“I’m just a little happy,” says Akari, smiling benignly at her new apprentice. It’s an echo of a line cited years before by Alicia, back when Akari was a new arrival on Mars. When Alicia said it, it was a lie: she was more than a little happy. She was nervous, she was excited, she was worried, she was thrilled; the prospect of handling Akari was the biggest challenge Alicia had ever faced and she was unsure how to go about it. She would remain uncertain in her methods throughout Akari’s training, finally crying at her retirement ceremony at the sight of Akari accepting her oar. What she saw in that moment of serenity was more than Akari’s gratitude: it was gratification.

I succeeded, she thought, I met my biggest challenge and I succeeded.

Alicia retires happily, and Akari takes up all the tasks her mentor left her. The task of opening the shade and welcoming a new day. The task of becoming the number-one gondolier in New Venice. The task of pleasing customers while gently sculling across a town composed entirely of smiles (what’s behind them? Cats?). The task of training a successor to the Aria Company.

The task of lying.

“I’m just a little happy,” says Akari, and, just as it was when Alicia said it, it’s a lie. It’s not a lie for the same reason, however. It’s a lie because Akari is more than a little happy.

She’s very happy, and she deserves it.

You’ve flown too far from the Sun; let me take you back to Earth.

It’s a dark world. Pollution has permeated the mantle. Rivers flow slow and purple with sludge. Domed cities like those the Avenger creators thought might dominate Mars instead form the mainstays of civilization on what the Martians call ‘Manhome.’ Earth isn’t truly home to anything, anymore. It’s a husk on life support, a test-case for the technologies that enabled the terraforming of Mars, and also a reason why the terraforming of Mars was so necessary. A fake sky akin to that of a Macross is all that an Earth girl knows.

She grows up with picture books, though the pictures are drawn from pictures from pictures. No one remembers a cat. No one remembers a dog.

A girl knows only a few things: that her parents are at work, that she must do her best in school in order to go to work someday, and that she can never leave her domed Tokyo save for the occasional luxury vacation to Mars. One day, her fourth-grade class takes a field trip to Kyoto. The students obediently pile into a train with no windows and the train chugs silently along a desolate landscape of blurry green and brown hues. The train arrives. The students flood out onto the streets of another dome. A few remnants of 21st-century Kyoto impress the young ones, but mostly the city is the same as their native Tokyo. A girl yawns; she sees the same fake sky. She’s seen more realistic skies in holographic form: travel brochures for various cities on Mars.

New San Francisco.

Newer Orleans.

New Venice.

Tokyo 4-C meets with Kyoto 4-C. Students exchange formal greetings. Teachers and chaperones aren’t too concerned about friendship; this is a leftover tradition, in any case, and the students are unlikely to see each other ever again. Nevertheless they encourage interaction. This is your chance to meet another culture.

“We’re all Japanese,” whines one kid.

“Your parents are backward.” The teacher is blunt. “Every dome is its own community.”

The students nod in obeisance.

There is no sense of solidarity among the students. There is nothing but an awkward agreement that fourth grade is irrelevant later in life. A girl is disinterested. She doesn’t talk. But maybe she looked kinda cute, or maybe he didn’t have any friends among his own peers… a boy addresses her.

“Um…”

“Eh?”

“Hi, I’m … … nice to meet you.”

“I’m Mizunashi Akari; nice to meet you.”

She has little to say but he’s persistent. Eventually he mentions family…

“Do you have any siblings?”

“No.”

“I do! I have an older sister. She works in New Venice as a gondolier.”

“Eh?”

A girl blinks. Work, in New Venice? New Venice was on Mars. You go to Mars to work? A girl returns from her field trip, sees her father that night. Work on Mars, she asks? He laughs dismissively. Mars is a slow place for the dregs of society. True hard workers remain on Earth. They don’t escape to a paradise of idiots. They stick together and try to make the most out of what they’re given.

Daddy, Mars is out there for a reason right? It was given to us.

No, he responds, we stole it.

A girl doesn’t understand, but she doesn’t bring it up again. She has an e-mail address, though, so she contacts the boy in Kyoto. They become pen pals, exchanging letters once or twice a week.

Both boy and girl grew and changed over the years. He succeeded in school, getting good grades, heading toward a career that would suck up most of his time. She faltered in school, barely keeping up when she did and failing to frequently. The fast pace of the Tokyo dome was too much for her. She wanted to stop and enjoy things — not that there was much to enjoy.

She would e-mail her pen pal, “how is your sister doing?”

She dreamed of New Venice. She dreamed of water that didn’t sting, of an atmosphere she could breathe. A city that would be more of a home than the steel-plated womb of Tokyo.

“Slacking off,” her pen pal would respond, often with a derisive emoticon or two.

“Sounds nice,” she’d muse.

“Hardly. Stay focused.”

The year she turns fourteen, the big decision comes. Is she going to try for high school, and advance her education from there? She’s barely surviving already in the strenuous middle school environment. Her father has worked himself to death in a water treatment facility. Her mother works twice as hard now, and is never home: she sleeps at work and sends her paychecks to Akari, who buys her own food and sets her own hours.

Akari doesn’t want to stay in Tokyo.

Tokyo is sad, for her: her father died here. Her classmates ridiculed her performance here. Her mother is somewhere here, but never here here. She wants to get away. She considers Kyoto: she could visit her pen pal. Maybe they could work something better out for both of them. But she knows she’ll just get in his way. Cornered by an incompatibility with an Earth lifestyle and a lack of friends, with nothing but the Tokyo International Spaceport behind her, she turns and looks upward.

For the first time, she sees more than pixelated clouds and an inauthentic glossy sky. She sees far beyond, thousands of kilometers into the deep black, and she sees freedom.

“Hey, do you have any info on the gondola market?” A frantic e-mail to her pen pal.

“Umm… I can ask my bum sister, I guess.”

“Please.”

“She says there are always new openings at some company or another for apprentices. I’ve attached a few flyers that my sister sent. She also says, ‘I hope Akari-chan can visit me in New Venice!’”

A girl examines the glamorous hiring materials. The top three companies seem to be Himeya, Orange Planet, and Aria. Akari likes the blues and whites on the Aria material, and the oddly-shaped animal that the stunning blonde gondolier is holding. Is that a dog or a cat?

She decides to apply. She has nothing else. She doesn’t even tell her mother: her pen pal and his sister feel more like family to her at this point. She downloads the training software — there are no canals or gondolas left on Earth — and she prepares for her trip to Mars.

It’s a gamble.

It’s a chance at salvation from the cruel pace of a dying planet.

She gazes off into space, lost in a holographic representation of New Venice. She’s fifteen now, and this spring she departs for her ‘paradise of idiots.’ She’s thrilled by the prospects. Living without cars, without machines. Folding her own laundry. Preparing her own food. Breathing clean air. Touching grass, and water. Cloud-gazing. She could gain everything…

… but if she failed, she’d be penniless, alone, an orphan not only in another city but on another planet entirely.

She wishes desperately for happiness.

She cries at the possibility thereof.

She’s nervous, excited, worried, thrilled. The prospect of apprenticing herself to Alicia is the biggest challenge she has ever faced with all her heart, and she is unsure how to go about it. She practices her smile in the mirror, and laughs at herself. I… I hope this works out.

Things rarely go as planned.

As if by some fairy magic, Mars opens its heart to Akari.

Years later, Alicia has retired and Akari is the sole member of the Aria Company. She examines the applications, flipping through them until she comes across a young girl from Earth. She smiles at the girl’s photo: uncertain smile, messy hair. Cute eyes. The application screams “hesitant.” That’s all Akari needs.

“I’d like to offer you a position … ”

She gets off the phone, blinking back joy.

A couple weeks later, the first morning with her new apprentice.

“Why are you staring at me?” asks the girl, not sure if she is supposed to begin eating.

“I’m just a little happy,” says Akari, smiling benignly.

The idea is this: for one month (through August 31st), I will attempt to use what “wonderful power” I might have and act like a better human being. The premise is clear; our world is one that simply is not wonderful. There is war, there is disease, there are issues of resource control and discrimination, there is religious conflict, etc. In this world that is not the heaven of Neo-Venezia, is it possible to be the kind and loving human being that Mizunashi Akari is?

She's wishing for your happiness.

My hypothesis is no.

But one of the interesting things here will be seeing what triggers cause me to stop being wonderful. What in my life can pierce a shell of wonderfulness and irritate me? What can make me want to yell, or lie, or hurt others?

And then: why do those triggers exist? Can anything be done about them? What if more people tried this experiment? What if people in general were simply more courteous and kind and loving?

In order to attain answers to these questions, and in order to brighten our own lives and those of the people who surround us, icystorm and I are beginning this experiment. We would like to invite (everyone) to join in. We have some guidelines on how to proceed, but you don’t need to follow them—simply being kind to those around you is a wonderful first step, and if our experiment inspires you to try that, that’s already amazingly good.

Here are our guidelines:

1. document un-wonderful behavior
If, during this experiment, you do something that irritates someone else or yourself, record it in a blog post (I’ll be doing daily updates when possible). If applicable, investigate why your behavior was abrasive, and how you might act differently in the future.

2. document close calls
If, during this experiment, you think negative thoughts or catch yourself right before yelling at someone etc., record it in a blog post. If applicable, investigate why you were upset, and how you might avoid becoming such in the future.

3. don’t give up if you do something mean or un-wonderful
This experiment is not a competition. The point isn’t to see how far you can get. The point is to be the best you can. If you do something un-wonderful, record it a la Guideline #1, and attempt to avoid it in the future. You’re still “in the game”—one failure is not a reason to give up on kindness.

4. avoid debates and arguments
Even the most civil arguments are, at their cores, conflicts. While these are unavoidable from time to time, you don’t really need to butt into that one “most moe character of summer 2008″ forum thread, do you? Avoid conflict where you can. Having strong opinions is one thing and expressing them is another; only do the latter if it won’t bug others.

5. greet people
If you walk by someone on a sidewalk, smile and say hi. Greeting others is a basic courtesy that few practice these days. By acknowledging others’ existences and importances in your own life, you make yourself more important to them. This is how Akari makes her friends (see: Episode 10 of the Natural). If you smile at someone, they might not smile back—but they might smile at someone else later, or at you if you ever see them again.

6. make wonderful observations
A minimum of once per day, note that something is wonderful or lovely. This can be a thought to yourself or a remark to someone nearby. “The world is wonderful in the eyes of wonderful people,” says Alicia (Aria the Animation, Episode 6).

We considered more guidelines, but they either fall under #1-2 or are just plain silly.

If you’d like to participate in this experiment, following all guidelines, consider making a similar Day 0 post on your blog. Inform your readers of your goals and encourage others to do the same. We’re not trying to start a movement or a revolution—we just want to try being nice and see where it gets us.

Majime na Lolikit
How Aria Ruined Subtext, or Why Yuri Isn’t Funny Anymore

In early 2005, I finished watching AIR. At the time, I was active on the AnimeSuki.com forums (handle: Broken), and was active in discussing the episodes as they were aired and fansubbed. In the AIR episode 12 thread, someone linked to lovelykitsune.com‘s special feature. LK had written Misuzu’s final diary entry for her. I laughed my ass off and proceeded to read through the rest of his archives. I gobbled up his Maria-sama ga Miteru reviews like candy. It was, as he himself put it, a writer’s gold mine.

Amazed at how humorous this Maria-sama show appeared to be, I downloaded it (along with Negima and Kanon, some of the first anime I consumed after my introduction to the medium via Naruto) and watched it.

I laughed at the subtext and the ridiculous premise (it’s a lesbian Catholic school lolol) but the show simply wasn’t as funny as Lovely Kitsune had portrayed it. Saddened, I groped for a new angle from which to enjoy it, and eventually I found it: I could amuse myself by looking too far into possible subtext and then laughing at how gay everyone was (it’s a lesbian Catholic school lolol). It wasn’t that I was homophobic (those were turbulent times, and I was seriously considering the possibility that I myself was gay—actually, I still don’t have an answer O_o), but the overabundance of this otherness was more than enough to make me chuckle.

After reading Pretty Face (“Become my onee-sama #2!”) and watching such blockbusters as Mai-HiME (ShizNat) and Kannazuki no Miko (best confession scene ever), I found that I liked this ‘shoujo ai’ business quite a bit. They were so cute, and in a lot of cases they were facing adversity in order to stay true to themselves and their hearts.

A lot of the lulz went away, but the yuri goggles remained.

(What am I talking about? The lulz was as strong as ever. I lurked the shoujoai.com forums for a while and witnessed the first ever declaration of YFR—the hilarious forum interchange that led to me creating kyousora.com and infecting the minds of several other anibloggers.)

Eventually I came upon Strawberry Panic. It made me laugh at the yuri because it was laughable. I blame this entirely upon premise and script. Oh, and the over-dramatization of everything. Around the same time, I was just a fledgling aniblogger. I discovered danbooru. I discovered various other things… like Shoujo Sect… long and short of it is that I came to this revelation: yuri is hot!!

Subtext became even more awesome as I tread into the world of AWESOME Nanoha.

Desires were fulfilled as Kyoushiro to Towa no Sora ended.

And after some time, I saw Aria.

You say good things sometimes, Alice!

Aria’s an odd cookie. Almost entirely female cast, lots of deep caring and emotion, and yet not once—not once did I find a hint of girls’ love, subtextual or otherwise. I found sisterly doting, I found friendship, I found admiration.

Please direct your attention, for a moment, toward this post of Erica Friedman’s: Yuri Anime: Aria OAV Arietta (Thanks to icystorm over at Miminum Tempo for the heads’ up.)

I’ve never been a huge fan of Friedman’s. I know she’s done some great work, etc., but one day I stumbled across some Noir review of hers and it made me cringe. Noir wasn’t yuri as far as I could tell. I recall thinking to myself—is friendship such an impossible thing?

This is, for the record, the same reaction several of my classmates had in Bible as Literature when my teacher presented unto them the theory that David and Jonathan were “romantic friends.” So maybe I just had a preconception of Noir since I’d seen it before and might find the romance between Kirika and Mireille if I were to go into the show with Friedman’s review in mind… but there’s still a distinction, I feel, even between:

- romantic friendship

and

- sexuality

I can’t really imagine David and Jonathan going for that hawt hawt butthsekcz. They definitely did seem like more than (contemporary definition of) friends to me, though. The characters in Noir share an incredibly powerful bond; does that mean that they are a yuri couple? I don’t recall any indications that the two of them felt ANY attraction toward each other, physical or mental or otherwise. I was under the impression that they were brought together by the past, or fate, or something dumb like that, and that perhaps the “odd bedfellows” saying applies.

But a yuri couple?

And I say that same thing to Aria, only a million times over.

Creating something, together—possibly the height of human existence.

When I first watched Aria episode two or whichever, the one where Akari sleeps over in Aika’s room, I probably thought something like, “oooo yuri action oh yeah.” I guarantee that by the time I finished season one, such vulgar thoughts had been completely dispelled. When I say vulgar, I am not incriminating yuri—I am incriminating subtext. Sure, it’s there, and I’m sure people can find it (after all, Erica Friedman did!), but what does it add, other than cheap giggles? If it’s not solid, if it’s not canon, it’s only speculation.

Speculation is something that you get fans to do when you try to entice them with fluff (see: Suzumiya Haruhi no Yuuutsu). Did Kozue Amano want use to try to figure out which of the Aria girls were getting off on which others’ fingers? For some reason, I doubt it. Did Mag Garden? Please. It’s there, but only if you’ve trained yourself to find it anywhere can you find it in Aria. Subtext can literally be found in everything if you’re well enough trained.

It’s like over-analyzing things.

I’m not trying to be a deconstructionist, I’m just trying to rationalize—what benefit does Aria gain from lesbianism? I found it quite reassuringly non-retarded that the work just about never touched on sexuality (we know Akatsuki is crushing on Akari and that Aika and Harry Potter get together, but even that doesn’t tell us that much) because, from my point of view, sexuality is a fairly boring topic (though this does not mean that I intentionally ignore it). It’s much more interesting for me to focus on the scenery or the messages or the character drama than the possibilities of who’s attracted to whom. Yes, believe it or not, you can have character drama without romance! Alicia and Akari’s tearful hug in Origination 13 was not the culmination of their lust and sexual tension.

gomenasi, for everything gomenasai

Before you say “but it could be!” let me point you to a very similar scene, both in direction and character action: AIR episode 6; Tohno Minagi returns to her mother’s home and the two share a tearful embrace.

The writer(s) behind AIR had serious mom issues, methinks—there’s a bit of a trend here.

(I refuse to believe that Minagi was hot for her mom. If you think that this is a bad comparison becaue she was hot for her mom, please explain to me why and how she is hot for her mom.)

And because there is nothing explicitly stated in Aria, and because I see no sexuality implied in it, I don’t find any lesbians. Whether the characters ARE gay, or straight, or bi, or what have you, is a pointless question: none of the characters are in yuri relationships. You can spend a lifetime speculating about sexuality if you have no solid cues.

The idea of Aria porn makes me uneasy.

The show is too pure for that. Too innocent. Too much about living a certain way. Not at all about whom to do or why.

Similarly, the idea of pairing Aria characters and doing anything in the vein of fanporn unsettles me, be it fanfic or fanart or so much as discussing one’s support for a coupling. Much as Neo-Venezia is a world beyond disease and homicide, it is a world beyond sex. Such thoughts simply don’t exist in Aria. There was never anything about dating or societal pressures to fulfill gender roles and get into certain relationships or making babies or not making babies or defying a conservative society or taking advantage of a liberal one. None of these topics are touched upon, thus furthering the detachment from sexuality.

And with all the unbridled potential for yuri (a full cast of females at the extremes of hot or cute in terms of both appearance and personality), combined with this total absence of sexuality, I have completely lost my drive to examine subtext or find lesbians in anime.

I don’t see the point anymore.

Why seek cheap laughs or pursue fetishes when something so perfect, so pure, so devoid of questions exists? Aria is the end-all be-all of my anime experience, and it has vanquished my love for yuri. It has vanquished my love for giggling childishly at possibilities.

Aria killed subtext.

And one last note, in case any staunch Aria yuri fans are reading this:

If Akari and Alicia were in a lesbian relationship, would Alicia have left to go get married to some other person? Alicia is mature. She doesn’t need to graduate schoolgirl lesbianism.

The Call
Akari decides she wants to be a professional gondolier and sets out to achieve this goal.

Allies
Joining Akari in her quest are Aika and, later, Alice. Providing guidance are the Three Water Fairies and Those Warm People‚Ñ¢ (includes Cait Sith and Grandma).

Preparation
Akari arrives on Aqua, joins the Aria Company, begins basic learning stuffs and practice routine.

Crossing the Threshold of Adventure
Akari takes on her first customer, Akatsuki.

Road of Trials
Aria the Animation 1-13, Aria the Natural 1-26, Aria the OVA, and Aria the Origination 1-8. Akari goes about her training, seeks out more knowledge/power, overcomes obstacles, learns valuable lessons, and becomes more and more wonderful with every passing frame. Also, she befriends new allies as she overcomes obstacles.

The Belly of the Beast
Aria the Origination 9-11. Akari is falling behind her allies as they go on ahead and pass through the gates of victory before she is able to. Suddenly she is ‘alone.’ Though she is too wonderful to actually be down about it, it’s a downing experience—it is a dire period.

“Saving” Experience
Aria the Origination 12-13. Akari becomes a professional, accomplishing her quest’s goals.

Transforming Changes
Akari is no longer the incapable darling we remember from Aria the Animation. Alicia leaves the Aria Company, leaving Akari to fend for herself. Akari matures as a person and learns her final—and most important—lesson: that nothing lasts forever, and that change is whatever you make of it.

The Return
Akari returns to her friends as a caring and mature professional. Also, she has attained a new level in life: she has become an expert of wonderfulness.

Sharing the Gift
R1 DVDs!