Hello hello hello, welcome back to TriviAqours!
If you’re new to this segment; for the past few weeks, my amazing buddy Leap250 and I have been researching and discussing different trivial facts about the lovely seiyuu that voice Aqours, the school idol group featured in Love Live! Sunshine!!. I asked him a few months ago if he wanted to do this particular project with me, since we both really like this group of voice actresses and their personalities, and here we are now!
Sor far we’ve made posts about all but one of the seiyuu, them being Saito Shuka, Aida Rikako, Takatsuki Kanako, Komiya Arisa, Suwa Nanaka, Inami Anju, Kobayashi Aika, and Furihata Ai. So if you missed one or a few or even all of them, there they are for your convenience.
Today’s post is sadly the last of the series but definitely a fun one, since Leap and I combined forces and we both found some fun facts about the wonderful lady in the spotlight. That being said, we present to you the final installment of TriviAqours, talking about none other than Suzuki Aina!
Suzuki “Ainya” Aina
- Born on July 23rd, 1995
- Image color is Purple
- Height: 147 cm/4’10’
- Lists “playing video games” as her hobby
- Specialty is “minyou*” (folk songs)
- Favorite food include omurice and salisbury steak
- Voices Ohara Mari from Love Live! Sunshine!!, as well as Rina Shioi from Mahou Shoujo Site, and Jashin-chan from Jashin-chan Dropkick
(i kinda made this a back-and-forth mix between both of our facts so yeah lol)
1. Nice Ball! (Al)
During a Twitter Q&A, Ainya was asked some questions regarding the subjects she exceeded in during her time at school, as well as what kind of sports she liked. Some of her most enjoyable and successful classes were Music and English, but Ainya’s absolute favorite subject was Physical Education. In addition to that class, she was a member of her junior high track and field club, and ran both short and long distance events. Ainya also said she loves certain ball sports such as basketball and volleyball, even though she isn’t the best at them.
2. Min’you Songstress (Leap)
Ainya playing the role of a partial foreigner in Love Live! Sunshine!!’s Ohara Mari might have detracted people from the fact that she is a HIGHLY accomplished Min’you (Japanese folk song) artist. Fearing that she might have been tone deaf, Ainya’s mother and grandmother had her train Min’you singing as early as 6 years old — not really knowing that it would lead to Ainya holding the title of All-Japan Min’You Champion from 2007 to 2010 (she’d be 12 in ’07.. let that sink in for a bit…). She aspires to become an Anison artist that incorporates Min’you stylings; a style which she dubs herself as AniMin’You. Other accolades regarding Ainya’s singing prowess include being the champion for the Sapporo Qualifiers of the prestigious All-Japan Anison Grand Prix (2014), and making it to the Top 3 in the nationals that same year.
3. The Summer Triangle
All of the Aqours seiyuu were asked what their charm point in their interviews with Ultra Jump magazine, and while there were normal answers such as Inami Anju and Kobayashi Aika mentioning their eyes being their charm points or Suwa Nanaka’s long bangs, Ainya’s answer was a bit odd yet interesting. If you look closely at these photos, you can see on Ainya’s left cheek three beauty marks that, when connected, resembles an equilateral triangle (what luck she has :P). She went on to say that that formed triangle, which she calls “The Summer Triangle”, is her charm point.
I had to look up what that was since I didn’t have even a slight clue.
From what I read, “The Summer Triangle” is an asterism (a pattern of stars, not to be confused with what a constellation is) that can be found in the night sky during the months of June and July. It’s made up of three stars that are all in separate constellations; Deneb, Vega, and Altair. You can learn more about this asterism on your own, but that’s what Ainya was referring to.
4. Not Short, Just Vertically Challenged
Standing at 147cm tall (almost 5 feet), Ainya is unequivocally Aqours’ shortest member, barely being edged out by Rikyako (150cm) and Shukashuu (150.5) by a narrow margin. In an earlier episode of UraGirls High School Radio, Suwawa recounts how once during a recording session, she saw the microphone stand inside one of the booths adjusted incredibly low where she couldn’t help but think to herself “Wow, I can’t believe such a short person exists!” only to find out later that it was Ainya who had went in before her (xD)
5. With A Little Help From My Friends… And Mom
A few months after Aqours’ first single, “Kimi no Kokoro wa Kagayaiteru kai?” released, the group was set to perform in front of fans for the very first time at a special event, held at the Mielparque Hall. One specific part in the dance routine of that song has Ohara Mari vaulting over Takami Chika (reference gif). Ainya was actually very nervous about doing this particular move, mainly because of a past incident in middle school where she failed doing a vault and hit her head. But despite her doubting that she can do it, a couple of people helped her along the way such as Inami Anju, who Ainya was going to be vaulting over. Even her lovely mother agreed to help her practice a lot whenever Ainya came home to visit… this legit sounds like it could be an episode in some anime xD
If the live performance I found on YouTube is the one we’re talking about, Ainya successfully did the vault and definitely made Anchan, her mother, and all the fans very proud.
6. Southpaw
Ainya is left-handed! …Yeah, that’s pretty much it (xD) But when you consider how they always say that only 10% of the world’s population are lefties (probably a pretty dated statistic by now), and the fact that men are more likely to be left-hand dominant than women (whilst subsequently putting aside how there are more men than there are women), it’s pretty neat that at least one of the nine is a left I would think. But the real thing I wanted to point out here was how exactly people found out, since it’s not really something that’s in her bios and profiles out there, and the topic doesn’t really come up as much whenever they do their broadcasts, and it’s only when fans saw her draw and write stuff for prompts that they realized this. Left-handedness has always been associated with in-born talent which, if you think about it, kinda fits Ainya here too. Of course the girls of Aqours are all talented, but when you’re tearing it up as an anison prodigy at twelve years-old, that says something.
7. Hand-Me-Downs
Here’s a short fun fact; apparently Ainya receives hand-me-down clothes from fellow Aqours seiyuu Aida Rikako, and has stated that they smell really good. @DIAflower0514 on Twitter found some proof of this, showing both of them in the same plaid dress/outfit, with Rikyako wearing it during a photo shoot while Ainya is shown wearing it on one of her radio shows.
8. Heart on Her Sleeve
Something that fans who follow Aqours’ content outside of the anime and the mobile game would be quick to tell about Ainya is that she has shown to be very easily moved to tears in both their broadcasts and their live events — most notably during their closing MCs, where Arisha and Suwawa are almost always on the ready to hand her a towel. She’s also the first to burst out in uncontrollable laughter whenever something funny happens during their livestreams (coupled with some claps and some arm slaps to Arisha for good measure). In both cases the other members quickly call attention to Ainya either joking about how much of a crybaby she is or about how she’s guffawing too much again.
9. A Bishoujo Collecting Bishoujo Figures
Many Love Live fans, as well as general anime enthusiasts, often buy figurines of their favorite characters to put on display in their rooms, households, desks, etc (I have one of Watanabe You, and honestly I’m surprised I haven’t bought anymore).
Ainya is no different from us. Since she loved anime as a young child, Ainya often collected different goods such as figurines; she even bought and completed a whole nine-figurine set of Love Live characters (wasn’t specifically stated which group). It also got to a point where she was scolded for buying too many of them.
And apparently Ainya also has some impressive wizardry abilities because she could tell what was inside a blind box/gachapon just by feeling the weight of it.
That’s Ainya for ya! I really do love her energy and passion, she definitely livens up the whole Aqours seiyuu group, if it wasn’t lively enough already.
And now, we come to the end of this fun segment. I had a really pleasant time doing this project, researching different trivial facts about these nine ladies, and especially getting to know a lot more about them. Not only that, but after finding facts and reading the posts by Leap, I started to appreciate certain seiyuu a lot more from learning more about their background (i.e. Aikyan). So this was absolutely a wonderful experience for me, and I guarantee that it’s not an understatement when I say that Leap was the perfect person to do this with. We both really love the seiyuu culture of both Love Live and general anime, so we hope we got to express our knowledge and appreciation for it in an enjoyable and informative way.
Speaking of Leap, here’s a few ending words of his own:
“After a month and some change, in a series spanning a total of 9 post/volumes across both my and Al’s blog here, TriviAqours has now officially come to a close! This has been a fun project to be a part of from start to end — mostly because I never really get to talk much about these little things that I notice and pick up on about the members of Aqours (well, other than Rikyako maybe xD). I follow their content more or less on a regular basis, and it was nice putting that knowledge to good use (lol) in letting you guys know more about this amazing group of women, so I do sincerely hope we’ve done our part in that regard.
In as much as I repeatedly mention on my end that the facts that we presented won’t be the most outlandish things you’d hear about these girls, I did try to impart to y’all stuff that I gathered from my own observations apart from what you can already read elsewhere whilst also trying to keep it fairly non-fan friendly as possible. I know that most people who’ll come across our posts will be LL!/Aqours fans already, but if you aren’t and if we’ve made you a fan of one, if not all of ’em, then I’d say we did a bang up job here!
Of course, many thanks to Al; for not only inviting me to take part in this whole thing, but for letting me know that much more about these girls as well. I’m far from being an authority on Love Live!, and at best I can probably say that I know a bit more about Rikyako than some, so I’m happy learning all these new things about members that I might’ve not given as much attention to but apparently should’ve (Haha!). All in all, I had a blast, and in trying to lineup my favorite facts for the members that I wrote for — I can’t help but feel that I’ve started to appreciate them that much more.”
Thanks for reading!! 😀
(also be sure to check out Leap’s blog for more content revolving around Love Live, idols, music, and much more!)
-al
omunibasu 
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