Non-no August 2011

Long time no magazine posts! You thought I gave these up, didn't you? ^.^

While packing up my apartment in Japan, it wasn't just a few mooks I found under a layer of dust. There were a few magazines too from late summer 2011 I had totally forgotten about! So here's to better late than never, this is Non-no August 2011. It came with a Coach fan and handkerchief. These freebies made it a popular issue and it was sold out quickly. I was so lucky to get even one issue, and there I was letting it sit for more than a year! 

If you're wondering why a magazine would give out a fan and handkerchief as freebies, you should know that to survive a Japanese summer, these 2 items are must-haves in your handbag. Yes, one is to keep cool, and the other to keep dry. Both men and women carry fans and handkerchief, so it's not a girlie thing to do at all. You will often see salarymen in full black suits fanning and dabbing away in the subway. Man, just remembering that makes me sweat. Urgh.

The fan is kind of neat. It is wood with polyester fabric in red Coach logo print.

The handkerchief is made of cotton and measures 40(height) x 40(length) cm. It is red with the brand name and trademark picture in white. Too bad it also has a snag on one of the sides, though it's not really noticeable. I ended up giving both of these away to a relative. I actually don't like logo prints ^.^

This issue actually wasn't bad! Here are some fashion rankings.

Trend (street) snaps, which are always enjoyable.

A 20-days outfit diary from the rainy season to the beginning of the summer. ...But, but, but... this is an August issue?!?

Styling Q&A.

A section on yukatas is required for summer issues!

Erhh...fan service, I guess, if you're a Miura Shohei fan.

Takei Emi, who played Kamiya Kaoru in the super awesome Rurouni Kenshin live action that came out last fall.

She was alright, but holy hell, the movie was one of the best live actions I've ever seen in years, or ever, period. Let me tell you, it's extremely difficult to make a good live action of a famed manga with a host of anime series, OVAs, animated movies, what have you, under its belt, let alone that manga is about a wandering swordsman infamous for his fighting technique (and for being a killing machine...). The risk of making the characters cartoony, or worse, making a caricature out of them, is extremely high, to speak nothing of choreographing the crazy fictional sword fights. And yet somehow, this movie managed to do all that, bringing both Kenshin and his ass-kicking Hiten Mitsurugi-ryū to life, and then some! Let's just say my sister and replayed a couple of the fighting scenes at least 10 times on slow motion, just so we could catch what the hell just happened.
The first few times went pretty much like this:
- *gasp* Did you see what he did?!?
- No. Did you?
- No. Rewind.
- *gasp* OMG, did you see that?!?
- No. Did you?
- No. Rewind ^.^'

A year before the movie was released, I was iffy about the casting, chiefly because I wasn't sure Sato Takeru could fill Kenshin's shoes. Boy did I eat my words. I didn't like that he often overdid the hunching over of the back and shoulders (Kenshin can be goofy, but he's a confident sob, none of that insecure and/or withdrawn hunching over stuff), but other than that, hands down he is Kenshin in the flesh and no one could have done it better. Okay, impromptu movie review over. 

Speaking of Sato Takeru, below is his buddy, Miura Haruma, aka the Oi Ocha guy according to my sister, because his ads for the tea was everywhere when we were still Japan (they probably are still...) LOL!