OOC: HISTORY
The second of four children and the only boy, Ash grew up in St. Kilda, a coastal suburb of Melbourne, Australia, sandwiched between his brilliant one year older sister McKenzie (Kenzie) and bratty younger twin sisters Nicola and Danielle (Nic and Dani). His mother, a travel broker slowly completing her Master's in classical studies, was always easily distracted by his sisters, and his engineer father was often working during Ash's childhood, so Ash has always felt like he has had little attention from his parents.
His father did make an effort, though, introducing Ash to rugby and windsurfing in his rare free time. While Ash didn't quite catch on with playing rugby, he has been a fan as long as he can remember, and as a child began windsurfing. His father was also the first to teach him how to use a camera, cementing photography as one of Ash's lifelong passions.
The winter of 1999, or, more accurately, Vamdemon's worldwide search for the eighth Chosen Child, changed Ash's life. Ash had been showing Kiwi relatives around Melbourne's Luna Park when the amusement park was invaded by Digimon, both Vamdemon's forces and the resistance. Pukamon was part of this resistance, somewhat ambitiously, considering his Baby II level. When Pukamon was on the verge of deletion, Ash realized Pukamon was on his side and saved him by bashing a Tureiemon over the head with his tripod. The Tureiemon was suitably distracted. The tripod was destroyed.
This first impression of Digimon unfortunately colored an eight-year-old Ash's perception of all Digimon. His parents said they were dangerous, the media labelled them a threat, and despite Pukamon's persistence Ash refused to acknowledge Pukamon as his partner, even attempting to throw out his digivice.
The next spring, Ash was caught in a rip while windsurfing and almost drowned. He came very close to clinical death, but Pukamon rescued him and brought him to his one year older sister Kenzie. Ash never went windsurfing again (instead sticking to sports and performance photography) and began to grudgingly accept there was something between them, and their bond gradually strengthened over the years.
Their relationship was still nowhere near the friendship most other Chosen Children have with their Digimon partners, a fact painfully driven home on a family trip to Townsville at Christmas 2002. Ash hadn't even wanted to bring Pukamon along, but Kenzie had packed him anyway. This came in handy once Eucalyptus came calling for any Chosen Children who happened to be around. Ash was rather put out by how close all the other Chosen seemed to their Digimon, and was especially disconcerted by Derek's windsurfing with Crabmon.
Having come close to losing Pukamon once, Ash did not allow him to take part in the Digimon battles, using the excuse "you're just a Baby" after overhearing the term from other Chosen. Instead, Ash declared himself a babysitter and looked after a particularly young Chosen Child, to her chagrin and Eucalyptus' bemusement. Despite seeing the friendships between Digimon and their partners first hand, Ash was still wary of Digimon and anything (and anyone) to do with them.
Luckily, the digital world turned a blind eye to Ash after Christmas 2002, allowing him to pretend any incidents with Digimon had never happened. He was accepted to the prestigious Melbourne High School on account of his skills in mathematics and science, but soon lost interest in both fields upon discovering the school's darkroom. As Ash grew older, he began almost exclusively attending his English, math, and photography classes and spending most of his time either in the school darkroom or out taking photos. His father, keen to make amends for their distant relationship, turned a blind eye to his frequent absences from school and, to Ash's surprise, agreed not to tell his mother about them.
Early in his high school career, Ash befriended a third generation Italian girl, Katia, and the two soon became best friends. An accidental exposure to Pukamon made Katia the second person in Ash's life to know about his involvement with Digimon. The third member of their little trio, a self-proclaimed otaku named Tegan, has not been told about Pukamon with the excuse that "she'd think it was like Pokemon or something". Ash is also close to his older sister Kenzie. As his closest friends were girls, this tended to set off people's gaydars, and he wasn't particularly social in high school.
Considering he rarely turned up to class, Ash was, at best, mediocre at Japanese, but at the age of sixteen and in his second to last year of high school, he signed up for an AFS exchange to Japan on a whim and promptly forgot about it. When he was accepted on the one year exchange, he figured he'd better go so as not to have wasted AFS's time. His Japanese teacher agreed, in the hopes that living in Japan might force him to learn some of the language.
Ash moved to West Shinjuku, Tokyo in early September 2007, staying with the Terayama family and adopted as a younger brother by his overzealous host sister Megumi (Meg). He soon began tutoring Tsubasa Matsuki, the son of the owners of a cake shop, sparking his first friendship in Japan and in fact his first friendship with another boy for several years. He also met and befriended Hikari Yagami and Takeru Takaishi, his first Chosen friends. Except for breaking his ankle during a Christmas shopping trip and his host sister thinking he was gay, Ash's exchange went without much incident. Megumi discovered Pukamon was in fact a digimon a matter of days before going to Melbourne, but did not spill the beans to his family. Her parents never found out about Ash's involvement with digimon either.
In September 2008 Ash returned to Melbourne much more fluent in Japanese. There he found that Megumi had gotten on alarmingly well with his sisters and best friends, and that his parents had bought him a car for the Christmas he was in Shinjuku. Miscommunication between his exchange school and Melbourne High meant that Ash only narrowly graduated high school at the end of the year, though his grades were high when they finally came through.
Trying to get this sorted out jaded him to formal academic education, and so instead of applying to university, he began a practical photography certificate at a local TAFE (vocational) college in 2009, living at home. He remained in contact with his Japanese friends and family and still hung around with Katia; Tegan went to university four hours away and the three visited each other. As well as this Ash began to make new, if shallow friends and dated around a little bit (the car helped).
At last his father discovered Pukamon. After ten years of hiding his involvement with digimon, Ash finally came clean about it to the rest of his family. As Digimon were becoming more common in Australia by now, his family were generally more upset that he'd hidden it than that it had happened.
It took half his first year of TAFE for Ash to realize how else Japan had changed him: He had become fond of travel, of exploring a new country, of discovering a new culture. So when the Disney International College Program recruited at his TAFE, Ash immediately applied for a one year exchange to work at Walt Disney World in Florida. He was accepted onto the program as a concierge for the first half of his program and working in attractions the second.
In January 2010, for the second time in his life Ash found himself packing up his life and moving to a different country, though at least this time he spoke the language. His roommates and friends knew about Pukamon but kept it quiet, as Disney's housing does not allow pets.
After a brief but highly successful stint as concierge, his managers allowed him to transfer to photography, where he took photos of people outside Space Ship Earth, with characters, etc. Ash did well for himself in Disney Photoimaging, taking consistently good photos and even being trained to be a trainer.
Halfway through his time at Disney, Ash got himself a Livejournal in an effort to reach out to more Chosen than just Hikari and Takeru as well as chronicle his adventures in America. Thanks to Livejournal, he met an American Chosen Child, Maria Vasquez in New York City on a quick roadtrip up the East Coast at the end of summer.
The isolation of the Disney College Program makes for a somewhat tumulteous personal life and Ash was no exception: One girl he briefly dated but remained friends with later came out of the closet. He was hit on by a (male) Goofy performer. In a moment of weakness at the end of his summer roadtrip, he hooked up with one of his best friends from Disney, and their relationship never recovered from the resulting awkwardness. His first girlfriend ever had been an American girl on vacation in Australia; though they didn't keep in touch on her return to the States, she began her own College Program and similarly transferred to photography, where Ash had to train her. As she was new to the Program when Ash had been there for almost a year, he showed her around on their off time, and though the two never discussed restarting their relationship they certainly didn't see anyone else.
Towards the end of his internship Ash applied on a whim to continue as a seasonal cast member at Disney and in traditional fashion promptly forgot about it, as international interns are very rarely allowed to change status. To his endless surprise his change of status was approved.
Ash's visa afforded him a month's travel in the United States after completing his Program, and he and Pukamon embarked upon a whirlwind tour of the country within a few weeks, hitting Puerto Rico with his old College Program friends, Washington DC with his other best friend from the Program, New York City (where he spent some time with American Chosen Wallace Schubaker), New Orleans, and Disneyland, before meeting with a cousin teaching snowboarding in Vancouver and flying over to visit his friends and family in Tokyo on a generous joint family Christmas present. In Tokyo, Ash got to catch up with Takeru and meet another Japanese Chosen Child, Sora Takenouchi; Pukamon also had some time to catch up with Tailmon.
Finally, after a year overseas, Ash returned to his hometown of Melbourne and to TAFE to finish up his photography diploma, and also began a Spanish course at a local university, struggling with reverse culture shock all the while. Natural disasters in his old flatmates' home and college towns, his own home town, and finally Japan, his second home, spurred him into volunteering with cyclone cleanup in Queensland and earthquake cleanup in Christchurch in weekends. However, his first school break of the year had long been scheduled for Florida, and so Ash returned to Disney to work for two weeks. By his second term, his spending on his charitable travels and his barely profitable work at Disney limited his travel to breaks, and his studies became more stressful.
His father did make an effort, though, introducing Ash to rugby and windsurfing in his rare free time. While Ash didn't quite catch on with playing rugby, he has been a fan as long as he can remember, and as a child began windsurfing. His father was also the first to teach him how to use a camera, cementing photography as one of Ash's lifelong passions.
The winter of 1999, or, more accurately, Vamdemon's worldwide search for the eighth Chosen Child, changed Ash's life. Ash had been showing Kiwi relatives around Melbourne's Luna Park when the amusement park was invaded by Digimon, both Vamdemon's forces and the resistance. Pukamon was part of this resistance, somewhat ambitiously, considering his Baby II level. When Pukamon was on the verge of deletion, Ash realized Pukamon was on his side and saved him by bashing a Tureiemon over the head with his tripod. The Tureiemon was suitably distracted. The tripod was destroyed.
This first impression of Digimon unfortunately colored an eight-year-old Ash's perception of all Digimon. His parents said they were dangerous, the media labelled them a threat, and despite Pukamon's persistence Ash refused to acknowledge Pukamon as his partner, even attempting to throw out his digivice.
The next spring, Ash was caught in a rip while windsurfing and almost drowned. He came very close to clinical death, but Pukamon rescued him and brought him to his one year older sister Kenzie. Ash never went windsurfing again (instead sticking to sports and performance photography) and began to grudgingly accept there was something between them, and their bond gradually strengthened over the years.
Their relationship was still nowhere near the friendship most other Chosen Children have with their Digimon partners, a fact painfully driven home on a family trip to Townsville at Christmas 2002. Ash hadn't even wanted to bring Pukamon along, but Kenzie had packed him anyway. This came in handy once Eucalyptus came calling for any Chosen Children who happened to be around. Ash was rather put out by how close all the other Chosen seemed to their Digimon, and was especially disconcerted by Derek's windsurfing with Crabmon.
Having come close to losing Pukamon once, Ash did not allow him to take part in the Digimon battles, using the excuse "you're just a Baby" after overhearing the term from other Chosen. Instead, Ash declared himself a babysitter and looked after a particularly young Chosen Child, to her chagrin and Eucalyptus' bemusement. Despite seeing the friendships between Digimon and their partners first hand, Ash was still wary of Digimon and anything (and anyone) to do with them.
Luckily, the digital world turned a blind eye to Ash after Christmas 2002, allowing him to pretend any incidents with Digimon had never happened. He was accepted to the prestigious Melbourne High School on account of his skills in mathematics and science, but soon lost interest in both fields upon discovering the school's darkroom. As Ash grew older, he began almost exclusively attending his English, math, and photography classes and spending most of his time either in the school darkroom or out taking photos. His father, keen to make amends for their distant relationship, turned a blind eye to his frequent absences from school and, to Ash's surprise, agreed not to tell his mother about them.
Early in his high school career, Ash befriended a third generation Italian girl, Katia, and the two soon became best friends. An accidental exposure to Pukamon made Katia the second person in Ash's life to know about his involvement with Digimon. The third member of their little trio, a self-proclaimed otaku named Tegan, has not been told about Pukamon with the excuse that "she'd think it was like Pokemon or something". Ash is also close to his older sister Kenzie. As his closest friends were girls, this tended to set off people's gaydars, and he wasn't particularly social in high school.
Considering he rarely turned up to class, Ash was, at best, mediocre at Japanese, but at the age of sixteen and in his second to last year of high school, he signed up for an AFS exchange to Japan on a whim and promptly forgot about it. When he was accepted on the one year exchange, he figured he'd better go so as not to have wasted AFS's time. His Japanese teacher agreed, in the hopes that living in Japan might force him to learn some of the language.
Ash moved to West Shinjuku, Tokyo in early September 2007, staying with the Terayama family and adopted as a younger brother by his overzealous host sister Megumi (Meg). He soon began tutoring Tsubasa Matsuki, the son of the owners of a cake shop, sparking his first friendship in Japan and in fact his first friendship with another boy for several years. He also met and befriended Hikari Yagami and Takeru Takaishi, his first Chosen friends. Except for breaking his ankle during a Christmas shopping trip and his host sister thinking he was gay, Ash's exchange went without much incident. Megumi discovered Pukamon was in fact a digimon a matter of days before going to Melbourne, but did not spill the beans to his family. Her parents never found out about Ash's involvement with digimon either.
In September 2008 Ash returned to Melbourne much more fluent in Japanese. There he found that Megumi had gotten on alarmingly well with his sisters and best friends, and that his parents had bought him a car for the Christmas he was in Shinjuku. Miscommunication between his exchange school and Melbourne High meant that Ash only narrowly graduated high school at the end of the year, though his grades were high when they finally came through.
Trying to get this sorted out jaded him to formal academic education, and so instead of applying to university, he began a practical photography certificate at a local TAFE (vocational) college in 2009, living at home. He remained in contact with his Japanese friends and family and still hung around with Katia; Tegan went to university four hours away and the three visited each other. As well as this Ash began to make new, if shallow friends and dated around a little bit (the car helped).
At last his father discovered Pukamon. After ten years of hiding his involvement with digimon, Ash finally came clean about it to the rest of his family. As Digimon were becoming more common in Australia by now, his family were generally more upset that he'd hidden it than that it had happened.
It took half his first year of TAFE for Ash to realize how else Japan had changed him: He had become fond of travel, of exploring a new country, of discovering a new culture. So when the Disney International College Program recruited at his TAFE, Ash immediately applied for a one year exchange to work at Walt Disney World in Florida. He was accepted onto the program as a concierge for the first half of his program and working in attractions the second.
In January 2010, for the second time in his life Ash found himself packing up his life and moving to a different country, though at least this time he spoke the language. His roommates and friends knew about Pukamon but kept it quiet, as Disney's housing does not allow pets.
After a brief but highly successful stint as concierge, his managers allowed him to transfer to photography, where he took photos of people outside Space Ship Earth, with characters, etc. Ash did well for himself in Disney Photoimaging, taking consistently good photos and even being trained to be a trainer.
Halfway through his time at Disney, Ash got himself a Livejournal in an effort to reach out to more Chosen than just Hikari and Takeru as well as chronicle his adventures in America. Thanks to Livejournal, he met an American Chosen Child, Maria Vasquez in New York City on a quick roadtrip up the East Coast at the end of summer.
The isolation of the Disney College Program makes for a somewhat tumulteous personal life and Ash was no exception: One girl he briefly dated but remained friends with later came out of the closet. He was hit on by a (male) Goofy performer. In a moment of weakness at the end of his summer roadtrip, he hooked up with one of his best friends from Disney, and their relationship never recovered from the resulting awkwardness. His first girlfriend ever had been an American girl on vacation in Australia; though they didn't keep in touch on her return to the States, she began her own College Program and similarly transferred to photography, where Ash had to train her. As she was new to the Program when Ash had been there for almost a year, he showed her around on their off time, and though the two never discussed restarting their relationship they certainly didn't see anyone else.
Towards the end of his internship Ash applied on a whim to continue as a seasonal cast member at Disney and in traditional fashion promptly forgot about it, as international interns are very rarely allowed to change status. To his endless surprise his change of status was approved.
Ash's visa afforded him a month's travel in the United States after completing his Program, and he and Pukamon embarked upon a whirlwind tour of the country within a few weeks, hitting Puerto Rico with his old College Program friends, Washington DC with his other best friend from the Program, New York City (where he spent some time with American Chosen Wallace Schubaker), New Orleans, and Disneyland, before meeting with a cousin teaching snowboarding in Vancouver and flying over to visit his friends and family in Tokyo on a generous joint family Christmas present. In Tokyo, Ash got to catch up with Takeru and meet another Japanese Chosen Child, Sora Takenouchi; Pukamon also had some time to catch up with Tailmon.
Finally, after a year overseas, Ash returned to his hometown of Melbourne and to TAFE to finish up his photography diploma, and also began a Spanish course at a local university, struggling with reverse culture shock all the while. Natural disasters in his old flatmates' home and college towns, his own home town, and finally Japan, his second home, spurred him into volunteering with cyclone cleanup in Queensland and earthquake cleanup in Christchurch in weekends. However, his first school break of the year had long been scheduled for Florida, and so Ash returned to Disney to work for two weeks. By his second term, his spending on his charitable travels and his barely profitable work at Disney limited his travel to breaks, and his studies became more stressful.