About

Quick update on my “About” because I realized how outdated it is.

About the illustrations on this site, I put a link to the source whenever I can over the pic itself. If you’re the artist and want me to remove one or more pic, just send me an e-mail/contact me and it’ll be done as soon as possible. Same thing with lyrics; if you’re the lyricist and want me to remove them from this site, contact me anywhere and it’ll be done as soon as possible.

I get excited when lyrics makes me dream, together with the song. This is what good lyrics must do: making me dream, making me imagine the world around the song, making me feel part of it, either as a protagonist or as a spectator… or at least that’s what I think. And when a song is able to do this, through music, through lyrics… I know that song deserves to be called “a masterpiece”.

Hello everyone! I’m Jaefine, and I’m always stuck when it’s time to write the “about” thing, and I don’t really know why.

About me, I graduated from university in July 2014, studied Japanese by myself for some time, then moved to Tokyo in March 2018 and have been living in Japan since. I have been studies Japanese in a Japanese Language school for one year, when I graduated and started to work as a teacher. I worked as a teacher for about 3 years (March 2019- February 2021), and now I’m working as an UI/UX Designer for a Japanese company where I’m finally able to speak/read/write Japanese in a business environment on a daily basis.

I got married in 2020, and my wife (she is Japanese, but is fluent in 3 languages) helps me with song translations – as you’ve probably already noticed from my notes.

I really love games; my favorite series is probably Shin Megami Tensei, but Zelda: Breath of the Wild is probably my favorite game overall. Recently I’ve been playing Sherlock Holmes: Crimes and Punishments, Control, Stardew Valley, Phoenix Attorney, Hades, Ghost Recon: Wildlands, Fire Emblem and Darkwood, but since I usually play games based on my mood, I often rotate them.

As for my “qualifications”, aside from period of studies in Tokyo, I only took JLPT N2 so far. At the moment, I am working for a Japanese company full time, so I am not so sure I will actually take JLPT N1’s exam anytime soon (I am thinking to take it by the end of 2022 if Coronavirus gets better here in Japan, because after the Olympics the situation is pretty bad).

And this ends the boring “about me” part.

Mirror of Paranoia

Why does this blog exists? For one simple reason: I wanted a place where to go, come back and stay, a place where I would have been able to reach people with what I love, what I think, what I feel.

It’s hard though to explain every single reason why I started “Mirror of Paranoia”. I want to share music and everything I like but at the same time I want people to have equal opportunities –this sounds too damn serious- about translations. I know how sad is to not being able to find the translation of a song you totally love, and thus how sad is to not being to fully understand that song. Thus why I accept requests and always try to do my best even if I don’t particularly like the song or it doesn’t belong to a genre I like.

This is also why it takes me so long translating a song: I want my English translations to be one with the music. They may –surely- won’t be as good as the Japanese ones, but as for me, translations must be part of the song and can’t be treated in the same way you’d treat a book.

Of course, meanwhile I discover new songs, which is amazing. You have no idea how many new songs, bands, vocalists and so on I’ve discovered so far thanks to requests. And this is absolutely fabulous.

I forgot to say “this is just my opinion”. Everything written here it’s something I think and you can agree with it or not, but that doesn’t matter. You’re free to think what you want, to like what you want and so on; you can like how I write as well as you can hate my style, you can like the songs I like as well as you can hate them, nobody will die because of it. As long as there’s respect, everybody is welcomed here.

A Mirror of…

Why someone would care about my blog’s name? No one actually, but I still want to tell you a story.

Long time ago, there was (or: In a future, there will be…; it’s up to you) a man, the reincarnation of Dracula. He wandered into that castle, fighting enemies without hesitation, searching an answer. Then he met Paranoia, and saw himself in a mirror. He was defeated, drowned into his fears, and into madness. He was condemned, yet… he had the chance to restart, and everything changed. His name, you won’t know it yet. You just have to know he was someone who kept trying, fighting against the Mirror of his Paranoia, until he finally succeeded, and was able to go on, meeting other people, other monsters. But this, this is another story.

Aside the fact I’m writing everything for filling the “About” page, and what I’ve written is just partially true –you just have to play Castelvania- that was the first time I saw the words “Mirror” and “Paranoia” together and well, in my mind slowly born “Mirror of Paranoia” which is pretty much self-explanatory.

For those who played Castlevania, I’m pretty sure the reference is blatant. Keep in mind though that I haven’t played “Dawn of Sorrow” in English, nor I remember if it’s written so in Italian, so I actually have no idea if Paranoia really says “Mirror of Paranoia” or not, and thus everything may just be something inside my mind.

This is how my “about” ends. Here. With nothing more. I already blather enough within my posts, so there’s no need to do it even here.