Gilles Update
May. 20th, 2008 03:05 pmOn Saturday I went to my old neighborhood to see my former co-worker/neighbor/travel buddy and wife, Gilles and Marion. Gilles, and then Marion, worked at the same high school as I did, as French ALTs. Gilles moved here during my second year and he fast became the ALT coworker who I didn't want to kill (Texas Anne, wanted to kill. Humorless Jamacian, Wanted to kill. Little Brother Jimmy, not yet a co-worker). We drank wine, coffee and occasionally did crepe nights. We traveled to Cambodia. We made fun of eachother's countries and then bashed our own for a bit. After Gilles and Marion had a Pax ceremony (similar to being a legal domestic partner) I flew to Paris and hung out with them.
When I ended my time at the high school, Marion moved to Japan and started teaching Spanish and French to children, and after a year took over Gilles position and he worked on writing and freelance work (including video game localization).
They are major geeks, but friends. They made me play a Steve Jackson Game (midget chuthulu?) and I don't usually roll that way...but they did give me wine and cheese first and some Balkan music. I gave them some dvds and yummy salad. Gilles had covered one wall in various post-in notes diagraming timelines and events and cultural info for a history book he wants to write,.
That's not the big news, I'm getting to it. Gilles set out to write about Japanese culture, but found that everything he wrote was just too preachy/teacherly. Gilles assimilated in ways I never dreamed off. He had a very high level tea ceremony master who was determined to prove to her peers that she could properly train a very largergaijin in the art. He was polite. He tried participating in Japanese RPGs. He was better at not shouting "Bullshit" when a teacher told us bullcrap about Japanese culture (did you know? Japan doesn't need foot doctors because they take their shoes off indoors....BULLLLLSHIIIIIIIT)
Gilles and Marion are working on transitioning back to a France-based life....so Gilles has been applying for schools/programs(apprentiships) at publishing houses and book sellers. I am a little unclear on how this all works. I just know that he got accepted at a publishing house. A porn one. And this helped him make a huge breakthrough.
He would write pornography that helps us all learn a little bit about Japanese culture.
He researched, and asked a lot of folks for very personal stories, and wrote what I am told is a VERY pornographic story about two French guys who come to Japan: one who is afraid of Japanese women and prefers prostitutes and imported friends from back home and one who wants to fuck a different woman every night...and through it they learn about Japanese culture. He says that it's so pornographic that only 3 publishing houses in France will even touch it....and he reminded me that we're talking about France...not Puritanical America. But soon my Brother Gilles is gonna be a published pornographer. He'll also be making a promotional clip for it this summer, and when it hits You Tube I'll link it.

http://antoinemisseau.canalblog.com/archives/2008/05/07/9087595.html#comments
I really hope it does well enough to be translated into English. There's a market!