[news] GACKT BLOG 10/25/2011
Finally a new GACKT blog.
Since I thought this was a very important entry, I translated more parts than usual.
From GACKT's Car Window - Long Time No See - Tohoku Edition
He's still organizing his pics for the EU tour report, let's hope the boy gets to it before too long.
YFCz has just finished the 1st day of Osaka lives, which turned out to be crazy-exciting.
My throat hurts like it's on fire.
I don't have any voice now, but that can't be helped.
I don't want to be a grown-up who would perform in a live thinking about tomorrow.
No matter how much people tell me I'm doing too much and that I'm foolish,
I will deliver everything I can to the people who come to see us tonight.
I'll think about tomorrow when tomorrow comes.
His body's still excited, while his brain's working at high speed.
He's decided to update his blog and talk about the trip YFCz took to Sendai.
Oct.1, 2011
After performing for 2 days in Sapporo, they flew directly to Sendai because all of the members agreed on their need to burn the current situation of the disaster areas into their eyes now that half a year has passed since 3.11.
Sendai still has a long way back to normalcy. The scenery everywhere is still so unbelievably surreal (See pics in the blog).
And yet, the members hear this line from many people throughout their trip: "This is so much better than it used to be, though."
At sunset, they visited the house of Yusa Kanako, who was a Dear that lost her life in the Tsunami at the age of 20. (I don't know if this is the same girl he talked about back then, but I'm almost certain it is). Her mother and brother welcomed the members.
The brother told them the details about the disaster (Kanako was found 5 days later) and showed them the pictures he took from the second floor of his house, risking his life. The pictures showed houses floating closer from afar. If your legs get caught by the waves impregnated with mud, you couldn't get away.
Just listening to the stories of that time made my chest hurt and pained me, no words could come out of me.
It is really difficult for us, who live far away from the disaster areas, to truly know these pains.
It's a very difficult thing to understand other people's pains.
A friend of mine who participates in other volunteer activities said to me "At any rate, just go to the affected areas and feel the current situations".
Now I truly know what he meant.
There are so many things here that you can't communicate with words, pictures, and videos alone.
My heart aches.
Oct. 2
They left in the early morning to Rikuzen Takada City, which is over 4 hours away from Sendai and not many volunteers go there.
They wanted to deliver as much courage as they could to the children there.
There, Kumatani-san, who witnessed the disaster directly, met them as a tour guide.
The scenery we witnessed in front of our eyes were totally different from those we'd seen in photos and videos.
The reality is that the 380cm-high tsunami swallowed whole many people and their livelihoods.
I guess this is what it means to be speechless.
In fact, no matter how many words I write down and post photos and videos,
what becomes communicated [through them] is still so small.
u:ZO muttered.
"It's no good.... No matter how many pictures I take,
no matter how many of these pictures I show [to people],
the core of the truth can never be communicated..."
u:ZO muttered as he held tears in his eyes.
The other members and I were also feeling the same.
I want to ask this of all of you.
I want you to actually go there and feel the real conditions at least once.
There are people who say it's indiscreet [to visit], but that's absolutely untrue.
It depends on the attitude/mindset of the people who go there.
It is never indiscreet to feel the current conditions there,
to know what happened there,
or to never forget what happened there.
Rather, it's much more indiscreet to feel like you've understood the situation by merely watching the news or looking at photos.
There are many things we shouldn't forget as the Japanese.
This, I ask of you from the bottom of my heart.
After this, they paid a surprise visit to the local junior high and high schools.
All the members were interacting with the kids with broad smiles on their faces.
We were feeling the deep joy of seeing the kids' smiles.
Many of these children lost their parents.
Still, they are moving forward toward the future.
At the end, the kids gave us this message.
"Thank you so much for traveling so far to see us.
We will keep doing our best to restore [the city] as fast as we can.
It will probably take a very long time, but please keep on supporting us.
Thank you so much for your visit today."
I feel like it's us who has to thank them.
These kids are doing their best to live today.
The future of this country belongs to these kids.
We, grown-ups, have to do what we can for these kids, one thing at a time.
Oct. 3
They met with the mayor of Tagashiro City, who thanked them for their support since immediately after the disasters.
It's us who have to thank them.
They also made a surprise visit to a college campus, where the students were all shocked.
But in the end, there were many students who were shedding tears toward the end of his speech.
They spent as much time as they could looking around the disaster areas before they had to go get ready for the live.
The two lives they performed there in Sendai ended up being greatly different in terms of the meaning.
I believe that we must keep continuing this matsuri (YFC lives) with the understanding of its meanings.
Some people say we should be more discreet with our matsuri.
But I think that now, more than ever, is the time we must have this matsuri.
Matsuri is originally a ceremony where people gather together to cleanse souls and send them to the afterworld.
That's why, at a time like this, all the participants need to have serious fun so that the souls won't leave their sorrows in this world, so that they can be sent on with smiles, or the screams of the souls will never cease.
Many of the fans participating [in the matsuri] were crying while laughing toward the end.
They all bear different pains,
but I sincerely hope that they took home even a little bit of courage that they could use to move forward into the future lying ahead of them.
That day after the matsuri,
I saw the members crying, as well.
Over and over, for some reason,
I couldn't stop the tears in the middle of the songs, and I had to fight them.
Why did my tears keep flowing...
Tears kept overflowing in the middle of the songs.
"It's no time to cry, I have to communicate my feelings to them!!"
I kept scolding myself as I kept reminding myself of this.
[snip]
We will deliver courage to many people through YFC activities.
I believe that the day will come when, in 10 years, we meet the people who were able to start moving forward from this point,
and be proud of what we've done as YFC as we look back on our own activities.
At any rate, the tour will keep on continuing for a long time still.
We'll do what we can.
We'll do what we can, even if it's little by little.
So that when we look back, we can see people looking at us with smiles.
GACKT
Source: http://gackt.com/gacktblog/?p=2181
Since I thought this was a very important entry, I translated more parts than usual.
From GACKT's Car Window - Long Time No See - Tohoku Edition
He's still organizing his pics for the EU tour report, let's hope the boy gets to it before too long.
YFCz has just finished the 1st day of Osaka lives, which turned out to be crazy-exciting.
My throat hurts like it's on fire.
I don't have any voice now, but that can't be helped.
I don't want to be a grown-up who would perform in a live thinking about tomorrow.
No matter how much people tell me I'm doing too much and that I'm foolish,
I will deliver everything I can to the people who come to see us tonight.
I'll think about tomorrow when tomorrow comes.
His body's still excited, while his brain's working at high speed.
He's decided to update his blog and talk about the trip YFCz took to Sendai.
Oct.1, 2011
After performing for 2 days in Sapporo, they flew directly to Sendai because all of the members agreed on their need to burn the current situation of the disaster areas into their eyes now that half a year has passed since 3.11.
Sendai still has a long way back to normalcy. The scenery everywhere is still so unbelievably surreal (See pics in the blog).
And yet, the members hear this line from many people throughout their trip: "This is so much better than it used to be, though."
At sunset, they visited the house of Yusa Kanako, who was a Dear that lost her life in the Tsunami at the age of 20. (I don't know if this is the same girl he talked about back then, but I'm almost certain it is). Her mother and brother welcomed the members.
The brother told them the details about the disaster (Kanako was found 5 days later) and showed them the pictures he took from the second floor of his house, risking his life. The pictures showed houses floating closer from afar. If your legs get caught by the waves impregnated with mud, you couldn't get away.
Just listening to the stories of that time made my chest hurt and pained me, no words could come out of me.
It is really difficult for us, who live far away from the disaster areas, to truly know these pains.
It's a very difficult thing to understand other people's pains.
A friend of mine who participates in other volunteer activities said to me "At any rate, just go to the affected areas and feel the current situations".
Now I truly know what he meant.
There are so many things here that you can't communicate with words, pictures, and videos alone.
My heart aches.
Oct. 2
They left in the early morning to Rikuzen Takada City, which is over 4 hours away from Sendai and not many volunteers go there.
They wanted to deliver as much courage as they could to the children there.
There, Kumatani-san, who witnessed the disaster directly, met them as a tour guide.
The scenery we witnessed in front of our eyes were totally different from those we'd seen in photos and videos.
The reality is that the 380cm-high tsunami swallowed whole many people and their livelihoods.
I guess this is what it means to be speechless.
In fact, no matter how many words I write down and post photos and videos,
what becomes communicated [through them] is still so small.
u:ZO muttered.
"It's no good.... No matter how many pictures I take,
no matter how many of these pictures I show [to people],
the core of the truth can never be communicated..."
u:ZO muttered as he held tears in his eyes.
The other members and I were also feeling the same.
I want to ask this of all of you.
I want you to actually go there and feel the real conditions at least once.
There are people who say it's indiscreet [to visit], but that's absolutely untrue.
It depends on the attitude/mindset of the people who go there.
It is never indiscreet to feel the current conditions there,
to know what happened there,
or to never forget what happened there.
Rather, it's much more indiscreet to feel like you've understood the situation by merely watching the news or looking at photos.
There are many things we shouldn't forget as the Japanese.
This, I ask of you from the bottom of my heart.
After this, they paid a surprise visit to the local junior high and high schools.
All the members were interacting with the kids with broad smiles on their faces.
We were feeling the deep joy of seeing the kids' smiles.
Many of these children lost their parents.
Still, they are moving forward toward the future.
At the end, the kids gave us this message.
"Thank you so much for traveling so far to see us.
We will keep doing our best to restore [the city] as fast as we can.
It will probably take a very long time, but please keep on supporting us.
Thank you so much for your visit today."
I feel like it's us who has to thank them.
These kids are doing their best to live today.
The future of this country belongs to these kids.
We, grown-ups, have to do what we can for these kids, one thing at a time.
Oct. 3
They met with the mayor of Tagashiro City, who thanked them for their support since immediately after the disasters.
It's us who have to thank them.
They also made a surprise visit to a college campus, where the students were all shocked.
But in the end, there were many students who were shedding tears toward the end of his speech.
They spent as much time as they could looking around the disaster areas before they had to go get ready for the live.
The two lives they performed there in Sendai ended up being greatly different in terms of the meaning.
I believe that we must keep continuing this matsuri (YFC lives) with the understanding of its meanings.
Some people say we should be more discreet with our matsuri.
But I think that now, more than ever, is the time we must have this matsuri.
Matsuri is originally a ceremony where people gather together to cleanse souls and send them to the afterworld.
That's why, at a time like this, all the participants need to have serious fun so that the souls won't leave their sorrows in this world, so that they can be sent on with smiles, or the screams of the souls will never cease.
Many of the fans participating [in the matsuri] were crying while laughing toward the end.
They all bear different pains,
but I sincerely hope that they took home even a little bit of courage that they could use to move forward into the future lying ahead of them.
That day after the matsuri,
I saw the members crying, as well.
Over and over, for some reason,
I couldn't stop the tears in the middle of the songs, and I had to fight them.
Why did my tears keep flowing...
Tears kept overflowing in the middle of the songs.
"It's no time to cry, I have to communicate my feelings to them!!"
I kept scolding myself as I kept reminding myself of this.
[snip]
We will deliver courage to many people through YFC activities.
I believe that the day will come when, in 10 years, we meet the people who were able to start moving forward from this point,
and be proud of what we've done as YFC as we look back on our own activities.
At any rate, the tour will keep on continuing for a long time still.
We'll do what we can.
We'll do what we can, even if it's little by little.
So that when we look back, we can see people looking at us with smiles.
GACKT
Source: http://gackt.com/gacktblog/?p=2181