This year end, guess what I did after work? *laugh*

The good old couch potato tradition of spending time with a screen. *laugh*

Nothing too spectacular but at least I enjoyed time to myself with the simplest form of mental escapism – movies. Hehe.

Since it’s too expensive to buy DVDs in Japan, most people including moi, resort to renting. It costs about RM70 to rent 5 movies for a week and although it isn’t the cheapest form of entertainment, the rental business in Japan is thriving especially this week, thanks to people like me. *laugh*

What amazes me most if the integrity of the Japanese people, as illustrated in the Japanese DVD rental system. Basically, the systems works like this – you sign-up for a membership card at no cost.

After that you are free to rent from any outlet throughout the city (there’s one in almost every district). When you want to rent a particular DVD, you take the special DVD case out of the title cover and bring it over to the cash counter where you would have to present your membership card and pay for the duration of your rental (i.e. whether you’re intending to rent for a day or a week).

The return of the rented DVDs would just be by dropping them in the return box. If you are late, you need to return the DVDs at the cash counter so that you can pay for the penalty fee.

Now, imagine that scenario in Malaysia. Without a deposit for a membership setup I’d forsee the issue of people not returning the DVDs at all, or even if they do return the DVDs late, how many Malaysians would actually be honest enough to own up for the late charges? *laugh* I guess there is no wonder why such a system doesn’t quite exist within the country. *laugh*

Well at the end of the day I reckon it has to do with mindset.  Let’s hope time will change things for the better ay?

In my little cosy room, I finally caught up on the Harry Potter series, Narnia 2 (the 3^rd one is yet to be released until February!), Dances With The Wolves, Jennifer’s Body, The Oxford Murders, Inception, The Other Man, The Box, Wall Street 1 and some others which turned out to be grade B movies! *laugh*

I’m looking forward to catching a good movie when I make my next trip back home. Not sure what’s showing now though since new releases seem to premier a tad later in Japan than they do in KL. Regardless, it’ll be on my to-do list during the upcoming trip. Yay! *smile*

HAPPY NEW YEAR everyone! あけましておめでとうございます！