Nogizaka46: The jubilant 'Asuka Saito post' #22....

 

 Had all intentions of doing a post for a different Nogi member, the one who finished ninth on the fave's list. But thought this would turn out a tad better, hopefully it will(!) and you'll see that other post in a day or two. Good news if you're an Asuka fan and that's because of some comments that she made at an event yesterday. She was asked about the rash of 2021 Nogi graduations and when was she thinking of leaving?! Luckily not for a while, Asuka said the dreaded G word had crept into her mind but she has no plans on leaving for a while, she's just 23 in age so why not stay for a few more years. She also mentioned it's a nice change for her as for so long she was Nogi's youngest member, not these days and she enjoys the newer members referring to her as their senpai.

 This could be one massive post but won't make it that way(it is!), have 75-80 new pics but will hold about fifteen or so back. This makes five months in a row Asuka has had a solo post so was thinking why not try to stretch it out to a year? Tried that one time with a Keya member but wasn't able to do twelve straight months but came close with a post in ten months. So will hold some things back for another post in January but Asuka has been so much busier lately after a quiet Summer so perhaps there won't be any need to hold on to things but better safe then sorry. One other thing is that while she didn't make this year's faves list she easily could have, next week will do a recap post for this year's list and may give her and one other gal a 'special award'.

 This past year has been the worst if you're a Nogi fan with all of these graduations and the only reason it may slow down is that there's so few first and second generation members left!!!! But as mentioned Asuka isn't going away any time soon and that's a good thing, she has become one of my top Nogi members the past few years and her getting older has helped. But of course the biggest graduation of the year took place on the 15th when Erika held her final concert. Have the video of it which is quite long but not going to discuss her in this post. Just had one for her and planning on hopefully two more in the next month so will save any pics and news for those. But she did have a graduation photobook come out three days ago which also features some other first generation members, looks like the duo is really enjoying their Naopperini pizza! The bottom pics are from 'Showroom' which aired earlier today, hope it stays on YT for a while and here's the link to the video: Showroom with Erika

 Few recent Instagram pics, not all that many but can remember the days when Asuka used to have four posts a year at her Nogi blog, perhaps not even that many!

 Last year wasn't a good year for Nogi cards as it seemed the company or management really cut back on them. However 2021 has been a different story and now have too many of them to post! One collection I don't get to enough is the 'Nogi Fes' series which have two kinds of sets, one is for regular cards while the others are seasonal pics and all of these are from this year.

 One more batch of 'Nogi Fes' pics which came out last week for Christmas.

 That event mentioned at the top which Asuka attended took place on December 16th. It was a special fashion show titled 'Spring is Akebono, Summer is Night, Autumn is Dusk, Winter is working.... It's SHOWTIME!', not a title that easily rolls off the tongue. It was held at the Roppongi Theater and this is when she had been asked about the Nogi graduations. Have three batches of pics from the show, Asuka took two strolls modeling traditional Japanese clothing and there was one interview session. That reminds me of the 'Tokyo Girls Collection' show and wonder if they'll be having another show this February or March? Those shows are always decent and we do see many members from Nogi, Keya and Hina, here's a link to a video of this show: Event video

 Asuka has been a long time model with the Sweet magazine and have some terrific new pics from their site. But am holding on to her January issue spread for that next post and it has ten pages.

 Asuka will also be the cover girl for the next issue of Tokyo Calendar so looks like that next post will be another huge one. Will end off with this set and once again she's a cover girl, this spread is from the December 17th issue of Young Jump. Following the pics is another short video from yesterday's event, it's the part when she was asked about the graduation(s).