@Abel da Silva whoooooaaaaaaa, what a great coincidence!

@Abel da Silva RIP to one of the GOATs

初めまして！僕はマルコです。アメリカから来ました。 今、タイの大学で農業を研究しています。大学院生です。 来年、日本の大学へ勉強しに行きたいです。 趣味は日本の歴史と料理、それから日本の映画を見ることです。 一緒にビールを飲みましょう！ I am a lifelong lover of Japan who finally took the plunge and started studying the language about two years ago now. I used to train Judo in high school, I have seen many classic Japanese movies ("Golden Age" of Ozu, Mizoguchi, Kurosawa, the Japanese New Wave era with Imamura, Teshigahara, Shinoda, Oshima, etc... and also the modern classics with Miike Takeshi, Yamada Yoji, Miyazaki, and others. My favorite Japanese authors are Endo Shusaku, Abe Kobo and Yoshikawa Eiji. I love to study Japanese history and I am currently studying Japanese Farming systems. Pretty much everything Japanese!! Favorite Japanese Food: Ramen Favorite Japanese Movie: Ikura (Kurosawa)/HaraKiri (Kobayashi) Why am I studying Japanese? I hope to move to Japan!

@Joe Bennett His most famous novel is Silence and is a good place to start. Both Shinoda and Scorsese made movie adaptations (I prefer the Shinoda version, as the screenplay was co-written by Endo, and this was more true to his vision).