Assembling the Dreams of Others

When the series Gundam Wing made its American premier on Cartoon Network in 2000, I became fascinated by it. It had strong characterization, a deep storyline, and (of course) giant robots. I followed the series from start to finish and bought the entire collection of DVDs. But I wanted more.

I had made a habit of travelling to Seattle to visit some friends of mine once a year or so and in 2001, my friend Rachel took me to a model store where I was first introduced to Bandai's collection of Gundam models. I spent over $300 without even thinking about it and within an hour or two after getting back to her house, I'd managed to get the first of the models assembled. I was hooked.

These weren't the first model kits that I'd worked on. When I was younger, like many other kids, I'd had a few model cars. I wasn't very good at the assembly, though, and having a short attention span, I quickly lost interest with the hobby. But Bandai's models were something different. They didn't require glue, for one thing. And though the assembly instructions were all in Japanese, they were accompanied by step by step visual instructions which, in combination with a logical numbering scheme on the individual pieces, made them relatively simple to put together.

Over the next few years, I spent a lot of time and money on Bandai models, eventually progressing from the very simple all the way to the most complex ones they offered, called Perfect Grade. The Perfect Grade models are massive, with over 1000 pieces, multiple sizes of screws, and LED lights that require some simple wiring to install in the model. They also cost over $200 apiece, making them not for the passive enthusiast. But I developed a real joy in the hobby which eventually brought me back to model cars, as well.