This week has been quite a ride for the Yuri fandom. I would like to sit back and just talk about something else than making reviews on the intensity of the week. If ever I am blessed with time in the coming days, I’ll do what I can to catch up on my review backlogs.
Not sure if I’ve mentioned this here in the site but I have been a fan of Yuri since 2004-2005 so I was pretty much entering high school at that time. For an innocent girl who is new to this genre, I only appreciated it as it is and did not dwell on the deeper stuff like my sexual orientation and preference. I just loved the genre as it is.
DSL connections were still very expensive at that time so I only had to deal with a 56k dial-up connection and a few diskettes to find and enjoy Yuri (USB Flash drives weren’t a thing yet).
Aside from the various yuri fanpages hosted under Angelfire and Geocities sites, one particular website still has a special place in my heart and has been ever since– the website was Shoujoai.com
A Sacred Haven for Yuri Fans
Shoujoai.com was made in 2001 popular for its Yuri fanfiction database and archive as well as its forum and IRC roleplay channel called Shoujoai-MUSH. The creator of the website was Philip Mak or pmak0 as he is known in the community.
My search for more Sakura and Tomoyo subtext pics has lead me to Shoujoai.com and its fanfiction archive. Fanfictions centered in this ship were the second largest in the website’s database (Sailor Moon being the first largest). It had around 800 fanfictions in its website alone. It was also in Shoujoai.com where I got to know about going into forums and the basic etiquette in posting there. It opened so many doors for me not only as a starting yuri fan, but also as a regular Internet user. I became way more advanced with my peers when it comes to the World Wide Web and I think I have to give a part of the credit to the site.
Philip Mak
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| Pmak0 is a ‘Slayers’ fan hence this Lina Inverse picture ^_^ |
I always remember Philip Mak as a person who creates ways to bring all Yuri fans together. It was in Shoujoai that got me hope that this genre would connect me to different people not only in my own country but also in other parts of the world. We (the fans) finally had a place to call “home”.
I wasn’t too familiar with sending emails yet when I was in high school but back then, I really wanted to send an email to pmak0 to thank him for his hard work in creating Shoujoai. By the time I was already in my Freshmen year in college, I realized that my chances of sending him my thanks were too late. Philip Mak died in 2007 due to brain aneurysm. When I heard about it, my heart just sank.
A Website to Remember
In this new generation where Yuri webcomics dominate and there are a lot of sources for you to go and search for Yuri recommendations, Shoujoai.com is a yuri website that will remain closest to my heart. Philip Mak will always be remembered. If it weren’t for his efforts, yuri fans wouldn’t have a safe haven to just read yuri and interact with fellow fans all over the world.
Pmak0, thank you so much. This blog post is dedicated to you and it is the least I can do to say my thanks for the things you have done way back. 🙂
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