Gushing over Kiara (Thank you, Part 2)
I’m a fan of Kiara Takanashi!
This post is a continuation of my series about Kiara Takanashi. The first part contained some vague and unfocused amalgamation of a story about my latest ‘obsession’. The wording is stiff and barely resembles anything thoughtful at all. I’ve merely seen a glimpse of the magical world of true fandom. In light of getting better, I sacrifice a piece of my mind to the gods lest they somehow blocked my path to glory.
Anyway, I dissect the more hidden in plain sight parts about being a true fan. The gushing that started with the previous installment overflowed into this one! Sorry, not sorry in advance.
Don’t like to read that much? Check the third installment for a fun (I’d say so) FAQ section that also intends to summarize the experience a bit.
Fans and their trigger
Right off the bat, I’ll come out and say that I have no clue how an average person converts into a fan. The practical circumstance is highly individualistic. It might be fruitful to philosophize about the seeding moment, so I can tell you how this thing started for me.
Humans look for points of origin to contextualize the present. Even if we’re talking about constantly changing processes, like a meandering riverbank, it’s interesting data to either accelerate, decelerate, or prevent the phenomenon.
Uncovering a source is often a tedious and longwinded process. It’s not always possible to reconstruct a point of origin without some guessing. Computers can do the repetitive calculations for us if the problem is modeled into a set of constraints to satisfy; A meandering river will pull itself straight over time, potentially flooding houses and acres. If we intend to intervene, the original river trajectory will guide us in reversing the corrosion. Or allow us to optimize the water flow to minimize the corrosion effects.
Good luck taking this approach on the topic of anthropology, though!
For me, reasons for mentally latching onto anything root from the following items.
- Weak affiliation.
- Active effort to understand.
The first is a general reason that’s also known as “I just rolled with it”. Some people, sometimes, have no reason other than being at the right place and time. This rule applies to most of my decision-making. I rolled into the consequences they caused. Strolling a bit further down that path makes the “autopilot mode” appear. I don’t believe that turning on autopilot is a bad thing, given you’re not doing anything dangerous.
The second is me quasi telling myself that I’m “diving in”. Contrary to the previous item, this doesn’t happen that often. I’m very particular about the topics that fall into this category. Diving into a topic claims my free time almost entirely for a maximum duration of a year. The topic lingers at the back of my mind afterward. I can very easily forget at that point. No habits, or urges, or other neurotics remain.
Now about Hololive, and consequentially Kiara. There was initially a weak affiliation because a friend was already interested. It’s because of that friend that I experienced the VTuber phenomenon for myself.
Clips of Hololive streams are easily accessible, and the interview with Calliope on the Thrash Taste podcast provided me with a plan to dive into the topic. I essentially followed Calliope’s advice to watch the debut streams and go from there.
The Youtube video linked above is an ok introduction to the VTuber topic. The three guys hosting the podcast each have a different opinion and experience going into the interview. Their questions and expectations are discussed, but sometimes the vocabulary has niche words. Listen specifically to Connor because he did not know about the topic before the interview.
Fans and their hook
I didn’t like the Hololive EN debut videos and felt like I was not part of the intended target audience. It left a bad taste. Out of the five talents, Calliope and Gura were kind of interesting because of their musical skills. I watched some clips, typically a single funny moment from a live stream or a collage of them. Eventually, my interest waned.
I created a hook on my own and started actively searching for information on their physical personas.
Remember that I explicitly stated in the first post not to look for that information? An effortless search gives you this info, but keep in mind that the physical and virtual persona are explicitly separated. Linking both, and spreading that information, goes against the wishes of the talents and makes the action disrespectful.
As it turns out, I was spoiled many times before but not clever enough to see the connection. When I eventually did care, this nugget of information changed my experience completely. The talents are amazing people! I could bring up a lot of respect as if that wasn’t possible for a virtual avatar.
Kiara’s experiences specifically intrigued me a lot. I wanted to know her story and understand her motivations. I became a serious fan of physical Kiara!
But the reality is different. I’m a member of the ‘Kiara the phoenix fan club’. You’ll see me posting messages during her live streams and interact with her on social media. Kiara sounds genuine to me; I like her stories, her jokes, random outbursts, her singing.
Her physical side is put at the very back of my mind, soon forgotten. But I cannot deny that it helped me accept her virtual avatar as a regularity.
There is a lot more I’d like to say about her, but words are hard. I don’t regret what I did as long as she’s happy with the outcome.
In a professional setting, we generally prefer online video meetings over a phone call. During a phone call, our eyes are providing unrelated information that lowers our focus and engagement. To counteract, we subconsciously project the person’s face image on our brain, but only if we’ve already seen it. It’s like an urge, and some people handle this better than others do.
By now I used different reasons for getting myself invested into the topic. As if a puzzle presented itself with a lot of open space left for pieces still inside the box. That puzzle is hard to solve, and it took time to find the right spot and orientation to fit myself in.
The topic boundaries also changed because I stripped uninteresting parts over time. The reason why I’m a fan today isn’t the same one as on day 0.
- Looking into Hololive because of a friend
- Hearing good things from people close to me sparks interest
- Looking into VTubers because it’s new
- I’m always interested in understanding boundary-pushing events
- Looking into VTuber talents individually
- These virtual avatars come with pretty unique personalities
- Looking into ‘backstory’
- Falling in ‘love’ with Kiara
The word ‘love’ is special to me, an expression I strictly use for romantic love. I can’t imagine saying that out loud willy-nilly. But it’s used here regardless, and the reason was a challenge for me to figure out. After all, that’s the crux of this series of posts. Every struggle so far has been an effort to properly contextualize what is happening here.
My strict definition of love breaks down. Not because of logic, but feelings. Nothing more incomprehensible to me than feelings, even if they are my own. Love is one example of life’s aspects that you accept as is. Logic and reason fail to describe this thing.
Talking to others about feelings revealed that they have an easier time accepting than me. I effectively struggle with acceptance at face value.
There is no understanding of feelings. There exists no logical explanation, not always. This applies to both your feelings and those of others. On top of that, feelings create external reliances.
People accept that, while I struggle with acceptance at face value. It’s like I’m blind to the non-logical. Note that I now think of this thing outside of the duality; it is logical, it is unlogical, or it is non-logical. Can you come up with a 4th dimension?
I’m aware this makes me sound broken, or immature at the least. If I can recognize and write about all these details, why do I keep living such a sour-sounding life?
It’s a choice I made for myself. I believe this makes life less stressful, and so far works out for me. Honestly, there is no real reason. The real underlying cause still hides deep within. Maybe I like being contrary.
Now we reached the point where the title of this series falls into place. My journey into fandom leads to a full 180 degrees turn on my common approach to life. I became hypocritical. But being a sour person doesn’t mean that I’m not open to being proven wrong. I actually love a good discussion. This one ended up being a discussion with myself, but it bore fruit nonetheless.
The answer is Kiara; all of her jokes, looks, mentality, laughs, advice, and blurted out happy little accidents. There aren’t any arguments to substantiate why. She intrigues me as if she’s an enigma existing outside the realm of my reality.
She tugged on my feelings. That’s all she did… or I did to myself. In any case, the proper thing to do is thank her for this realization.
I imagine she’s my polar opposite. Still, she reaches decisions that I would have made myself given the same circumstances. Bear in mind that I have never met her, nor did she ever respond to me. It’s a weird thing to explain. She’s both the same but different.
My best analogous example would be mirror images. A mirror mimics the physical world perfectly, wave your right hand into the mirror, and it waves right back at you. But the hands are swapped when you cross the mirror world; left becomes right and vice versa.
The logical explanation is my first assertion being wrong, or I accept that she is a law-bending puzzle. I choose the latter. By now, it’s become clear that sometimes acceptance can be relaxing. She’s entertainment after all, and what does it matter to rack my brain so much?
I feel different when I’m in fan mode; filters disappear, thoughts are more shallow, maybe I even smile like an idiot in front of my screen. It’s hypocritical, or magical, but it depends on how I choose to label it.
My perspective on life changed. I feel more wholesome than yesterday. I haven’t become a different person overnight, but it’s an indication that I may become a happy bastard. Someone free from worries, accepting everyone and everything. Kumbaya, or whatever!
Fans and their future
Coming soon!
NOTE; This post is last updated on 2021-05-19 to sand off rough statements from the previous iteration. Too little detail and a stern tone made it look like I have no clue what I was writing about. I fixed it, and might do another take later.
Check my github repository, profile link at the top of this page, for some juicy history.
I publish immediately for peace of mind. I regularly revisit my content to look for opportunities to improve.
“Staging? NO! We ride or die, Sunny Boy!” - Bad idea factory