So, me and my exchange person started sharing messages early on in the piece with talk like 'what kind of anime do you like?' and such. We liked a few of the same things too which meant we were off to a pretty good start.

Over the weeks they assured me the swag they were sending me would amaze my face off and holllly SHIT, THAT is one understatement.

I came home today to find two rather large packages from Japan and instantly I was pretty pumped. They even drew a cute little alien face on the box. I've been wanting to visit Japan for a long LONG time and many of my friends have lately so I've seen what kind of cool stuff they've come back with and been very much wanting to get some for myself.

Opened the box and the first thing I saw was a bag from the Japanese Pokemon Center complete with some cool stationary thing with chibi Charizards on it which made me smile.

I then opened the large tube and found two Great Teacher Onizuka posters which are damn awesome. It's also one of the anime we both liked which is great.

Delved a little deeper in the box to find a whooole lot of Anime themed snacks. Dragonball Z, BECK (fuckin' love BECK, damn good series), GTO and even some badass little Wreck-It Ralph ones I didn't know existed. I must add that, as a massive retro videogame fan and someone who loved the shit out of that film this came as a pleasant surprise.

The best was yet to come though, oh yes, the best was yet to come. As someone who is rather fond of outdated technology I have always wanted to get myself an old-school Laser Disc player. Even just flipping the movie over half way through would feel fantastic...which brings me to the next part.

Enter Anime Laser Discs. Oh my shit, there's no way I can described how overjoyed I was to see these and be able to start myself off decently towards a collection of the things.

Dragonball Z, Grave of the Fireflies (yesss), Ranma 1 1/2, some...other one that I have no idea what it is but it looks cool...and the real finisher. Four Neon Genesis Evangelion Laser Discs. As a massive fan of the series since it was released (over 15 years I'm sure) who even has the NERV logo tattoo'd on their body, THESE are the prize of my new collection. They're beautiful...so very beautiful and as my match said, they make great art (yes, I get what you meant now haha).

I frequent conventions over here in Australia quite often and have met most of the English voice cast of Dragonball Z (Chris Sabat is a top guy, great to hang out with whenever I see him), the Japanese voice actress for Asuka in Evangelion and Teryl Rothery who was in part of the English Ranma dub and honestly I've run out of things like DVD covers, manga books etc. for them to sign when they eventually come back...but now I am set. Oh I am very VERY set.

To Blackmaru: you are the greatest person ever. Nobody will ever be greater than you. When I end up making it over to Japan I owe you one MASSIVE high five.

I cannot thank you enough for this, you deserve a life full of awesome and great.

From your match, Mike-Towns.