Kin (Adam Nazmul)

The story is set in Japan, beginning in the 1990s up until the then present day (2007), with each act centered on a boy named Takaki Tōno. The first act takes place during a time when cell phones are uncommon and email had not yet reached the general population.

Takaki Tōno quickly befriends Akari Shinohara when she transfers to his elementary school. They grow closer to each other due to similar interests and attitudes; for instance, they both prefer to stay inside during recess due to their seasonal allergies. As a result, they form a strong bond; they speak to each other using their given names without any form of honorifics, which is a sign of deep friendship and familiarity in Japan.

Upon graduating from elementary school, Akari moves to Tochigi, due to her parents' jobs. The two keep in contact by writing letters but eventually begin to drift apart. When Takaki learns that his family will be moving to Kagoshima, he decides to personally go see Akari, since they will be too far apart to visit each other at all after moving. He also prepares a letter for Akari containing his feelings. However, Takaki loses the letter during the journey and a severe snowstorm continuously delays his train for several hours. As the two finally meet and share their first kiss, Takaki realizes they will never be together again. Stranded in a shed due to the snowstorm, they fall asleep after talking late into the night. Takaki departs the next morning, and the two promise to continue writing to each other. As the train rolls away, Takaki decides that the loss of his letter is not important anymore after the kiss, while Akari silently looks at her own letter addressed to Takaki.

Takaki is now in the third year of senior high in Tanegashima, where the Tanegashima Space Center is located. Kanae Sumida, a classmate of Takaki, had fallen in love with him ever since meeting him in middle school but has never had the courage to confess her feelings. She tries to spend time with him, waiting long after school for the chance to travel home together. However, Takaki appears ignorant to Kanae's feelings and only treats her as a good friend. Kanae observes that Takaki is always writing emails to someone or staring off into the distance as if searching for something far away. It is later shown that Takaki's emails are not being sent to anyone, and that he has had recurring dreams which feature Akari. After a failed attempt to tell Takaki she loves him, Kanae eventually realizes that he is looking for something far beyond what she can offer and decides not to, though she acknowledges that she will always love him.

It is 2008. Takaki is now a computer programmer in Tokyo, while Akari is preparing to get married to another man. Takaki is still longing for Akari to the detriment of his lifestyle, which is acknowledged by an ex-girlfriend. A depressed Takaki later leaves his job, being unable to cope with his feelings for Akari. Akari goes through her old possessions and finds the letter addressed to Takaki. Takaki and Akari have a dual narration, both recalling a recent dream depicting the events of their last meeting in the snow and hoping to watch the cherry blossoms together again.

One day while walking down a road, Takaki and Akari appear to pass and recognize each other at a train crossing, where they had decided to watch cherry blossoms together thirteen years ago, right before Akari's sudden moving to Tochigi. At opposite sides of the tracks, they stop and begin to look back, but the passing trains cut off their view. Takaki waits for the trains to pass and sees that Akari is gone. After a moment, he smiles to himself and continues walking.

The plot follows the two characters Haruto Kirishima and Yuzuki Eba. Yuzuki moved from Tokyo to her father's rural hometown in Hiroshima Prefecture to attend high school. Given that Haruto's father is an acquaintance of Yuzuki's father, the Kirishimas take her into their home. Haruto is not keen of the situation because he believes that Yuzuki is a complete stranger and that a girl his same age, who is not a relative, living in the same home will cause complications for him. The misunderstanding he wants to avoid the most is that they are a couple because he already likes his classmate, Nanami Kanzaki. The problem is that Yuzuki has romantic feelings for Haruto and is not timid in pursuing a relationship. It turns out Yuzuki is no stranger: She visited Haruto's city in her childhood. During the summer festival, Yuzuki was on her own and crying. Haruto approached her and made her happy. Also Yuzuki never got along with her family since she was treated like the fifth wheel by her step-family.

When Haruto finally confesses to Nanami, he is rejected. He does not understand for a long time, until Nanami opens his eyes: Even though Haruto pretends to love Nanami (even to himself), his actions said otherwise. Whenever he had to decide between spending time with Nanami or saving Yuzuki from one of the situations she would keep getting herself into, he would choose Yuzuki. After finally admitting to himself that he has fallen for Yuzuki, he tries to pursue a relationship with her - only to find out that she has somewhat given up and decided to go back to Tokyo, to patch things up with her family. After many complications Haruto confesses his love at a festival before Yuzuki is to return to Tokyo and they both start a long distance relationship.

The long distance relationship becomes a problem when Yuzuki suddenly stops all contact to Haruto, presumably after having fallen in love with a boy from her school. Haruto doubts this and believes Yuzuki is in trouble instead, and decides to go seek her to help her out. He persuades his parents to allow him to move to Tokyo in order to pursue a career as a cook. Finally in Tokyo, he soon makes friends with Asuka, a girl, and Kazama, an open hearted guy who is always in high spirits. Kazama wants to become a professional biker and asks Haruto to open a restaurant, so Haruto can become Kazama's sponsor. Haruto soon finds out that Kazama is terminally ill and will die in a year; however, Kazama is also the new boyfriend of Yuzuki. Haruto learns from Yuzuki that she is with Kazama only due to his illness. He decides not to lie to his friend Kazama and fight for Yuzukis love openly. It turns out that there is a surgery that can possibly save Kazamas life - or pass away during the surgery, if things go back. After a heated discussion, Kazama decides to take the surgery. Coming back from the successful operation he first writes on his helmet "this space is reserved for Haruto-kun's restaurant", but dies the night after due to the stress the operation has been for his body. On his funeral, Haruto sees the Helmet and cries. Due to the experience they made with Kazama, Yuzuki and Haruto decide not to see each other again.

In the following time, Asuka and Haruto become very close and eventually start to date. As graduation comes closer, all of Haruto's childhood friends decide to go to the same university as him, among them Nanami and his closest friends Takashi and Akira. In order to pay for a trip that they want to make, Haruto takes a job at a supermarket close to Yuzuki's home. Yuzuki and Haruto meet each other frequently and become friends again. After a few misunderstandable situations between Yuzuki and Haruto, Haruto finds that he still has strong feelings for Yuzuki. He lies to Azuka to be with Yuzuki who finds out about this. Haruto confesses his feelings for Yuzuki to Asuka and breaks up with her, causing all his former friends to turn their backs on the couple. Haruto, who knows he will be happy with Yuzuki, accepts and endures this for a long time. After going to Kazama's grave together a long time later, the two find out that their friends have finally forgiven him; However, Akira's father becomes sick and she decides to move back to Hiroshima. It is also around this time that Haruto realizes his dream to become a chef.

When Haruto and Yuzuki get together, Haruto decides to move out of his sister's apartment, and get his own place in Tokyo. The main reason for this is because he is constantly reminded of his time dating Asuka, which is painful and awkward for them both. After he moves in, Yuzuki's father finds out that they are dating, and because Yuzuki lied to him about it (and because he is jealous of Haruto making her happy, while he couldn't), her father decides that Yuzuki will stop seeing Haruto altogether. Because of this, Yuzuki runs away from home to live with Haruto, again. She and her father eventually reconcile, with him giving his blessing to the couple. The two become good friends with their neighbor, Miyu Hoshina, a timid and insecure girl, who goes to the same college as Haruto. Though she is afraid of men, she warms to Haruto after he helps her a few times, for no apparent reason. She causes many humorous misunderstandings between the three of them. Together with Haruto and Yuzuki, she plans a trip to Okinawa, in order to cement their friendship. When they return, Haruto ponders what it means to fall even more in love with someone, and how he can express it to Yuzuki. He eventually realizes how, and on their one year anniversary of being together in Tokyo (as well as the 200th chapter of the series), they finally make love for the first time.

Manga are comics created in Japan, or by Japanese creators in the Japanese language, conforming to a style developed in Japan in the late 19th century. They have a long and complex pre-history in earlier Japanese art.

In Japan, people of all ages read manga. The medium includes works in a broad range of genres: action-adventure, romance, sports and games, historical drama, comedy, science fiction and fantasy, mystery, suspense, detective, horror, sexuality, and business/commerce, among others. Although this form of entertainment originated in Japan, many manga are translated into other languages, mainly English. Since the 1950s, manga has steadily become a major part of the Japanese publishing industry, representing a ¥406 billion market in Japan in 2007 (approximately$3.6 billion) and ¥420 billion ($5.5 billion) in 2009. Manga have also gained a significant worldwide audience. In Europe and the Middle East the market is worth $250 million. In 2008, in the U.S. and Canada, the manga market was valued at $175 million. The markets in France and the United States are about the same size. Manga stories are typically printed in black-and-white, although some full-color manga exist (e.g. Colorful). In Japan, manga are usually serialized in large manga magazines, often containing many stories, each presented in a single episode to be continued in the next issue. If the series is successful, collected chapters may be republished in tankōbon volumes, frequently but not exclusively, paperback books. A manga artist (mangaka in Japanese) typically works with a few assistants in a small studio and is associated with a creative editor from a commercial publishing company. If a manga series is popular enough, it may be animated after or even during its run. Sometimes manga are drawn centering on previously existing live-action or animated films.

The term manga  is a Japanese word referring both to comics and cartooning. "Manga" as a term used outside Japan refers specifically to comics originally published in Japan.

Manga-influenced comics, among original works, exist in other parts of the world, particularly in China, Hong Kong, and Taiwan ("manhua"), and South Korea ("manhwa"). In France, "manfra" and "la nouvelle manga" have developed as forms of bande dessinée comics drawn in styles influenced by manga. The term OEL manga is often used to refer to comics or graphic novels created for a Western market in the English language which draw inspiration from the "form of presentation and expression" found in manga.

Modern manga originated in the Occupation (1945–1952) and post-Occupation years (1952–early 1960s), while a previously militaristic and ultra-nationalist Japan rebuilt its political and economic infrastructure.

Writers on manga history have described two broad and complementary processes shaping modern manga. One view emphasizes events occurring during and after the U.S. Occupation of Japan (1945–1952), and stresses U.S. cultural influences, including U.S. comics (brought to Japan by the GIs) and images and themes from U.S. television, film, and cartoons (especially Disney). The other view, represented by other writers such as Frederik L. Schodt, Kinko Ito, and Adam L. Kern, stress continuity of Japanese cultural and aesthetic traditions, including pre-war, Meiji, and pre-Meiji culture and art.

Regardless of its source, an explosion of artistic creativity certainly occurred in the post-war period, involving manga artists such as Osamu Tezuka (Astro Boy) and Machiko Hasegawa (Sazae-san). Astro Boy quickly became (and remains) immensely popular in Japan and elsewhere, and the anime adaptation of Sazae-san drawing more viewers than any other anime on Japanese television in 2011 . Tezuka and Hasegawa both made stylistic innovations. In Tezuka's "cinematographic" technique, the panels are like a motion picture that reveals details of action bordering on slow motion as well as rapid zooms from distance to close-up shots. This kind of visual dynamism was widely adopted by later manga artists. Hasegawa's focus on daily life and on women's experience also came to characterize later shōjo manga. Between 1950 and 1969, an increasingly large readership for manga emerged in Japan with the solidification of its two main marketing genres, shōnen manga aimed at boys and shōjo manga aimed at girls.

In 1969 a group of female manga artists (later called the Year 24 Group, also known as Magnificent 24s) made their shōjomanga debut ("year 24" comes from the Japanese name for the year 1949, the birth-year of many of these artists). The group included Moto Hagio, Riyoko Ikeda, Yumiko Oshima, Keiko Takemiya, and Ryoko Yamagishi. Thereafter, primarily female manga artists would draw shōjo for a readership of girls and young women. In the following decades (1975–present), shōjo manga continued to develop stylistically while simultaneously evolving different but overlapping subgenres. Major subgenres include romance, superheroines, and "Ladies Comics" (in Japanese, redisu レディース,redikomi レディコミ, and josei 女性).

Modern shōjo manga romance features love as a major theme set into emotionally intense narratives of self-realization. With the superheroines, shōjo manga saw releases such as Pink Hanamori's Mermaid Melody Pichi Pichi Pitch Reiko Yoshida's Tokyo Mew Mew, And, Naoko Takeuchi's Pretty Soldier Sailor Moon, which became internationally popular in both manga and anime formats. Groups (or sentais) of girls working together have also been popular within this genre. Like Lucia, Hanon, and Rina singing together, and Sailor Moon, Sailor Mercury, Sailor Mars, Sailor Jupiter, and Sailor Venus working together.

Manga for male readers sub-divides according to the age of its intended readership: boys up to 18 years old (shōnenmanga) and young men 18- to 30-years old (seinen manga); as well as by content, including action-adventure often involving male heroes, slapstick humor, themes of honor, and sometimes explicit sexuality. The Japanese use different kanji for two closely allied meanings of "seinen"—青年 for "youth, young man" and 成年 for "adult, majority"—the second referring to sexually overt manga aimed at grown men and also called seijin ("adult" 成人) manga. Shōnen, seinen, and seijin manga share many features in common.

Boys and young men became some of the earliest readers of manga after World War II. From the 1950s on, shōnen manga focused on topics thought to interest the archetypal boy, including subjects like robots, space-travel, and heroic action-adventure. Popular themes include science fiction, technology, sports, and supernatural settings. Manga with solitary costumed superheroes like Superman, Batman, and Spider-Man generally did not become as popular.

The role of girls and women in manga produced for male readers has evolved considerably over time to include those featuring single pretty girls (bishōjo) such as Belldandy from Oh My Goddess!, stories where such girls and women surround the hero, as in Negima and Hanaukyo Maid Team, or groups of heavily armed female warriors (sentō bishōjo)

With the relaxation of censorship in Japan in the 1990s, a wide variety of explicit sexual themes appeared in manga intended for male readers, and correspondingly occur in English translations. However, in 2010 the Tokyo Metropolitan Government passed a bill to restrict harmful content.

The gekiga style of drawing—emotionally dark, often starkly realistic, sometimes very violent—focuses on the day-in, day-out grim realities of life, often drawn in gritty and unpretty fashions. Gekiga such as Sampei Shirato's 1959–1962 Chronicles of a Ninja's Military Accomplishments (Ninja Bugeichō) arose in the late 1950s and 1960s partly from left-wing student and working-class political activism and partly from the aesthetic dissatisfaction of young manga artists like Yoshihiro Tatsumi with existing manga.

Dōjinshi, produced by small publishers outside of the mainstream commercial market, resemble in their publishing small-press independently published comic books in the United States. Comiket, the largest comic book convention in the world with around 500,000 visitors gathering over three days, is devoted todōjinshi. While they most often contain original stories, many are parodies of or include characters from popular manga and anime series. Some dōjinshicontinue with a series' story or write an entirely new one using its characters, much like fan fiction. In 2007, dōjinshi sold for 27.73 billion yen (245 million USD). In 2006 they represented about a tenth of manga books and magazines sales.

sometimes spelled penchak silat or pentjak silat in Western writings) is an umbrella term for a class of related martial arts originating in the Indonesian archipelago. It is a full-body fighting form incorporating strikes, grappling and throwing in addition to weaponry. Every part of the body is subject to be attacked and used to attack. Pencak silat was practiced not only for physical defense but also for attainment of higher psychological ends.

The leading organization of pencak silat in Indonesia is IPSI (Ikatan Pencak Silat Indonesia, meaning Pencak Silat Association of Indonesia). The liaison body for international pencak silat is the International Pencak Silat Association or PERSILAT (Persekutuan Pencak Silat Antara Bangsa).

The archipelagic chain that is today Indonesia was the scene of warfare for much of its long history, and the people of the region naturally developed effective methods of combat and self-defense.^[2] The earliest weapons found in Indonesia were spears, single-edge swords, shields, and axes. Proto-Malay farmers migrated into Sumatra from the north and mixed with the local tribes. Whole communities from China were transferred to Indonesia, bringing their weapons and weapon-making technology with them. Similarities have been observed between southeastern Chinese boat communities and the Indonesian sea-nomads (orang laut), such as the long-boat culture, war fleets, tattoos, familiarity with plant poisons, and bladed weaponry. Whether the Baiyue and Tanka people first originated in China or Southeast Asia is debated, but it was the Baiyue introduction of metallurgy that lead to the prominence pencak silat gives to blades.

Pencak silat styles and movements are as diverse as the Indonesian archipelago itself; each schools and disciplines might uses distinct styles and movements. Pencak silat employ wide ranges of movements, either as strikes (serangan) by punching (pukulan) or kicking (tendangan), to block the attack (tangkisan), or as feigned attack (tipuan). Compared to other Asian martial arts, Pencak Silat seems to emphasize more on hands movements of kuncian (lit. "locking") andg rappling.

Malioboro Street is a major shopping street in Yogyakarta, Indonesia; the name is also used more generally for the neighborhood around the street. It lies north-south axis in the line between Yogyakarta Kraton andMount Merapi. This is in itself is significant to many of the local population, the north–south orientation between the palace and the volcano being of importance.

The street is the centre of Yogyakarta's largest tourist district surrounded with many hotels, restaurants, and shops nearby. Sidewalks on both sides of the street are crowded with small stalls selling a variety of goods. In the evening several open-air street side restaurants, called lesehan, operate along the street. This is the street of the artists. Street musicians, painters, and other artists exhibit their creations on this road. Less obvious to the tourist, but more for the local population, side streets, lanes and structures that lead on to Malioboro are as important as the street itself.

The street was for many years two-way, but by the 1980s had become one way only, from the railway line (where it starts) to the south - to Beringharjo markets, where it ends. The largest, oldest Dutch era hotel, Hotel Garuda, is located on the street's northern end, on the eastern side adjacent to the railway line. It has the former Dutch era Prime Minister's complex, thekepatihan, on the eastern side.

For many years in the 1980s and later, a cigarette advertisement was placed on the first building south of the railway line - or effectively the last building on Malioboro, which advertised Marlboro cigarettes, no doubt appealing to locals and foreigners who would see a pun with name of the street with a foreign product being advertised.

It does not reach the walls or grounds of the Yogyakarta palace, as Malioboro ceases in name adjacent to the very large market Beringharjo (on the eastern side as well). From this point the street changes name to Jalan Ahmad Yani (Ahmad Yani Street) and has the former Governors residence on the western side, and the old Dutch Fort Vredeburg on the eastern side.