Gaijin

Hashi wrote a post about the term 'gaijin' and how Japan bloggers feel about the connotations surrounding it. I thought it was an amazing post and I read a lot of interesting views from the bloggers and the people who read and commented on the article as well. My PC was crashing the day I was working on this and gave me the biggest headache in the world trying to find a way to access my files and put it on the article. Fortunately I managed to access the illustrations (before it crashed again, aw) and got it on the post. You can read more about the article here.

Best Japan Blogs

This article was done way back, but as I'm compiling my stuff here chronologically, I figured I start my June posts here. Hashi made a list of his favourite Japan blogs and I was tasked to draw him surrounded by things that we love about Japan. And of course I had to add in Richard Gere, somehow, hahaha. You can read more about it here.

sharehouses

Animated illustration for Tofugu's article about Japanese sharehouses. Look at how excited the clouds are! :P You can read more about Japanese sharehouses here and download the hi-res version of the animated GIF and the wallpaper here and here.

beckoning cats

Animated illustration for an article about maneki neko on Tofugu. It's my first illustration for our new writer, Jordan too! I hope to make more awesome and animated art things for the articles he'll be writing for us. :) Bring luck to your desktop and download the wallpaper over here.

lights

Illustration for Tofugu about pachinko. Read about it here.

how do i even

Omg. I loved illustrating this. Capybaras + onsen = WHERE DOES ONE GO WRONG WITH THIS. Hashi is partly to blame, he got me all excited when he started writing the article about it in Tofugu. He sent me capybara photos for reference a few days ago, which lead me to Googling the creatures, and saving all the cutest capybara pictures I could find. This may not be as worse as my love for alpacas (and if you know me well, you know how crazy I get with alpacas), but I cannot deny how much I love them and how adorable they are. You can read about capybaras and save a super hi-res wallpaper of the above illustration over here at Tofugu! ♥

taiho jutsu

Animated illustration for an article in Tofugu about the Japanese police and the martial arts they practice. For some reason the two men in the middle reminds me of a fresh-faced policeman Akihiko (from P3/P) and a surprisingly young and yet still gruffy Ryotaro Dojima (from P4). I guess this is what happens when you go over Soejima's art books over and over and over again... You can read more about the whole thing here.

perspective

Animated illustration about Japanese documentaries for Tofugu. Read about it and watch the documentaries here.

locking horns

Animated illustration I made for a Tofugu article about bullfighting in Japan. You can view the hi-res version of this and read more about it here.

teen probz

Animated illustration on underage drinking & smoking in Japan for Tofugu. You can read the article and download the wallpaper of it here.

golden week

Animated version of the illustration I made about Golden Week for a Tofugu article. You can read about it here. Always a lot of fun doing these. :)

happy birthday sho!

Happy birthday Sho! Super late I know, aw. :) I made this a day ago for Sho Nakata, one of my favourite players in the NPB. He just became a new papa this year with a lovely baby daughter (that I hope he takes to games in the future). :) Hee, I know she's just a wee little baby right now, but it's how I imagine her when she grows up with Papa Sho by her side. :) Best wishes on you and your family, Sho! I'll be cheering you on always. :)

i say 'papa' you say 'oh'

Did this over the weekend -- supposed to be a landscape/painting thing (as you can see on the back, ahaha) but it ended up as Otani Shohei instead. :) I can't express how much I love the Hokkaido Nippon-Ham Fighters. I've been a fan since 2008 (this was before I started following the Giants) and it just makes me happy that I'm still here cheering them on. Ah, and you can also see it here, in a recent Tofugu article, about what else, yakyu. :)

taro aso v.s. old people

Last week, the Japanese Finance Minister was quoted to have said that elderly people should be allowed to 'hurry up and die' instead of costing the government money for medical care. I ended up drawing about it! Well, initially this was just a warm-up but I spent my free time making it look better and I got this. Watch Taro Aso as he hurls himself towards an elderly Japanese woman with his flaming fist of fury! We also had them up as wallpapers for Tofugu's Sunday News. AWESOME.