My Top 11 Yuri Manga Highlights of 2012

Sorry about the neglect here as of late- I moved from my hometown in Florida to New York City last Thursday. Now that things have settled down, this blog will revert back to regular posting. Sorry again about the dry spell, and thank you for your patience!

The Top 11 titles below all came out in tankoubon format in Japan in 2012. Following them, I've listed a few series I really look forward to seeing as tankoubon and, last but not least, a summary of the goodies English-speaking yuri fans saw published in 2012. (In that respect, we have a lot more than we did after 2011 and 2010.)

Aoi Hana by Shimura Takako (7 volumes, ongoing):
Because like many of you, I love Fumi and Akira and am waiting with bated breath to see what becomes of them. I have more to say about their current relationship and its possible final outcomes, but will save that for my review of volume 7. Also- not in volume 7, but I love the increased focus Hinako and Orie got in recent chapters.

Collectors by Nishi Uko (1 volume, ongoing):
Collectors is that rarest of yuri delights- a series about two women who are already in love and well past "Does she like me back?" Takako's hobby is collecting fashionable clothes while Shinobu's is collecting books. Despite their very different interests, they clearly belong together. Nishi Uko has been drawing realistic yuri doujinshi as one half of a circle called UKOZ for years (some of which I own; you can read some of her earlier work in English in the Yuri Monogatari 5 and 6 anthologies), so it's great to see her going pro with this series, which is running in the josei magazine Rakuen Le Paradis.

Girl's Ride by Isomoto Tsuyoshi (1 volume, complete):
Wow, does this series make me grin. Simple premise- Sei is a new student at Nan's school, Nan befriends Sei, Nan picks up motorcycle riding because of Sei, and Sei and Nan go riding to different places- often out of town- together. This series has a bit of an old school seinen vibe, it isn't servicey (not even the beach chapter), and its characters are incredibly charming. And, well, it's part of a yuri imprint, so... ^^

Gunjo by Nakamura Ching (3 volumes, complete):

Volume 2 of this series was, as noted in my Yuri Manga Highlights of 2011 list, an emotionally gut-punching book. Volume three's resolution is... haha, I wont tell you. I'm not just being an asshole here- you really should read it without being spoiled. If someone had spoiled it for me prior to my reading it, I would feel like punching them in the face. On that heartwarming note, if you're following this series but haven't read its ending, I hope you get to asap. By far the most likely licensor for this title is Viz (because of its Sig Ikki line; Gunjo ran in Ikki magazine), but I could also see it fitting in, say, Vertical or Dark Horse's catalogues. (Basically, publishers that have shown interest in dark, offbeat seinen titles.)

Hatsukoi Kouzoushiki by Amano Shuninta (1 volume, complete): 

I've become such a big Amano Shuninta fangirl. This collection is a goodie bag of everything she does well- goofiness, sweetness, realism, weirdness, and, yes, sexiness. (She is one of the special few mangaka whose PWP work I find hot. See why this list is so subjective?) My favorite in this collection is one of the non-PWP stories, though- the one about a woman who decides to counter how boring and stuck-in-a-rut she's becoming by ordering a mega-spicy bowl of ramen and eating the entire thing before, eyes watering and lips swollen as an unintended side effect of the ramen, confessing to the co-worker she's in love with. It's utterly adorable, and I love its message.

Kuchibiru Tameiki Sakurairo by Morinaga Milk (2 volumes, complete): 

Specifically, the Kuchibiru reboot, for giving Nana and Hitomi a more conclusive Happily Ever After, and their own place! ^_^ Morinaga has wanted to finish Nana and Hitomi's story for a long time, and Futabasha finally gave her the chance to do so. She did a wonderful job, and while I would be thrilled to see more of Nana and Hitomi, I'm happy with where they are at the end of this series.

Pie wo Agemasho, Anata ni Pie wo ne by Sakamoto Mano (1 volume):
For, quite simply, excellent execution of a variety of premises, featuring characters who feel like people I could know and make me want to see what will happen to them. My favorite in this collection is the one about an actress (a lesbian, happily in love with her girlfriend) moving on from how the idol duo she was once a part of broke up. I don't want to spoil too much, but it's a really lovely, poignant story. As with Nishi UKO, Nakamura Ching, Amano Shuninta, Goto Hayako and Morishima Akiko's work on this list, this collection's focus on adult characters is refreshing.

Poor Poor Lips by Goto Hayako (4 volumes, complete):

Ahhhhhhh! I don't want to spoil how this series resolves either. I will let you know that volume 4 ends happily, and that there is a completely unexpected plot twist in it. I'm so, so happy to see Ren and Nako get a happy ending, though. Those two had me rocking in a fetal position in a corner, hyperventilating, after the events of volume 3.

Renai Joshi File by Morishima Akiko (1 volume, sort of complete):

As long as Morishima Akiko continues putting out at least one yuri tankoubon a year, she'll always have a spot on these "Top Yuri Manga of Such-and-Such Year" lists. This entire collection was great, but it included two things I especially like- seeing a character who lost in a love triangle in another series find her own love, and a long-term, adult lesbian couple acting as role models for a younger lesbian couple finding their footing. I hope it's a long, long, long, long time before Morishima Akiko retires.

Sasameki Koto by Ikeda Takashi (9 volumes, complete):

Sasameki Koto's final chapter came out late in 2011, but its final tankoubon came out in early 2012. As you can see from volume 9's cover, our two lovebirds Sumi and Ushio finally graduate high school. The ending they got made me tear up, in a good way- particularly when I read the chalkboard message from their classmates.

Series That Haven't Been Published as Tankoubon Yet:

Cirque Arachne by Saida Nika:
This series' last chapter ran in the last issue of Yuri Hime to come out in 2012, but its tankoubon hasn't been published yet. It's due to (finally!) come out on February 18. Anyway, want to read something different- as in a yuri manga with an unusual setting? Check, this series is about two women who perform in a Cirque du Soleil-like troupe called Cirque Arachne. What's that, you want to know if the actual story is good? Yes, it's very sweet.  And have I seen Kaliedo Star? Yes, I enjoyed it quite a bit. If you liked it, you should like this series.

Kazuma Kowo's one-shots in Yuri Hime:
Count me as a Kazuma Kowo fangirl also. I've enjoyed Junsui Adolescence and Sayonara Folklore, her two other Yuri Hime collections (and Dear Tear, her het romance from Rakuen Le Paradis), but her one-shots are my favorite part of her body of work so far. I'm also glad she continued the couple from "Recalculation"'s story, since I liked them (especially Kisaragi) quite a bit in their original one-shot. Oh, but all of them are squee-worthy. ^.^

Hayashiya Shizuru's one-shots in Rakuen Le Paradis:
It's no secret that Hayashiya Shizuru's Strawberry Shake Sweet is one of my all-time most beloved series. As great as Hayate x Blade might be as a yuri-flavored action-comedy, I'm very glad to see Hayashiya also doing more romance-centric work in Rakuen Le Paradis. ^^

Under One Roof by Fujio:
I will probably die of old age before this series comes out in a collected volume (it being only 6 or so pages in each issue of Hirari), but man, this is such a delightful little series. Miho, a recent college graduate, decides to move out of her parents' house, so she tours a sharehouse where the only resident is a woman around her age named Fuuka. Fuuka and Miho get along swimmingly, and Fuuka tells Miho right off the bat that she's gay, just to be sure Miho's cool with it. Miho is, and they become housemates. What happens when Miho and Fuuka fall for each other? ^^ (Hint: Squeeee!)


Goodies English-speaking yuri fans got last year:

Cardcaptor Sakura omnibi 3 and 4 by CLAMP (release by Dark Horse):
Yeah, sucks for Tomoyo that she didn't get the girl, but she's still one of yuri's most iconic classic characters, and CCS is a great story all-around.

Girl Friends omnibus 1 by Morinaga Milk (release by Seven Seas): And omnibus 2, now that it's out. Want a realistic coming-of-age yuri romance? Girl Friends is just the ticket. Not only was having this series published in English an utterly delightful surprise, so was its selling well enough to make the New York Times best-selling graphic novel list, AND Seven Seas licensing Morinaga's Kuchibiru Tameiki Sakurairo, which they will publish this summer.

Rica'tte Kanji!?: Tokyo Love by Takashima Rica:
This wonderful yuri classic about a lesbian college student named Rica- her moving from her hometown to Tokyo to attend a college and finally meet other women in the lesbian community, before getting together with her girlfriend, Miho- is now in electronic format, with the addition of Takashima's Rica chapters from the Yuri Monogatari anthologies, a cracktastic original doujinshi by Takashima, and some snazzy all-new content. This 2.0 version of Rica'tte Kanji!? is going to come out (hurr) in print at some point- but for now, it's available as a DRM-free downloadable e-book and can be read for free on ALC's website, which I think is quite neat.

Sailor Moon volumes 6 through 8 by Takeuchi Naoko (release by Kodansha): Haruka and Michiru. Enough said.

Lots of yuri on JManga, most of it published in partnership with ALC Publishing:
Thanks to the influx of yuri on JManga, I got to see some favorites licensed and released this past year (like Sweet Blue Flowers a.k.a. Aoi Hana, Hanjuku Joshi, Haru Natsu Aki Fuyu, and Poor Poor Lips) and check out titles I hadn't read (for the love of god, if you haven't read Tears of Thorn, READ IT). I'm glad Ameiro Kouchakan Kandan is on there as of today, and look forward to seeing what else comes next. ^_^

Another Yuri Classic Revisited: A Discussion of Girl Friends Omnibus 1

Every yuri fan and their grandmother knows Girl Friends- Morinaga Milk's popular yuri romance about Mari, a shy, studious high school girl, and Akko, the outgoing popular girl who becomes Mari's first best friend and turns out to be her true love. :-)

For something different, I thought it'd be fun to review Seven Seas' release of Girl Friends volume 1 in an Off the Shelf-inspired conversation between myself and another blogger- the lovely Day from GAR GAR Stegosaurus. Day is a seasoned yuri fan and a fan of Girl Friends, and a generally awesome person, so I thought it'd be a good idea to discuss this book with her on Skype, before transcribing our meandering ramblings here. (With minor editing for some misspelling, lack of capitalization, lack of punctuation- basically, making it look less like a Skype conversation.) What better way to get a fresh perspective on a story I've read multiple times than to discuss it with someone else?

We're getting meta: Female Yuri Fans in Anime and Manga

On Skype this past week, I attended a panel on sexism in anime and anime fandom by Patrick and Lauren that spawned some interesting discussion of how female otaku are portrayed in anime- predominantly in an objectified or male-otaku-wish-fulfilling way, even though there are exceptions like most of Kuragehime's cast, Hyouka's Mayaka and Sasameki Koto's Aoi. (Heads up, Lauren and Patrick recorded the sexism in anime and anime fandom panel they held at Otakon and posted it here.) Hence my idea for this post, going character by character.

Ritsuko in "Where the White Flowers Bloom" in Sakuraike's Hanakotoba doujinshi (publication date circa 2004, but I'm not sure exactly when) and later republished in English in Yuri Monogatari 5:

"Where the White Flowers Bloom" is a comedy one-shot about a yuri doujinshi circle composed of two friends- a straight girl named Kotomi, who attends a coed high school, and a lesbian named Ritsuko, who attends an all-girls' high school and has a cute girlfriend named Miyuki. There is no angst here- Ritsuko and Miyuki are completely comfortable with themselves and quite happy together. Amusingly, Kotomi's little sister discovers Kotomi and Ritsuko's doujinshi and tearfully tells Kotomi that she'll support her and Ritsuko as a couple no matter what hardships they go through, not listening when Kotomi tries to explain that she's mistaken.

This one shot was originally published as a doujinshi by Sakuraike, a yuri circle known for their sweet, realistic take on high school romance. It's cute, it's funny, and it's frank about its characters' sexuality without objectifying them.

Kannazuki no Miko's Himeko:

I'm counting this drama CD (released in 2004 also) here because it contributes to the KnM anime's canon.

One of the many ineffective villains in the KnM anime is Reiko-sensei, a manga artist. One of KnM's two protagonists, Himeko, is a fan of Reiko-sensei's manga. In a scene from the drama CD that I would love to have seen animated, Himeko giddily attends a book-signing by Reiko-sensei and tries to explain why she loves Sensei's manga to Chikane. (For the two people reading this who don't know, Chikane is in love with Himeko, but thinks her love is hopeless at the point at which the CD takes place.) Chikane is suddenly very interested in Himeko's manga when Himeko describes the manga's heroine, Asuka, confessing her love to a princess. After Himeko acts out Asuka's love confession, a secretly giddy Chikane apologetically says that she had something else on her mind and didn't catch what Himeko said, so could she repeat it? Himeko does because she's glad Chikane is now interested in the manga. Oh guileless, naïve Himeko.

Nothing in this drama CD contradicts the anime's canon, but the overall thing feels more humorously self-aware than the anime, so it makes sense that, in it, Himeko's fannishness over Reiko-sensei's manga turns out to be fannishness over a yuri couple in said manga. It doesn't feel objectifying at all, just cute.

Yurina in "Hana no Yurina Gumi" in ES ~ Eternal Sisters anthology 2, and later Yuri Hime S issue 3:

Presenting the earliest example I've found of the cute-girls-slashing-their-friends trend in moe, from the ES anthology that came out in 2005. (See also: Hiyori in Lucky Star, Mugi in K-ON!, and Chitose in Yuru Yuri. I'm not doing a write-up on Chitose in this post because as much as she slashes Yuru Yuri's other characters, she isn't actually portrayed as someone who reads or watches yuri. I'd bet a million dollars she does, though.)

Yurina attends your classic yuri all-girls' school, and she makes a pest of herself by seeing every interaction between her classmates as gay and trying to get them to realize that they're experiencing, doki doki, forbidden love. She writes yuri doujin novels based on her "pairings."

Like every other moe girl slashing her friends in this post, Yurina's behavior is meant to be identified with by male yuri fans rather than female yuri fans- most evident in how she fetishizes lesbian relationships being "forbidden", which I've only seen straight guys do since the idea of gay relationships as taboo simply for being gay is distressing to the people who actually have them.

Unlike the other characters on this list who friend-slash, on the plus side, Yurina gets a love interest (who acts as a tsukkomi foil to her behavior.) But on the worse-than-average-for-her-character-type side, there's the "Yay, forbidden love!" thing. The best thing about this one-shot is its title, which parodies the title of a classic yuri-ish shoujo gang girl manga called Hana no Asuka Gumi.

Girl Friends's Tamamin:

In late 2006 (yeah, I can't believe it was that long ago either), Morinaga Milk's Girl Friends started running in Comic High! One of the closest friends of Girl Friends' central couple, Mari and Akko, is Tamamin, the resident otaku and flaming weirdo.

She cosplays! She's in the school manga club! She brings doujinshi to school! In fact, when she bumps into Mari in the school restroom, she drops her smutty Revolutionary Pretty Girl Marriage doujinshi, which Mari unwittingly reads and flips out over. (Partly in a "What the hell did you bring to school" way and partly in a "*light bulb goes off* Is this what I want to do with the girl I like?" way, thus joining the ranks of teens who have explored their sexuality through manga smut.) As with all of Tamamin's otaku moments, it's played as a comedic moment to lighten Girl Friends' angst. I think Morinaga just wanted to reference her own prolific yuri doujinshi drawing (and probably collecting), which has included Utena and Sailor Moon yuri slash.

Some of Tamamin's cosplay choices do pander to Comic High!'s seinen audience, like the cosplay Ohno does in Genshiken, but Girl Friends does a good job of not making it feel male gazey. Kind of like how Kaichou ha Maid-sama avoids making its scads of maid cosplay feel servicey- although in Maid-sama's case, because it's shoujo. (Tangent: If someone finds Tamamin's cosplay more problematic than I do, their opinion is totally valid. I don't want some defensive fanboy linking here to be like "See! A girl wrote this! Tamamin's cosplay isn't male gazey at all!" to someone who thinks otherwise. If a woman says she finds a story's depiction or treatment of a female character sexist or icky or problematic in some way and you're a dude who disagrees, step down. You'll step into condescending jackass territory otherwise. Or framed more broadly, if you enjoy privilege in any particular area and someone who has less privilege than you in that area finds a portrayal of a character in their less-privileged-than-you group problematic as a depiction of people in that less privileged group, it isn't your place to argue that it isn't problematic.) I am, admittedly, biased by the fact that I like Girl Friends as a whole and I like Tamamin, shameless nerd that she is.

Tamamin shares her nerdy interests with a group of otaku girls, which is quite nice to see. Interestingly, she's the only conventionally pretty one. The other otaku in Girl Friends, including a couple otaku guys who attend a mixer Tamamin attends, fit the gawky, not-caring-much-about-their-looks otaku stereotype. In the afterword to Girl Friends volume 1, Morinaga depicts herself and her friends in high school as plain and nerdy/not mingling with the Beautiful People- so her depiction of Tamamin's otaku group feels like she's poking fun at herself in a way. Tamamin's closest friend, ironically, is Sugi, a more image-conscious girl who loves Tamamin as a friend despite her otaku hobbies.

Kyoshiro to Towa no Sora's Kozue:

In the winter 2007 anime season, we got Kyoshiro to Towa no Sora, Kaishaku's Tsubasa Chronicle-esque mish-mash of series they'd done, including expies of Kannazuki no Miko's Chikane and Himeko, named Kaon and Himiko. Like KnM's Himeko, KyoSora's protagonist Kuu has a chummy, tomboyish roommate who teases her about her love life, named Kozue. When Kuu sees Kaon and Himiko kiss in episode 2, with sparkles around them and everything, she's like "Doki doki! Oh my! Two girls kissing, just like in the manga Kozue owns!" It is but a fleeting comment, but it counts. It's also one of KyoSora's few intentionally funny moments. KyoSora has plenty of service, but none involving Kozue, for what little she appears.

Lucky Star's Hiyori- and Konata?:

Hiyori is a fan of BL and yuri. She guiltily draws yuri doujinshi based on two of her friends who, blessedly for her, are too naïve to catch on. Hiyori has some funny moments (my favorite being the one in which she trips and twists around mid-air to save her drawing hand from being injured) and like every other otaku character in Lucky Star, is meant to parody how otaku practice their hobby and relate to non-otaku.

I'm sure the Konata x Kagami fans drew all sorts of inferences from Konata's geeking out over Maria-sama ga Miteru and watching Strawberry Panic! in episode 7. She could count, but she isn't as definite as Hiyori.

Lucky Star's entire premise (the daily lives of moe otaku girls) is service. And as with Tamamin's cosplay, it has elements that could be read as what we more commonly think of as service for people who really want it to be there. But like pretty much everything by Kyoto Animation, Lucky Star does a good job of avoiding feeling male gazey. I've only read a smidgen of the manga, so I can't comment on it. A lot of women like the Lucky Star anime, myself included, but I get that, even though I and other female anime fans identify with some of its characters' behavior, the female otaku characters in it are meant to, overall, be identified with more by male otaku than female otaku.

K-ON!'s Mugi: 

So basically, Mugi's as gay as a rainbow banner festooned with lilies at a pride parade.

She slashes her friends, which is obviously an unrealistic meta gag (I've explained why I don't like it before), but she's also the first one in her group to decide to go to a women's college. (<- Said with a wink and a nudge, y'all. I know there are other great reasons for attending women's colleges. But it's Mugi, so... ^_^ ) There's also her brief thing for Sawako-sensei in the anime.

After Mugi graduates, her kouhai Sumire (in the original K-ON! manga's high school sequel) confirms that Mugi has read her share of yuri. (I'll assume anime-Mugi has done it too, because I can.) Once again, just a one-time reference to the yuri fandom of the character in question, but still nice to see it mentioned- especially for a character who is already pretty gay.

Sasameki Koto's Aoi:

Sasameki Koto's Aoi, "Where the White Flowers Bloom"'s Ritsuko, and Hanjuku Joshi and Ruruiiro no Yume's Chie are the only characters in this post whose yuri fandom isn't A) only referenced once/obscurely or B) at all meant to make them act like your stereotypical otaku guy in a cute girl suit. Like Ritsuko and Chie, Aoi isn't a sex object at all either.

Aoi is a yuri fangirl (in love with a series of Maria-sama ga Miteru-esque shoujo light novels written under a female pseudonym by the brother of SK's protagonist's love interest, Ushio- try keeping that straight) who crushes on SK's protagonist Sumi after Sumi accidentally gives Aoi the impression that she likes the same novels. Thus, Aoi ropes Sumi into helping her publish and sell a doujin novel for a yuri event aimed at female yuri fans. Aoi's fan behavior is over-the-top when we first meet her, like a lot of otaku characters, but SK gives us a thoughtful reason for that. (Besides her age and inherent awkwardness.) None of the other girls she ever knew were into yuri, and they acted like she was "forcing [her] interests on [them]" when she acted the same way about yuri that they did about BL. So Aoi's really, really excited about having a friend (Sumi) who she thinks not only doesn't mind her interests, but shares them.

Aoi buys into some problematic, Class S literature-esque assumptions about lesbian relationships, but Sasameki Koto makes the point that that aspect of Aoi's fandom is ridiculous and deconstructs it while otherwise portraying her fandom well- as an outlet for her own gayness. I want to point out that, while Class S lit and the Class S feminist movement that spawned it have their problematic aspects, yuri fandom and feminism in Japan owe them a considerable debt, as explained here. Not trying to sugarcoat the problematic side of Class S, but I don't want to throw the baby out with the bath water either. Which I don't think SK does, given the positive aspects of its portrayal of Aoi's fandom for those novels.

Anyway, Aoi doesn't get a love interest before graduating high school, but she does become more comfortable in her own skin. See: Her befriending Sumi's out lesbian friends Tomoe and Miyako, who provoked some homophobic blustering from her when she first interacted with them.

Maria Holic's Kanako:

Ech, I have to include Maria Holic, don't I. I prefer writing about titles that haven't made me want to taser myself unconscious, but yeah. Kanako digs girls and yuri and attends her dead mother's all-girls' high school alma mater to find a girlfriend. That premise has potential to be charming, but MH's execution of it sucks. Rather than rehash what's wrong with the show, I'll just point you to my old review of it. Kanako is another example of a yuri fangirl character whose behavior is meant to resemble what otaku men stereotypically behave like rather than otaku women, but unlike, say, Mugi and Hiyori, I don't know a single woman who is a fan of the series she's in. I sat through MH's first season, didn't bother with its second, and haven't tried the MH manga.

Hanjuku Joshi and Ruriiro no Yume's Chie:

A lot of Morishima Akiko's fans (*pauses to leave fresh incense and flowers at our collective shrine to her*) are familiar with her "YurixYuri Observation Diary"- a funny series of short autobiographical manga she used to draw for Comic Yuri Hime in which she draws a parody version of herself acting like a mega-fangirl in various situations. It's hard for me not to think of them when I read Chie's story ("Soft-Boiled Fujoshi") in Ruriiro no Yume.

In Hanjuku Joshi, Chie's a side character. Chie's little sister Chitose tells her about her relationship drama before asking to borrow some of Chie's yuri manga. (Chie's also a huge BL fan, so she has a sizeable stash of that genre too.) Having far less experience with real relationships than fictional ones, she pretty much fails at giving Chitose advice.

But then! In Morishima Akiko's Ruriiro no Yume one-shot collection, Chie gets her own story.

In "Soft-Boiled Fujoshi", Chie attends Chitose's school culture festival (where Hanjuku Joshi fans get to see Chitose being lovey-dovey with her girlfriend Yae) and meets a cute girl named Yuria, who offers to show her around. Chie feels like she set off an "event flag" and thinks that everything is happening so conveniently, she's probably being delusional. Turns out Yuria recognized Chie as her favorite doujinshi author and is as big of an otaku as Chie is. Chie eventually finds that what she's feeling for Yuria isn't moe but, gasp, real love, and realizes that love is better than moe. Sayuri-hime volume 4 includes a cute, brief one-shot about Chie and Yuria working on a doujinshi for Winter Comiket.

So yeah, obviously I like this example. It's funny, it doesn't treat Chie and Yuria like sex objects or male wish fulfillment vehicles, and Chie's the only character on this list whose love interest digs anime and manga also, making for some charmingly nerdy interaction between them. I also quite like that Chie's surprise at her feelings for Yuria aren't caused by Yuria being a girl, but by her being that unused to non-fictional relationships. While some of her behavior is over-the-top (including shipping some random girls from a distance), she doesn't feel like an avatar for male yuri fans- just a weird girl who likes another weird girl who likes her back. I can get behind that.

You know that you watch and read too much yuri if you...

• hear "anise" and think of the lesbian magazine, not the plant.

 

• try to recreate the teas blended at the Amber Teahouse. (Even black seaweed and strawberry cream.) Bonus points if you make scones and tea for you and your girlfriend right before accepting her marriage proposal.
•  compare you and your significant other to a teapot and tea cozy.

 

• read every single literary work you haven't read that Shimura Takako references.
• schedule a trip to a city or town around the sights referenced in a series you love. (Like, say, Aoi Hana and Kamakura.)

 

• try every music artist name-dropped by Yamaji Ebine.

 

• get beauty tips from Girl Friends.
• visit Mister Donut because Akko is obsessed with it.
• drink Kahlúa milk because it's Mari and Akko's alcoholic beverage of choice.

 

• order a grasshopper every time you get drinks with someone you like.

 

• seduce someone by inviting them to eat mapo tofu.

• convinced some older guy to let you treat him like a surrogate brother and send him letters about how much high school sucks before you entered your freshman year. Poor bastard.

• sing the Amigo Tacos song every time you have a taco.

 

• are enraged by the lack of lesbians in the Romance of the Three Kingdoms.
• are similarly disappointed by the Pillow Book. 

• take it as a challenge if someone offers to befriend you.
• name your daughter Vivio.

• decide that even though you're not a ten year old girl, no one will be creeped out if you convince the person you like to cosplay dresses you made while you gleefully film them with a video camera.

 

• watch Battle Athletes to get in the mood to exercise.

 

• are still willing to try whichever new title Kaishaku produces that's tenuously connected to Kannazuki no Miko. (Kaishaku have turned themselves into the herpes of the yuri genre. They won't ever quite go away.)

• are a man who acts fanboyish over real women- not fictional characters, but flesh and blood people in front of you- who you perceive as a couple. If this applies to you, know that no real lesbian will ever like you and you aren't as progressive as you think you are.

 

• refer to butchy women as "princes" or "princely."

 

• get all of the references in Strawberry Panic!

• substitute Lonely Planet (or your travel guide of choice) with Rica'tte Kanji!? and Honey & Honey when you visit Shinjuku Ni-Choume.

 

•  when listening to a completely unrelated band (say... The Chieftains) you begin imagining what an AMV of the music would look like, results naturally involve yuri anime. (Contributed by Steven.)

• say "Gokigenyo" when greeting someone, even if they don't understand you.
• buy an orange lipstick that reminds you of sunset.
• check almost every day if there are new yuri releases.
• have read "Wuthering Heights" right after Aoi Hana and not because of some boring vampire book.
• if a significant part of the music you've got is from yuri anime. (This one + the above four are contributed by Gata de los canales.)

 

• ....See white lillies as more than just a symbol of death. (Contributed by P.S.)

Have any more suggestions? Share them in the comments, and I shall add them. :-)