Tuesday, July 18, 2006

Buying manga is not so straight forward

So many things which happened lately, yet somehow I don't have the mood to put them into words.

The past two weeks have been really hectic, work-wise. Attended two days of seminar last Monday and Tuesday. The day after that, I met up with Silentside, Louis and his boyfriend.

And on Thursday, I met up with Silentside again.

Pretty draining to go meet them after a tiring day at work. Still, it was fun to meet Louis and the boyfriend for the first time. They bought some stuff at Bodynits, just like Xavier did not too long ago.

I didn't know this brand has quite a large gay customer base. ;P

We had dinner at Marina Square and then got lost trying to find our way out to the Esplanade.

I tell you, Marina Square is the most confusing shopping mall ever. The layout is not user-friendly and the design and layout of the floors are not the same from one portion to the other.

Even my Singaporean friend took a good 20 minutes to find a restaurant there which he has been to before.

At the Esplanade, Silentside recounted for the hundredth time his dilemma. I hope you have got as many opinions as you can and finally decided on something.

Or not. Things may just get solved by themselves sometimes.

As I was meeting Silentside at Orchard, I decided to go get some not-easily-available manga for CF from Kinokuniya.

Censored material stuff, in other words.

I tried looking for the two titles. The map says that one was on shelf 26-H, but there is no such shelf. The shelf stopped at 26-A.

For the other book, the instruction said to seek the staff's assistance.

So I have to ask the staff for help.

First thing she asked was, "Is this for your own personal reading, sir?"

"Yes, they are."

"Please wait a moment. I'll check for the availability. If we have them, you have to show identification that you're eligible to buy them as these are conditional release titles."

Sheesh. The way this was happening, it almost seemed like I was buying hard core porn or something.

Or those which involve animals.

And so she went off to look for the books. They were stacked behind the counter. There were quite a number of other manga titles too.

After the titles were found and I showed my ID to prove my age, she handed over the books to me. Just as I was about to walk away, she turned around and asked her colleague nearby ...

"Do I need to escort him to the cashier?"

WTF? It's not like I was buying weapons or drugs or something dangerous .... Hmmm, what has CF gotten me into?

These titles had better be good and worth all the discomfort I was going through. Hmmm ... I wonder how hard core these titles are? The drawings on the cover seem to be quite mild ... but there is the word yaoi printed ...

Fortunately, her colleague replied no.

And I didn't get any strange looks from the cashier.

Or did I detect a hint of surpressed snigger?

Finally, the plastic was unwrapped and I got to see what all the fuss it's about.

There's nothing even remotely explicit in them, just cartoon porn artistically drawn comics with some homosexual hint ... not even an inch of exposed rendered skin ...

How disappointing! Anyway, it was to be expected. My sweet and mild-mannered boyfriend is just well ... sweet and mild mannered.

And hard core free.

9 comments:

Kihu said...

oh god... they actually did tat.. Huh well it sounds that that comic are illegal there.. Well homosexual is illegal in singapore anyway..

Stinging Rabbit said...

When I first saw it, I thought as much but I think they are overdoing it a bit. Plus, I asked for an erotic gay novel once at the counter. :p It wasn't so bad. And yes, I did get a lot of opinions and it confused me more. Lolz.

Ganymede said...

Hmmm. Perhaps I should try it in Kinokuniya here. Hehehe. Just to see the look on their faces. :P

Anonymous said...

I am not a manga fan but Borders doesn't house many manga titles as compared to Kino. Personally, I prefer to shop at Borders as they won't even raise their eyebrows on some of the titles I purchased in the past.

- Chee Kam

Anonymous said...

I've seen some yaoi titles on the bookshelves here too. Perhaps it's cos they're not even near softcore (as in they only go as far as unbuttoned shirts).

Interestingly, I've even seen cartoons here with a tinge of yaoi. There were cut episodes, though, probably due to some heavier yaoi action going on :P

Derek said...

famezgay: Hello there and welcome to my blog!

I don't think it's illegal in Singapore, just that you need to prove you're mature enough to buy, that's all. It's not an outright ban after all.


silentside: Hmm, what erotic gay novel did you buy? XD


defiant85: Knowing you, I am sure you would. LOL


anonymous: Hi Chee Kam.

I would think that usually they don't care what titles customers buy. Just that, I found the whole thing quite amusing. ;P

Kinokuniya has a wider range of titles. I never really like the Borders in KL.


kyle: Erm ... that happened in Singapore, Kyle dear ;P


weeshiong: Yeah, sometimes the censors and the moral guardians miss these things. They're busy blackening out breasts with black markers in magazine LOL

Harvey said...

Hmm... I've seen a comic ( in BM ) which got some homosexual action there... and they go uncensored (of course the vital parts weren't drawn)

Derek said...

harvey: In Malaysia? That's interesting.

But as you say, the vital parts weren't there, so nothing to ban or censor. LOL

MrBunnyBan said...

...ID? Dude, is that a compliment or an insult at your age? Lol!