One of my favorite bands is still Earth, Wind & Fire—one of, if not the first, major groups that she shared with me. From there, I have carried my love of music into my own journey, exploring all types of artists in genres that are in any way adjacent. I still call myself a Pokémon fan, even though it's been several years since I last played a game! (USUM was the last I played; ever since the games switched to being on the Switch, it just hasn't been the same. Buying a new console was a bit expensive at the time, so I mostly would watch playthroughs online.) Even so, Pokémon will always hold a special place in my heart. I have not been keeping up with the new games too much, but my brother did show me Starmie's Mega Evolution, and I thought it look...

I'm really enjoying our time together, and all that we are learning! It is interesting that I am now able to see my own handwriting 'emerge' in my hiragana…I find writing out hiragana characters a lot more fun than the English characters that I am used to! It is a bit of a challenge for me to keep some of the grammar rules straight; I have been trying to learn my parents' native tongue, Tagalog, and I am still at the very beginner stages, so I have some trouble, sometimes, remembering if I should be using the Japanese or Tagalog grammar structures and which is which! It is really a gift to be able to learn languages and about each other's cultures and grow in connection with our global human community. Anyways, here is my introduction: はじめまして。わたしのなまえはごんざれすです。わたしのせんこうはいがくです。わたしはよんねんせいです。わたしのしゅっしんはいんでぃあなのぐれんじゃーです。 どうぞよろしくおねがいします。

こんにちは！ For today’s blog assignment, I wanted to share a song that I discovered several years back and really enjoyed. Around 2018/2019, when meme culture was coalescing around the ‘vaporwave’ aesthetic, I (along with several millions of other people, it seems) stumbled upon the song “Plastic Love” (1984) by Mariya Takeuchi in my YouTube recommended feed. (Perhaps you've seen this image before? This is the most iconic image that many people associate with its 2018/19 surge on YouTube. It comes from an unofficial fan-posted video of "Plastic Love" that amassed around 20 million views before being taken down, even though the image was originally the album cover for a completely different song by Takeuchi.) I was immediately drawn to the song's nostalgic, city pop sound and quickly began begging my mom to play it during our drives to school. Interestingly enough, I never really took the time to consider the lyrics of the song until today. Its lyrics depict a woman who ha...