WINTER HAS COME
Listen up, you worthless creatures who will never amount to anything!
Find Holden Caulfield’s Penguindrum or…
Seizon Senryaku ~!

Rock Over Japan ~ 8 bit Ver.

DL (mp3): http://www.mediafire.com/?sywmeuwzgb9qdxd

Chiri Santa by Meison

Chi-Rho

The labarum was a vexillum that displayed the “Chi-Rho” symbol ☧, formed from the first two Greek letters of the word “Christ” (Greek: ΧΡΙΣΤΟΣ, or Χριστός) — Chi (χ) and Rho (ρ). It was used by the Roman emperor Saint Constantine. Since the vexillum consisted of a flag suspended from the crossbar of a cross, it was ideally suited to symbolize the crucifixion of Christ.

The Chi Rho is one of the earliest forms of christogram, and is used by Christians. It is formed by superimposing the first two (capital) letters chi and rho (ΧΡ) of the Greek word “ΧΡΙΣΤΟΣ” =Christ in such a way to produce the monogram ☧. Although not technically a cross, the Chi Rho invokes the crucifixion of Jesus as well as symbolizing his status as the Christ.

The etymology of the word labarum is unclear; it is perhaps to be derived from Latin /labāre/ ‘to totter, to waver’ (in the sense of the “waving” of a flag in the breeze). Other proposals include a derivation from Celtic llafar (“eloquent”), from the Latin laureum [vexillum] (“laurel standard”) or from ancient Cantabri dialect labaro (‘four heads’) (in modern-day Basque the word is lauburu, with the same meaning), an ancient celtic symbol taken by the Legions during the Cantabrian Wars.

Cantabrian Wars
The Cantabrian Wars (29 BC-19 BC) occurred during the Roman conquest of the modern provinces of Cantabria, Asturias and León, against the Asturs and the Cantabri. They were the final stage of the conquest of Hispania.

In this conflict, unusually, the Romans chose not to take prisoners. Moreover, there was a tradition among the Cantabri of preferring suicide to slavery. They did this by sword, by fire, or, primarily, by poisoning themselves with potions made for the purpose. According to Silius Italicus they used a concoction made from the seeds of the yew tree, a plant with mythic significance for the Celts. Strabo said that they belittled death and pain, to the point of singing hymns of victory while being crucified. For them, according to Strabo, to die as soldiers and free men was a victory.

Through the Cantabrian War and the surrender of the Astures to Rome, the Roman legions adopted from them the solar symbol of twin crosses and lunar symbols, such as the Cantabri lábaro. They would still be carrying this standard 300 years later.

(wiki)

Extreme Space Symphony’s Movement VII “Infinite Love By Momoiro Clover Z

Via ANN, Yuichi Sasamoto‘s novels Mini-Skirt Uchū Kaizoku (ミニスカ宇宙海賊 Mini-Skirt Space Pirates) will be animated under the name Mōretsu Uchū Pirates (モーレツ宇宙海賊)

Moretsu Uchuu Kaizoku PV1 ~ Black Holy

(Marika Ikimasu !)

Japanese manga and anime “are deft at portraying human emotions, including friendship and love,” said Nastya Pushkova, a 20-year-old college student. “Some of them deal with questions of thought. They rank with literature and philosophy.” Maria Luneva, 24, chimed in. “What is wonderful about Japan is its excellence in both traditional culture and contemporary culture,” she said.

Such a view, shared by many Russians, seems to be gaining stronger footing among the youths.

Japanese pop culture has easily transcended national borders and is attracting young Russians. It certainly will be a continuing bridge between Japan and Russia.

@MOSCOW: Japan’s pop culture enthralls young Muscovites, Asahi, December 22, 2011

See Also : Ivan X Momotaro ~ Love and Peace Through Anime Diplomacy

Ancient Energy Reactor

Humanity, a puppet named Hope
Held back by that evolution program
known as war.

The fascination with lost civilization is a relatively new ingredient in the occult traditions of the West. Versions of Western occultism dating from before 1750 or so show few signs of it. It sprang out of the achievements of nineteenth-century archeology, and above all the rediscovery of Ancient Egypt. In many ways, Egypt was the archetypal “lost civilization” – ancient, legendary, and (at least before the decipherment of hieroglyphics in 1822) sufficiently unknown to serve as a Rohrshach inkblot on which fantasies could be projected at will.

Egypt has remained a happy hunting ground for occult history ever since, but other lost civilization soon entered the fray. Nineteenth-century occult writings, in particular, were full of them; nearly every imaginable corner of the globe was assigned to some lost civilization or other. Large and details occult histories of the world were drawn up and published, tracking the rise and fall of forgotten empires and the emergence and sinking of lost continents. The sweeping planetary history traced out by H.P. Blavtsky in her immense tome The Secret Doctrine was the most famous of these, but it drew on many previous examples of the genre and inspired countless imitators.

Another lost-civilization theme of great current importance entered the picture in the middle of the nineteenth century, when J.J. Bachofen‘s book Mutterrecht introduced the idea that the first form of human culture had been matriarchal. In 1903, English classicist Jane Harrison proclaimed that Europe itself had been the location of an idyllic, goddess-worshipping, matriarchal civilization just before the beginning of recorded history, and spoke bitterly of the disastrous consequences of the Indo-European invasion that destroyed it. In the hands of later writers such as Robert Graves, Jacquett Hawkes, and Marija Gimbutas, this lost “civilization of the Goddess” came to play the same sort of role in many modern Pagan communities that Atlantis and Lemuria played in Theosophy. For a time in the middle and late twentieth century, the idea of neolithic matriarchies was accepted by many conventional archeologists and prehistorians, although this support has faded in recent decades, and forceful challegnes have been mounted by scholars claiming that evidence for ancient matriarchies simply isn’t there.

John Michael Greer, The new encyclopedia of the occult, p 280

Kim Jong-il launching a Taepodong ~ Mudazumo Naki Kaikaku OAV 01

(The Universal Truth Lies in Anime)

North Korea has reportedly conducted at least one short-range missile test amid worldwide concerns that the death of Kim Jong-il could destabilize the most militarized region in the world.

James Corbett, editor of Japan-based news website Corbett Report, thinks the reported missile tests were a demonstration of power for the neighbors and the world. “The new regime in North Korea is looking to assert its power and to show that it obviously still exists at the world stage and that this is not going to destabilize the country.”

KIMmortal: Death not the end as N. Korea tests missile, RussiaToday, 19 December, 2011, 17:48

Raimuiro Senkitan seiyus from AkibaTV in 2004

Raimu-tai (らいむ隊) LIVE ~ 凛花(Cold Flowers)

A person decided to survive,
A person decided to go to death,
Do you leave their hands ?

Sakimori System

The sakimori (防人), the 7th and 8th century frontier guards who were conscripts, usually of humble origin, were for period drafted exclusively from Japan eastern provinces (including Hitachi, the old name for Ibaraki). They were sent to live for 3 years in Kyushu, mostly to Tsukushi, what is now Fukuoka Prefecture, and to the Islands of Oki and Tsushima, where they did their military service and grew their own food.

In the year 633, the Yamato Court sent a naval fleet carrying an army of 27,000 men to assist the Korean Kingdom of Kudara in fighting off the invading forces of Tang China. The Japanese and its allies were soundly defeated in what is known in Japanese as the Battle of Hakusukinoe. After this fiasco, the Japanese government feared that in retaliation there would be an attack by continental ( Chinese or Silla Korean) forces upon Japan.

In preparation for this onslaught, the Yamato Court, which had just been reorganizing under the Taika Reform into a system resembling that of Tang China ( the Ritsuryo System), the government ordered, that men between the ages of 21 and 60 be conscripted and sent to Kyushu to protect the frontier.

The Sakimori system, which actually remained in operation for a period of 163 years ( until 826), imposed great hardships on the conscripted men and on their families.

Surprisingly, the great legacy of frontier guards is their poetry, and the poetic genre they inspired! It happened to be that in the year 755, in the sakimori system`s hayday, Otomo no Yakamochi, the poet and one of the compilers of Japan`s first and what many believe greatest anthology of poems, the Manyoshu ( about 759), was living as an official of the Office of Military affairs in Naniwa, the conscripts from Eastern Japan`s destination. Before they got on their ships to Kyushu, many wrote poems, possibly under the encouragement of Yakamochi. Anyway, about one hundred poems designated as Sakimori no Uta (防人の詩, song of the frontier guards) made their way into the Manyoshu.

The Enduring Legacy of the Sakimori, Tsukublog, March 21, 2010

Via MAL News Service, Japanese construction company Taisei Corporation commissioned an anime ad, ボスポラス海峡トンネル (Bosporus Tunnel), celebrating the dedication of women engineers for the Marmaray project. The CM is produced by Comix Wave and directed by Makoto Shinkai. The young woman is played by Mei Kurokawa (Yakuza Weapon), the music written by Anri Kumaki. According to TvTropes : Trains are present in all of Makoto Shinkai’s works. (And everybody loves trains)

Marmaray Project
Marmaray is a rail transport project in Istanbul. It consists of the construction of an undersea rail tunnel under the Bosphorus strait. And when the Marmaray Project is integrated into a planned railway through Azerbaijan, Georgia, and Turkey, you’ll be able to hop on a train in London, wave at the Hagia Sofia, and step off days later in Beijing. (Wired)

- Bosporus Tunnel Taisei Corporation Website
- “Bosporus Tunnel” Ad 30s : http://youtu.be/CXKuMPJNAYQ
- “Bosporus Tunnel” Ad 15s : http://youtu.be/-eaQlKJEOvE
- Interview of Makoto Shinkai : http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=RqCq71zQVf0

Ezra Scarlet cosplay by SweetCinn (Kristell Lim)

(slowpoke, I know) More of beautiful Kristell Lim‘s Ezra (Twitter & Facebook) here, here and here.

The Tragic History of Ezra Scarlet

Early in her childhood, Erza was enslaved by a black magic cult and forced to build the Tower of Heaven, a structure developed for the purpose of resurrecting the dark mage Zeref. She was imprisoned together with several other slaves, most of them children. Despite the harsh conditions of her enslavement and labor, Erza became close friends with the other children. She also formed a strong bond with Rob, an elderly mage from the Fairy Tail guild, who taught her about magic and his guild.

One day in X776, Shô came up with a plan for the ten-year-old Erza and all their friends to escape from the tower. They were unfortunately caught by the guards, who decided to send the escape’s mastermind to the tower’s disciplinary chamber. The guards reasoned that Erza was the one responsible and sent her to the disciplinary chamber, where she was tortured to the brink of death and lost her right eye. Jellal rescued her, but was captured soon after. Finally fed up with their torment, Erza staged a revolt against their captors so they could escape and save Jellal.

The revolt appeared to be successful at its inception until the tower’s mages arrived to repress the slaves, causing most of the other slaves to retreat. During the attack, Erza watched in horror as her friend Simon’s lower jaw was blasted off by a magical attack, while Rob sacrificed himself to defend Erza from another mage’s attack. In her rage, Erza’s latent magical power was activated for the first time, and she used it to turn all of the weapons and tools around her against the guards, finishing the revolt.

As the other slaves boarded ships meant to ensure their freedom, she reunited with Jellal, but discovered that he had changed; Jellal had been possessed by what he claimed to be the spirit of Zeref, and decided that the only way for them to attain true freedom was to complete the Tower of Heaven and revive Zeref. Erza refused to help him, prompting Jellal to cast her out of the tower by herself, only letting her live because she helped take care of all the guards who would have opposed him. Before letting her escape, Jellal told Erza to keep the Tower of Heaven a secret from the government, as well as to never return to the tower, threatening to destroy the tower and kill everyone in it, including their friends, if she disobeyed.

After washing up on the shores of Fiore, Erza made her way to and joined the Fairy Tail guild. She habitually began to wear armor and acted distant from the other members, still traumatized by Jellal’s betrayal.

(Fairy Wiki)

Rider by saber_01

Stepping on the ground
Over the moon’s shadow
Reflecting the round columns
Of the great temple,
Absorbed in thoughts.
Yaichi Aizu
in A history of modern Japanese aesthetics, Michael F. Marra, 2001, p142

Greco-Buddhism

Greco-Buddhism refers to the cultural syncretism between Hellenistic culture and Buddhism, which developed between the 4th century BCE and the 5th century CE in the area covered by the Indian sub-continent, and modern Afghanistan, Pakistan and north-western border regions of modern India. It was a cultural consequence of a long chain of interactions begun by Greek forays into India from the time of Alexander the Great, carried further by the establishment of Indo-Greek rule in the area for some centuries, and extended during flourishing of the Hellenized empire of the Kushans. Greco-Buddhism influenced the artistic, and perhaps the spiritual development of Buddhism, particularly Mahayana Buddhism.
(wiki)

Greco-Buddhism Art Influence

The arts of China, Korea and Japan adopted Greco-Buddhist artistic influences, but tended to add many local elements as well. What remains most readily identifiable from Greco-Buddhist art are:

- The general idealistic realism of the figures reminiscent of Greek art.
- Clothing elements with elaborate Greek-style folds.
- The curly hairstyle characteristic of the Mediterranean.
- In some Buddhist representations, hovering winged figures holding a wreath.
- Greek sculptural elements such as vines and floral scrolls.

In Japan, Buddhist art started to develop as the country converted to Buddhism in 548 CE. Many elements of Greco-Buddhist art remain to this day, such as the Hercules inspiration behind the Nio guardian deities in front of Japanese Buddhist temples, or representations of the Buddha reminiscent of Greek art such as the Buddha in Kamakura.

Various other Greco-Buddhist artistic influences can be found in the Japanese Buddhist pantheon, the most striking of which being that of the Japanese wind god Fujin. In consistency with Greek iconography for the wind god Boreas, the Japanese wind god holds above his head with his two hands a draping or “wind bag” in the same general attitude. The abundance of hair have been kept in the Japanese rendering, as well as exaggerated facial features.

Another Buddhist deity, named Shukongoshin, one of the wrath-filled protector deities of Buddhist temples in Japan, is also an interesting case of transmission of the image of the famous Greek god Herakles to the Far-East along the Silk Road. Herakles was used in Greco-Buddhist art to represent Vajrapani, the protector of the Buddha, and his representation was then used in China and Japan to depict the protector gods of Buddhist temples.
(wiki)