I spent two years tracking down the account of someone whose name I didn't even know, and my life took a wild turn

I'm not bragging, but I'm good at internet stalking. I can find the Instagram of a boyfriend's ex in seconds. Seriously, I'm not bragging. Recently, a friend told me they were doing VJ work, so I found their VJ unit's Twitter account in a minute and sent it to them, and they asked, "Are you a first-class net-stalker?" It's a gift of my obsessive nature.

Well, even so, identifying an account requires some clues. Name, place of residence, university attended, et cetera. It's difficult without some kind of hint. I don't have any special skills; I'm really just obsessive.

I've identified countless accounts in my life, but among them, there was one that was the most troublesome and took the longest.
The number of years it took: about two.
I didn't know their name or where they lived. All I knew was the university they attended and their face. We didn't have a single mutual acquaintance.

Even so, I absolutely wanted to find them.
For two years, I kept diving into the vast sea of the internet, looking around constantly.
I absolutely wanted to find them.

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In the summer of 2019, the words "Sambomaster" suddenly appeared in my YouTube recommendations.
I don't listen to Sambo that much. I don't particularly like or dislike them.
Wondering why it was suddenly recommended, I looked closer and saw that it was a video of a cover band from some university's light music club.

A cover? I'm even less interested in that, I thought, and was about to skip it, but I changed my mind and pressed the play button because I was confused by the number "600,000 views", which is an unthinkable number for a cover band video.

600,000 views?
Isn't that amazing? 600,000 views for a cover band??

To see how impressive 600,000 views is, I checked the music videos of some bands that just came to mind: PK shampoo's "Yakan Tsuyoguchi" had 310,000 views, and CRYAMY's "Getsumen Ryoko" had 430,000 views. "Saru no Gakusei" by Hanuman, led by our Ryoichi Yamada, had 670,000 views. They beat Yamato Pans and Kawano, and are competing pretty well with Yamada.
Also, a recent video by Yuyami ni Saruishi Shikkoku no Tenshi-tachi that I just looked up on a whim didn't even reach 100,000. Hey, do your best. Well, that's beside the point.

I play the video. A shaggy-haired guy with glasses, wearing a maroon hoodie with "AMERICAN EAGLE" printed in big letters, was shouting something quickly. I seriously couldn't make out what he was saying. From somewhere, someone heckled, "Get a haircut!"

The vocalist finishes shouting, and the bass drum kicks in.
I knew what song it was immediately from the intro. "Seishun Kyousoukyoku." The generation is spot on. Whether it's Naruto, Gintama, or Bleach, the theme songs for Jump anime from this era are all truly the best. When I looked closely, the video was already about five years old, so I vaguely thought, maybe these people are from my generation.

The moment I heard the first note of the singing,

Only one phrase popped into my head.

"Ah, I love it."

That was the moment my one-sided love for the American Eagle guy, whose name I didn't even know, began.

◆

His voice is good. Too good. His singing is inexplicably skilled. And above all, his intensity is incredible.

Thinking that, I started watching the Sambomaster video regularly during my commute. 600,000 views is no joke.

Everyone is being struck by it. Sorry for quoting without permission.

But at this time, it felt more like "I love this video" than "I love his singing." Still, I was watching the video like a madman. Watching him shout, sing, knock his glasses off, and slam his fist into the guitar strings, I would laugh, be moved, get fired up, and then laugh again. It wasn't the intensity of a cover band.

This is a tweet from back then. It was even starting to give me the will to live.
On another day, I also tweeted, 'Sambomaster works better for me right now than antibiotics or cold medicine.' Seriously, just take your medicine.

And then, a somewhat fateful event occurred.

It happened one day, a few months after I had become completely obsessed with Sambo's videos.
I just happened to search for 'Buzz the Bears cover' on YouTube on a whim. This is irrelevant information, but since I played in a cover band during my student days, there are times when I get an irresistible urge to hunt for covers of my favorite bands.

When I tried playing the video with the most views among the results, it was the guy in the American Eagle hoodie singing.

What!?

Is that the Sambo guy I always watch!?

Is this what he looks like without his glasses!?

Wow, so he can pull off Buzz the Bears too.

I mean, he's actually really good at guitar.

Starting with 'Backstage Jack Girl'—that's a real fan's choice of song.

He looks good in a suit.

I love his voice way too much.

His voice, I love it, seriously.

A whirlwind of emotions raced through my brain. It was so good it felt like my brain was melting, so I couldn't help but leave a comment.

My feeling of 'I like this video' changed into 'I like this person's singing'. I wrote earlier about the moment love began, but I think the moment I truly fell in love was when I watched that Buzz the Bears video.

His voice is good. His singing voice is incredibly good.
His MC voice is good, too. His way of speaking is nice. His Kansai dialect wasn't too harsh; it was relaxed and cool. Even if his jokes fell a bit flat.
I don't know why, but I even started to feel like I liked his face. I like guys with single eyelids, after all.

Back when I only watched Sambo videos, that was enough to satisfy me, but I liked him so much that it wasn't nearly enough anymore, and I started desperately searching for cover videos of him singing.
Kenshi Yonezu, Sakanaction, a flood of circle, Number Girl, Suga Shikao, Porno Graffitti. Those videos, which I found by digging through the light music club's account, were naturally all great. And he was wearing that American Eagle hoodie in a surprising number of other videos, too. Why? Does he like it that much?
He could pull off songs from every genre. Each one had a slightly different singing style, yet all of them brought out the unique charm of his voice.

If not every day, it became a part of my daily routine to watch his videos quite regularly.
I want to know what he's doing now. It didn't take long for me to start thinking that.

Every single video is from four or five years ago. No matter how I calculate it, he must be a working adult by now. Well, I don't know for sure; he could be a seventh-year student like Yamato Punx. People in light music circles really never graduate, do they?

What is he doing now? Is he still in a band? Since his voice is that good, there's a possibility he's doing original music instead of covers. If that's the case, I definitely want to support him.

I want to know.
I want to hear this person sing more.

“Kwansei Gakuin University Sambomaster”

“Zettai Ikiru Monz”

“Kwansei Gakuin Band”

No matter how much I searched, I couldn't find a single clue. I mean, it was just impossible. An impregnable fortress. I didn't even know his name. What kind of crappy search terms were these?
Still, I kept searching periodically, hoping for some kind of hint.

The only thing that seemed like a lead was that the account name posting the Buzz the Bears cover videos he sang in was a personal name. Even if it wasn't him, I thought there was a high probability it was a member who was covering Buzz the Bears with him.
I searched that name in a split second, identified his Twitter account, followed him, and since he followed me back immediately, I sent him a DM, but...

The conversation ended at lightning speed.

I didn't have the courage to ask, 'You posted a video of a Buzz the Bears cover, right!? What is the person who was singing in that video doing now!?' at that point. It would have been way too suspicious.

I mean, I want you to pay attention to the date I sent this DM: July 2020. A year had already passed since I first encountered the Sambomaster video. I wasn't discouraged at all. Even though I hadn't found a single clue in a year, I still intended to keep looking. It's scary.

◆

Truly, without finding anything, about two years had passed since I first started longing for American Eagle. Even when I tried searching periodically, it was no use. What happened to my first-class net-stalking skills?

But my obsession was top-notch. Don't underestimate the tenacity of a woman from snow country. For two years, I seriously never gave up once. It's truly scary.

But that's how much I loved his singing voice.

And then, a day I will never forget: April 17, 2021.

That day, I was heading to work for a Saturday shift. On the subway, I watched his video as usual.
For some reason, I scrolled through the comments on the Sambomaster video. Amidst comments like 'I got goosebumps,' 'Too hot,' 'The vocalist is amazing, I'm surprised,' and 'Doesn't the drummer look like Kakuta from Tokyo 03?', my hand stopped at one comment.

“I wonder if Yamada-kun, the guitarist/vocalist, is in a band now or doing original stuff. If he is, I really want to support him!”

HEY!!!!

YOUR NAME!!!!!!!!!

It's Yamada, isn't it!!!!!!!!!!

*Pseudonym

At work, I ignored my tasks and used the company computer to search for his university name alongside his surname.

What came up was his Facebook. His full real name was revealed. Wow, his name is incredibly rare and beautiful............

When I searched for the full name I had discovered, the next thing that appeared was his Twitter account.

◆

I thought it was a dream. I really did. I had been searching for so long. It took two years.

Without being creeped out by some random woman from a snowy region suddenly sliding into his DMs, he sent me videos of BUMP and Hanuman he had copied a long time ago, saying, "I'm sorry there's no new content." His heart is wider than the Aegean Sea.

I mean, BUMP and Hanuman? Did he do this knowing that my three favorite bands are the pillows, BUMP OF CHICKEN, and Hanuman? Huh? Is this fate?

When I typed his newly discovered full name into the YouTube search bar, a lot of old live performance videos appeared that his mother had apparently filmed and uploaded personally.
the pillows, BUMP, Hanuman, The Cheserasera, ACIDMAN, THE PINBALLS, WHITE ASH, Fishmans.
He was singing all my favorite songs. I almost cried. For two years, I had been yearning for the singing voice I love most in the world, and he was singing all the songs I love. Is such a thing even allowed? Is it okay?

I ruminated on his name in my head, as if tracing the letters I had wanted to know for so long.
It was a truly beautiful name.
I don't have to call him 'American Eagle' in my brain anymore. I can call him by his name.

And so. As a result of my emotions running high,

I couldn't hold back anymore.

Humans are greedy creatures. Knowing his name and being able to watch videos of him singing my favorite songs—that should have been more than enough to fulfill my wishes.

The next morning, seeing a LINE message that said "It's Yamada," I let out a sigh of pure joy.

◆

Since I've been reminiscing about the past for a while, I'll talk a little bit about the present now.

It is now 2022. It has been one year since I tracked down his account, and three years since I became obsessed with that nameless American Eagle.

Just recently, my surname changed from the one I had carried for 27 years to the one I found in that comment section that day.

Life is a jackpot.
I stalked someone online and ended up getting married.

◆

Back to the flashback.

After exchanging LINE contacts, we had our first phone call the following night. He was nervous as hell on the other end of the line. Apparently, he suspected it was a prank by a friend right up until he heard my voice. Hilarious.
However, as we talked, we gradually opened up to each other. As our five-hour call reached its climax, past 2:00 AM, I don't know what happened, but he booked a flight to come see me in Sapporo from where he lived in Fukuoka. What's with that speed?
When I asked him on the phone the next day, "Does this mean you've fallen for me?", he snapped back, "Of course I'd end up like this, obviously!!!!" Isn't he too simple?

And so, we messaged and called every day. Three weeks after exchanging contact info, we met for the first time. He showed up at the airport wearing stylish clothes that didn't have a trace of American Eagle, and he was wearing the same Dr. Martens shoes as me. His hands were shaking so much it was almost funny. He couldn't make eye contact at all, saying, "I can't look, ugh, I can't."

Even so, when he finally started looking at me and talking, we were at a nice izakaya in Sapporo, and he held out a sparkly silver ring and said, "Please go out with me."
I was surprised and answered, "I'd love to," and then added, "on the condition that we get married." Isn't it sneaky to add that after getting an okay?

After that, we carried on a long-distance relationship between Fukuoka and Sapporo—a distance of 2,050 km—meeting with the insane frequency of two to three times a month despite the distance.

Traversing the Japanese archipelago. It might have been faster to meet in Vladivostok.

And so, after many twists and turns, here we are now.

◆

If there were a Grand Prix for funny couple origin stories, I think we'd be a strong contender. It really is the fruit of my obsessive nature.

Neither of us was desperate to get married. I, for one, didn't care about marriage at all and thought it would be fine to stay single for life, and he apparently thought it would be nice to get married by the time he was around 35. Is that for real? Around our fourth phone call, before we had even committed to dating or anything like that, I said, 'I don't see the point in dating,' and he replied, 'I kind of get that, but then again, I think marriage has meaning, so how about we just get married?' I remember collapsing to my knees laughing. Is that something a person who doesn't want to get married says? I'm scary, but he's pretty scary too, right?

Before even talking about marriage, I didn't want to step into something as terrifying as a long-distance relationship, and we hadn't even met in person. I had just been cyberstalking him on my own.
Terrified by how fast things were moving—thinking, 'This is stupid, I can't believe this'—I heard American Eagle say this over the phone.

'I think it comes down to either finding someone nearby to instantly cure your loneliness, or deciding that even if you can't do that, this is the person you want. When I thought about the distance, the cost, and the mental burden, I still absolutely knew that this girl was the one. I don't want to let go no matter what happens. Even if it turns out it doesn't work, just try being mine for once.'

Is this a shojo manga?
Even though he looks like a scruffy-eyed Saiki Pointy, he started to look like a prince to me.

He’s a pragmatic guy who laughs about how the stranger from the snowy country who closed the distance at top speed that day was, 'When I first got the DM, I wondered who the hell this was, but when I scrolled back through your Twitter photos, you were my type, so I got excited.' During our long-distance phase, if I begged him to 'sing something,' he would play the guitar over the phone, and now he sings for me right in front of me. Listening to that voice, the same one from the videos, I always think that this is a happiness I grabbed for myself. It didn't just fall into my lap. I grabbed it with tenacity and obsession. I found him. I'm glad I'm a first-class cyberstalker. Good for me!!!

By the way, as an aside, a year and a half ago when I followed the person who uploaded the videos because I was searching for him so hard, it seems it was somewhat of a rumor among his friends that 'there's a girl looking for Yamada.' When I first went out for drinks with him and his best friend, the friend said deeply, 'So you're the girl from back then? You actually tracked him down...' and I laughed quite a bit, but I also thought, 'Man, I'm scary.'
But well, it turned out okay. Or is it okay?

It is okay. It's like a dream. I want the world to call this love, too. I'm glad I'm so tenacious! I'm definitely going to make him happy.
See ya.