Jan. 30, 2019 | Xiaohua Li
Middletown, Pa
You or those around may think favoring perception over reality is an awful idea, but what if perception can sometimes be more influential than reality? The Japanese comics, known as manga, triggered and shaped an ordinary college student’s sports, hobbies, daily activities, and even her favorite places to visit. If this doesn’t make sense to you, how about reading the following short interview?
Former Penn State Harrisburg student, Xinyao Zhao, is a 20-year-old girl born in Shenzhen, China. She began to play flute since she was in fifth grade. She also played tennis as her favorite sport. But her most enjoyable activity was reading Japanese comics at home, the manga. She traveled to Tokyo, Japan, and claimed it to be her favorite places to visit as it was where the manga was born.
Xinyao started her day with morning exercises. The one morning exercise that she always did was running. Specifically, running on an empty and wild field. Xinyao fell into this habit as she learned and copied it from the Japanese manga “Marathon Man” last year.
“I just enjoyed the feeling of flying against the wind when I was running,” Xinyao whispered as she screwed up her eyes in the effort to remember how she has felt.
“It reminds me of the manga I’ve seen, and my perception of that manga visual becomes a reality,” Xinyao excitedly added.
“As for playing the flute, I was inspired by a manga called the ‘Non Non Biyori’, and it’s another Japanese comic I read in elementary school. Since then, I have played the flute for five years,” Xinyao continued, “it’s the same way of how I fall into love with playing tennis, I read the ‘The Prince of Tennis’, another manga.”
Sometimes, perception is like a window on reality, but what manga does it that it inspired the readers and opened the window for them for it to become a reality.
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