Why Ryu and Sakura

I started out as only a simple fan of Night's Ryu and Chun Li forever site (you can visit it here). This was when Night's site was being hosted at homestead. Eventually homestead decided to charge people to make sites, so Night relocated...to Tripod. This was a great place for him, but then a jealous hater said something and Tripod took his site down. Frustrated, Night went to a friend at ryusan.net. It was around here that myself (as well as about 10 more people) became part of Night's entourage. Unfortunately, ryusan.net ran out of finances, and Night said farewell...for now...

This was around late November/December of 2001 when this happened. I had built my first site on tripod to try to reach the depths of stardom that Night had already acheived. I even attempted to type my first SF story called "SF: New Beginnings". The theme of this story was Ryu trying to choose between Chun Li and Sakura. To make things more interesting, Sakura was also starting to deal with the "Satsu no Hadou" that Ryu constantly deals with. While writing this story, I was really becoming intrigued with my characterization of an older Sakura. RCL stories were all the norm back in the late 90's to early 2000. I was quickly becoming bored with my project and really looking forward to a spinoff of Ryu and Sakura only. I typed 3 chapters of this spinoff and called it "Attack of the Dark Cherry Blossom". This was my first original story on Fanfiction.net (this was back when they had the NC-17 rating. This was when they were great, and not anal soccer moms like today).

About a week or 2 after the last chapter, people started to respond. This was the first time that anybody had attempted to write a Ryu/Sakura story on ff.net. I immediately gained attention for trying something new.

After I finished chapter 11, I knew that "Cherry Blossom" was coming to an end. But the thing is...I didn't want it to end. I enjoyed being one of the few to bring Ryu/Sakura fanfiction to the eyes of millions. I wanted something that could hold fans off until I finished chapter 12 but also something that could continue the Ryu/Sakura bond after the chapter was written.

Enter Tripod. My attempt at a Street Fighter website wasn't going anywhere (even with close friends like James and Sarah Amaya supporting it). On the 4 of July, 2002, I decided to convert it into the R/S shrine. For a couple of days, I spent that time removing files and adding stuff. Then on July 8, 2002, the Ryu and Sakura shrine was born.

This was the place for all great stuff and adventures until sometime in May 2004. A troublemaker that used to go to the message board at a site that myself and a couple of friends used to visit, started reporting sites being bad. What ends up happening is that first my teacher and mentor James site gets taken down. Like a week later, the R/S shrine is struck. Nearly all of my stuff was gone! Some of my pics, all of my interviews and articles, all that work! 2 years was wiped away!

But...I knew that there were people that still loved the R/S pairing, and it is for them that the site has returned. This is the haven for people that savor the love (even if not lovebut just friendship or connection) between the 2 Shotokan warriors.