Enclave

Galina Busigin, I met her a long time ago playing a fun, addicting multiplayer game called Subspace (later renamed Continuum), though most of us tended to call it SS for short. I want to say it was around 2002. The time frame is hard to judge. Even back then, in a game where we blow each other up, sometimes coordinated, she was outgoing and friendly. I cannot recall the exact reason we hit it off as friends, but we did, and exchanged handles for what would be our most common form of saying hi, AIM.

Here is where I get all tangenty. You’ll have to bear with me. I don’t really have an order here, just a stream of consciousness. Typos and all.

We had a long lapse of communication. I cannot remember the exact time frame, but I was shocked to see that familiar name pop up on aim. I always tried to leave aim up and running, just to try and catch people I have not seen in awhile. It was a happy surprise to find her again. She was coming back home after being gone for awhile. For the longest time, I had thought of her as Lina Lina. For forever, as far as I can remember. It does not get unstuck.

pete (7:58:19 PM): rarr!
lina (7:58:30 PM): roar
pete (7:58:44 PM): =)
pete (7:58:49 PM): how’s lina lina?
pete (7:58:56 PM): I don’t know why i do that
pete (7:59:04 PM): But I always think of your name that way!
lina (7:59:42 PM): hehe, I like it

(more…)

Let me tell you about a friend of mine. Her name was Elise, which happens to be a long standing favorite name of mine, but I knew her as Jayyde. She had an endearing personality. Her laugh was infectious. It was honest and earnest. You couldn’t help but feel welcome and return the laughter. I may have trouble remembering its sound, but never how warm it felt to hear it.

I’ll never forget the first time I got to hear her voice. I had returned to dabble in one of my favorite games, City of Heroes. I had been welcomed with open arms back to my old SG. They have always been very accepting over the years of my off and on returns. They had come to start using vent to more easily talk about what was going on and to just have fun. We were doing a respec trial for hero side and were fighting Sky Raiders I believe. They had convinced me for the first time to go on vent and it was a riot. It was like a family of friends, full of laughter. I couldn’t imagine a more welcoming experience. It was really the first moment that my friends of Adversity really became a family.

She was an amazing gamer. An addicted collector of badges and shiny things. She’d never hesitate to help you out in game. Oh sure, you could pull her arm by tempting her with shiny badges. But you knew she’d help you if she could. The badges just made it more fun. You’d be hard pressed to find another who could pick up a class as well as her. She could tank, blast, defend, scrap, control, and perhaps best of all, order robots to blast us to bits like a legend. There really was not a class she could not play to its fullest.

I remember when she would recant the latest episodes of Avatar the Last Airbender on vent. She held it in such high regard that I eventually had no choice but to check it out. It became out of my favorite shows to date. The humor and characters fit her personality so well. It will always remind me of her.

She was a selfless hero. Was not afraid to tell you when you were being stupid, but would never belittle you for it. She was witty and intelligent. It made her sense of humor so quick and sharp. She’d pick up and roll with my silly humor and would welcome it and make it her own.

Elise Rene Vallade, born Born October 27, 1979, suddenly, of natural causes passed away on September 27, 2011. It was the same day as my birthday. I’ll never forget her for as long as I live. I’ll always regret that I missed the opportunities to meet her in person at the chances I had. But I will always cherish the good times we had. Bananarama to you Jayyde. Rest in peace. It won’t be the same without you, but we know you are up there making sure to clear out the baddies for us and finding all the glowies until we reach your level. We all love and miss you.

I read this story awhile ago, but did not think to post it here until now.  It is a blog post someone else made about someone who, in my mind, is a legend.  Her name was Miki Endo.  Her story involves her tragically heroic acts following Japan’s earthquake and subsequent tsunami.

Excerpt from the article (linky).

Miki Endo was a 25 year-old public worker who worked in the Crisis Management Dept. of the city of Minami Sanriku, one of the worst-hit cities in the Miyagi prefecture – of its 17,000 inhabitants, 10,000 perished and only 7,000 or so survived the tsunami.

Many of those 7,000 that survived escaped death because of Miki Endo’s broadcast. Mainichi Shimbun reports that Miki Endo did not let go of her microphone, even during the very moment the black waves of the tsunami engulfed the city, so that every last villager could hear her warning call. One co-worker told Miki’s mother, that he saw Miki being swept away by the tsunami wave.

A 61 year-old man named Taeza Haga heard Miki Endo’s warning broadcast, and scrambled to his car, just his cellphone in hand. He barely made it to the higher regions of Minami Sanriku, where he could see entire buildings and houses being swallowed up by the tsunami. Mr. Haga noticed Miki Endo’s mother, standing anxiously by the list of survivors, and took hold of her hand, and told her

“I could hear your daughter’s voice all the while I came up here.”

All over Japan, these stories proliferate, encourage and move us even in the midst of this unbelievable chaos. There is even a video capture I saw of a ramen noodle shop in Roppongi, in which the owner is doing his heroic best to protect the safety of the customers before his own or his store’s… and as the store is rattling as if it will crumble in a wink, even in that moment of life-or-death kind of panic, the customers – before leaving – do not forget to leave the proper money on the table for their food! The incredible civic honor of the Japanese people and polity makes me profoundly ashamed of my own culture: from a college student to politicians to basketball players – Alexandra Wallace. Governor Haley Barbour’s press secretary. Cappie Pondexter – these people seem to regard Japan’s disaster as just an opportunity to air out their long-harbored racism or some narcissistic, self-serving purpose.

The skeletal structure of red beams in the YouTube clip above is the tattered remnant of the building where Miki Endo made her last broadcast, a girl in her beautiful 20s. No racist comments or insensitive quips made by any creep in any society can take away the lives that she saved: a precious multitude. Although cut tragically short, she lived the most worthwhile life of them all, a beautiful sentinel. Please spread the word of her legacy.

She was discovered in shizugawa bay about 700 meter from coast on 23th April.

I cannot imagine the strength of will it took to make that sacrifice.  All I know is I won’t forgot who she was.