As the topic title suggests, how did you stumble across the :cleris: forums? Did you know someone in it who recommened it? Did you just happen to find it?

I'll start with my story. And as with all my stories, I have a nasty habit of detailing... a lot. :whistle: You've been warned.

I played FFVII when I was in either 6th or 7th grade. It took me maybe 35 hours to beat, and I spent an extra five afterwards collecting everyone's last weapon, last limit break, and making my way painfully through the Ancient Forest (was that what that puzzle with the frogs and stuff is called?). The only optional weapon I fought was Ultimate so I could get Cloud's last weapon. Honestly, I was too afraid to fight Ruby or Emerald. They just looked so ominous and scary... a red tentacle in the middle of a desert, squriming anxiously, and a green monster floating around aimlessly underwater who will kill you if you so much as bump into him. And as far as chocobo breeding goes, I didn't even want to bother.

Years, years later, I guess I got really bored one day because I decided that I wanted to play FFVII again. I had already beaten Sephiroth a billion and a half times, so he wasn't even a challenge anymore. I decided that I wanted to face something new. I don't know why, but I began chocobo breeding and training for the weapons sometime around the beginning of this year. I got the Gold Chocobo, I got all the Chocobo Materia, I mastered them, and I massacred Ruby and Emerald.

Around this time, my boyfriend noticed my interest in FFVII suddenly respawning. So he mentioned to me how Advent Children was supposed to come out soon. I hadn't seen the trailer, but he had and he presented a theory that when Aerith touchs Cloud's arm, his Geostigma is healed. This idea seemed very cute and Clerithy to me, so I decided to look it up on the internet. I figured that someone would have seen the movie and written a spoiler-ridden review for me to lay my pink-tinted eyes on. After sifting through google, I found myself here... lurking through the Advent Children topics. Everyone seemed so nice, and everyone loved Clerith as much as I did! So I lurked for a while (maybe a month or less). One day, I just couldn't resist the urge, and I joined. That's how I find myself here now, posting this topic.

So...... what's your story? :cleris:

Oh! My story is quite short. I commented on one of Ally mcbeals journels' over a DA, and then we got into a conversation and I think I eventually told her I loved Cleris. Then she referred me here.

Hugs and Kisses to Ally.

Then I created an account, but I lurked and didn't post for like a month and a half. (wanted to get more comfortable with the forums) Then I finally broke out of the shyness I had, and introduced myself.

Well, it all started about a 3 years ago... my sister started playing FF 10. Their was a big love story involved, and i was 11 years old and i LOVED romance... i was crazy for it. And, after i watched her play it, i just loved FF! I had heard that their were other games, so my sister played 8, then X-2. Then, she bought FF7. She didn't play FF 7, so i decided i'd give it a try.
I liked play FF10, i thought 7 would be fun. But, i didn't like the battling system of 7, so I stopped playing of a while... but, the feeling of a unbeat FF sitting cold and alone in a dusty collection killed me.
So, i gave in and started play FF7. Then, i ran into Aeris, and i abosultely loved her... then she died... then i was sad.... cause she was my favorite... :aeris: :sad:
Then, after i beat FF7, i went on the internet, and while i was looking for some anime pics, i thought i'd type in Cloud and Aerith. Then, i found this site. It just sparked my interest so bad... but, i didn't join at first.
Until, i got brave and decided i wanted to join. :)

I got recommened to this site by Digital Holocaust.

Everyone has big fantastic stories of searching and I have a 1-liner <_<

:P

Well, At the time I beat Kingdom Hearts, I fell in love with Cloud and Aerith all over again :D.

So I decided to get back to the whole 'Cloud x Tifa versus Cloud x Aerith' type of thing, so I found Destiny Fullfilled. At first, yes I did think the essays on there were very biased, but Anastar did make some very good points. Then I started to look for art everywhere because I fell more in love with the couple that I wanted to make a layout, and I did see the forum link a couple of times.

The first time I checked it out, I didn't seem to interested, so I took a pass. :P.

However, the second time I just thought 'What the hey, I'll just sign up!' so I did.

Don't worry Scott, mines basically a one-liner too :lol:

I googled Cloud and Aerith one day, and this forum popped up. After a couple days of looking around, I decided to join ^_^

Same here.

A bored PKA was on the Internet and decide to Google FF7-related stuff. After many series of reading debates and seeing rabid Clotis, our Aussie came across the forum and after lurking, she joins.

Destiny Fulfilled
I was soo happy when the forum of CXA was made :)
thats about it XD

:lmao: MszAeris, my story will be humbingly short compared to yours!

Err....I'd actually moved on from FF7, and wasn't that psyched about AC because in the trailers (the early ones), Cloud looked kinda...gross. And there was no hint of Aerith, so I wasn't muchly interested. Then one day I decided to take part in a FF pairings fanart contest at Deviantart, and I just decided to do Cloud/Aerith on a whim, because everyone else was doing Tuna and Squinoa etc.

Then I saw the AC trailer with the death scene, and it made me feel kinda nostalgic, so I did a Google for more Cloud/Aerith ideas I could use for my fanart, and then it gave me Destiny Fulfilled. Was extremely impressed with the info it bore, and clicked on the link to the boards. I was just curious at first with no intention of joinage, mainly because Squinoa was my main OTP interest at that time - but I SAW THE PINK.

And I succumbed.

A year later, and now a proud veteran! That, folks, ends the story of how Yin-chan ended up here. :lol:

:woot: Holy schnap quackle pawpz, are you teh SERIAZ?? Haha, it took me nearly a year to finish (school got in the way MULTIPLE times). :sweat: *is a straight-up failure* ;_; Ah, but it was a good year, indeed... good year. *sniff* *tear* Splendid to the fullest. It was - probably - either that I took too long levelling up each member of the party (whole AVALANCHE, rather), just taking my time or that I hesitated for a few weeks after watching Aerith's death. Ah, I'm sucha sap.

Hmm... well I joined last August (2005). *thinks for a moment and tries to remember how she got here* Ah, I remember. I had a xanga, and I was joining all these fanlistings to show off their buttons 'n things. XD As I was going through my list of favored pairings, CloudxAerith (which was considered one of my "oldies" that time) ranked the top of my list, even though I needed to touch with FFVII more/again since I got rusty a bit on Final Fantasy. I just remembered that I have always loved them as a couple, and I was ever-so-heartbroken just knowing Cloud never told Aerith that he loved her (I first played the game when I was TOO young, yet CloudxAeris seemed too obvious :lol:). However, as I joined the Cleris fanlisting - which I thought was utterly cute - and grabbed my original Cleris eye that driven me to be a supporter of theirs from the first place, my love for it bounced right back and kicked my butt to do some more research on the couple. I began to visit Cleris shrines and looking at fanart, and there's one Cleris tribute that I got this site from... oh yes, the absolutely amazing Madame Batolli's Hikari site. I was browsing through all its snazz, then I asked, "hey, why not read the introduction/updates!?" And so I did, I checked it out ~ and in pink, bold letters, the link that transitioned me from a CloudxAeris-researcher to a CloudxAeris-LOVAH (well, I have ALWAYS loved them from the start, but the forum made me love them even MORE) was there. The link to all this pink magic. It's like one of those Harry Potter "portkey" things, too. So frickin' awesome, omg. *o* *ehem* Anyway, I'm wholeheartedly grateful for the opportunity to find out this site. Without my e-family and the lovely, sweet influential snazzfest this board shares, I'm just a blob of hair and crap (not the digestive one, ew). I love you all... (and thank you MUCHO, Madame Batolli! <3) Not only have I learned more info on my OTP-fo-lyfe, but I also have learned to be a better person inside&out, as well as going deep into the meaning of "love" and other essential values (family, friends) in life. Not to mention that I've also made new friends with such snazzy personalities, goals, perspectives on today's world... the diversity of everyone's style and personale among the members here... wow. I've realized so much that... *tackle-glomps all yuhz* So grateful, man. I appreciate it all. ;_; <3

EDIT:

LOL, that was me too, yin-chan! :huggle: XD When I FIRST heard about AC (from my older brother's friend), I was hyped, but not totally. x3 (I was excited for a real short period of time though. My hyperness for it prolly lasted a week or something, LOL, I suck. -__-') Well, continuing, I browsed through AC.net or saw some trailers to gather the latest info, but I wasn't 110% engrossed into the upcoming film... ESPECIALLY since Aerith's role was suggested as only a flashback, which pissed me off since she was my hero of all time. </3 I also didn't like how Cloud looked in the render where he was in Aerith's church with a mosaic(?) behind him... that's the one pic I didn't like. :ermm: He sort of looked like a girl there, to tell you the truth... hehe. With eyeliner. *dodges tomatoes* YEE! BUT, then... *watches fully-developed CGI movie AC* oh, my, shall I never prejudge again! *claims CLOUD AS BOYFRIEND, NYUK NYUK*

It probably took me three months in real time to beat it. When I played, I only played for short amounts of time. But yeah, the timer was around 35 hours when I first beat it. My brother is even more insane. He beat it in less than 25. :wacko:

Got here through Hikari sometime ago. Heh. :cleris:

I could probably sum it up as a one-liner too, but my inner babbler COMPELS me to babble. :D

So here it goes:

FFVII had also scuttled to the fandom background after a while, as I immersed myself in anime and stuff. Then one day, I saw an advertisement on LiveJournal announcing the start of a RP. The premise was every character from Squaresoft/SE games living in one giant apartment complex together. I chose Aerith as my first character, for reasons that elude me until today (I have chalked it down to Fate giving me a nudge towards returning To The Pink :P).

Since I'm quite anal about getting things right, I set about Googling Aerith shrines to refresh my information and ideas on our dear flower girl. That's how I stumbled onto Destiny Fulfilled. At that time, I was a budding Cleris-in-the-making, not all-out OTP-crazy as I was always more involved in the yaoi side of the FFVII pairing fandom since the beginning. :razz:

I read all the articles, and OMG, I was blown away! I had always figured there'd be some disagreement (to put it lightly, heheh) about who Cloud loved, but the sheer depth and style of the essays on DF had me starry-eyed. Upon one of my return visits to DF, I'd noticed the announcement of a forum, but hadn't joined as I wasn't interested in message boards at the time.

A while later, news of AC filtered in and my initial reaction to those early shots were just like yin-chan's-- I saw Cloud and immediately went "EWWWW!". :lmao: My dear Cloud was fugly! It was terrible! Forget the comparisons to Tidus (I didn't like the Asian look the FFX characters had), this was even worse! I wanted my pretty Cloud from my yaoi doujinshi back!

This was in the very early stages, so I don't believe we had any new characters other than Cloud and Kadaj (who also got an "EWWWWW!" from me). Call me shallow, but my interest for AC died on that spot (there were other reasons, but none that a decently pretty!Cloud wouldn't have overridden).

Then, much later, new shots of Cloud came in and, joy of joys, he was PRETTY again! They were all blurry shots of Cloud from trailers recorded illegally at the SE booth, but those were enough to send me scrambling for AC news, which led me to ACF. From there, I eventually stumbled onto Devotion, and posted somewhat regularly. I remember seeing the link to the CxA Forums on either Anastar and FFG's sigs, which led me to here!

I joined, but lurked a loooong while as I wanted to gauge the feel of the forum. In the meantime, I read every thread on the discussion section and couldn't remove the naggy feeling of familiarity (while being overwhelmed by how NICE everyone here was). It was only after a considerable amount of lurking that I finally found the balls to join, lurked even more (I'm pretty sure I only fully started posting regularly once AC was screened and reviews started filtering in) and that... is that. :D

Fun Facts:

- It wasn't until a chance return to DF, while lurking on this forum, that I finally recognised where all those CxA discussions came from-- and that this was the very same forum that was advertised on DF! It's almost like coming full circle, innit? :cray:

- I had no idea Anastar was the same Alyssandra who'd written some of the essays on DF until long, long, LOOOONG after joining this forum. The link started forming after I read posts here referring to Anastar as "Aly"... Hey, don't laugh! It was CONFUSING. "Why are they calling Anastar 'Aly'?! Does this forum have pet names for each other?! WHY DON'T I HAVE A PET NAME TOOOO?!!!1"

- Don't even ask me how long it took me to figure out our lovely Madame Batolli ran the CxA shrine, Hikari. ._.;;

I don't quite remember wich one I found first the ACF of this forum (I do remember I signed up first in the ACF). The thing is that one day I felt like typing in Google CloudxAerith, and this forum was one of the first 3 or 5 links listed in the results.

I never felt like posting until I saw an interesting thread in "The Lifestream" I guess it was about a rap song or something like that. Then I just bribed the admins and it seems as if I have lots of posts.... Damn!!! I forgot I shouldn't have said that.

*laughs at Lynn but suddenly stops...*
I'm somewhat the same case... I never knew why Anastar was called Aly. Once I thought "Anastar and Aly both start with A. That must be it." I don't remember if I came to undertand it becasue someone called her Alyssandra, or when I first entered DF and saw Alyssandra somewhere in that site.

i found this forum when i was checking out Destiny Fulfilled, the evidences were all there, but it seems not enough for me, there was a link to this forum that i might as well go, then i read some threads regarding cxa, that i really wanna join because of tons of evidences...and that's how I found this, end short story! :sweat:

Yay it's my 100th post! :dance:

I found it on Destiny Fulfilled, :wub: so thats about it :lol:

Well, I found this forum at the time news about AC first appeared. With FFVII still very fresh on the mind, I went crazy to find more news about it. So, I remember finding a FFVII:AC forum(FF7AC.net forums to be exact) and I joined it to keep updated about AC. Little tidbit, I joined back then as Lovely_Aeris, but now I'm Real_EmotionX2 there. Anyways, I remember a member named 'Shiva' who made a Cloud&Aeris discussion there for Cleris fans. I don't remember if I posted there much, but I did read a lot of their discussions.

One day, she posted a link to this forum. Curious, I checked out the link and was total floored by the uber pinkness! :lol: This was back when the forum was pretty much like a newborn baby. *researches* According to Madame B's sexy CxA timeline, the forums were created on Oct 24, 2004 and I joined Nov 1, 2004. So I joined eight days later after the forums was created. (RE is one of the vet members! lol) Anyways, I fell completely in love with this forum and joined almost instantly. :wub:

Almost two years later(or 1 1/2 years later?), and I'm still here.

And, imagine my surprise when I discovered Destiny Fulfilled's creator, Anastar and Hikari's Madame Batolli, where here too. Two cleris sites that I had been huge fans of before joining here. Heh, I almost felt like I was in the pressence of cleris legends. :lol: Another little tidbit: If memory serves me right, Shiva, the person I credit to have introduced me to this forum, just happens to be FF_G. ;)

Well, I hang around gamefaqs a lot.
And since I love Aerith so much, I started an Aerith cult.
Someone there (True_Osiris, or something like that) asked me if I was a big Cloud X Aerith fan, and when I said yes, he gave me the link to this site :cleris:

Destiny Fullied! :P My big story! :lmao:

I saw it on Real_Emotion's sig in FF7AC.net

lol that's it ;)

Searching Cloud and Aerith on Yahoo! search. ^^;;;;

To tell the truth, I can't remember the first time I saw the forums. I just kind of kept running into them by lurking around different Cleris sites like Destiny Fulfilled and Hikari (which still rank highly on my Favorites list :wub: ). I'd been an active member of good old AC.Net when I finally joined, because I'd been thinking about it for a while after reading through a ton of great topics and buzzing around with the lovely members of Devotion. I finally signed up last November. 'Twas calling me. :D

Probably Google or Destiny Fulfilled (which was probably from Google, so yeahh...). I lurked awhile (more like two days) and then joined. ^_^ Short and simple. :]

Edit:

:lmao: That happened with me too. It was hilarious. I was so confused. I didn't find out until like, 5 months later that Anastar was Aly. xDD

Um...actually... I just figured that out. .______.;;;;

:mellow:

..............

LOL. LOL. LOL. XD
THENA-CHAN, I LOVE YOU. XD
(but, I have to admit, it also took me a looong time to find out that MB was the founder of Hikari while being in the forums. I'm so sorry, Madame, you're just too genius for me. <3)

Oh, Lynn, you can never be any funnier than you are now. XD~ That also happened to me too, and I was like, "WTF?! Who is this Aly? Isn't her name Ana or something (y'know, judging from Anastar)..?" Yeah, I'm so stupid, but yes, I do enjoy calling Aly "Aly". She's frickin' AWESOME!

It took me 5 moths to beat FF7!!! Seriously, i'd tell myself "ok goddess, were gonna play FF7 and make some progress" then, i'd forget... and i just kept putting it off....
but, it look me like...70 hours to beat FF7... i trained SOOOO much... :ermm:

Yeah, after I bred teh hottest Gold Chocobo and raced him to champion of S Class and after I killed Ruby like WOAH and destroyed Emerald in one try, I think the clock in the corner of the menu was up to somewhere around 70 hours.

Is being off topic...

It seems like most of the people who responded found this place through Destiny Fulfilled. I didn't even know about it until after I joined here. *dodges tomato* Probably because I wasn't into the whole FFVII thing online. I had played the game, and that was enough for me. That was until I found the beautiful pinkness of course. :cleris:

hehe don't worry! I found the forum randomly looking for Cloud/Aerith websites on google!

Google = amazing.

I stumbled across this forum by accident. :lol: About two years ago I was looking for another Final Fantasy forum that I was a member of but I couldn't remember the name of it and I lost the link. But I thought this place was cool so I signed up. :P

Ummm... I came from the Tainted Destiny forum I believe.

And I actually don't even remember how I got to Tainted Destiny... >.O

(Actual 2 minutes pass by from thinking)

Ah nevermind... I remember now. I was looking for affiliates for my old forum and stumbled across it. Joined quite a few forums back then just for the sake of getting aff's.

This forum is probably the only one that could keep my interest out of all the forums from back then.

I saw the link on DF and thought, "If the people there are all like the person who spent all this time researching and putting all that awesome info together, CG will have much fun" and then joined. ^_^

I was invited by Anastar. XD

And I thought, hey why not and joined.

I had just finished watching AC, and was going around Aeris and CxA websites in a state of squee, when I stumbled upon a link to these forums in Hikari. ^_^

I was actually doing a project on Final Fantasy and went looking for pictures of Cloud & Aeris to put on the front page and somehow (after clicking all the links on google) I found Destiny Fulfilled and me bing a big fan of Cleris had a look around and found a link to the forum....and thats how found this place XD

On June 2006, I was sooo obssesed of Final Fantasy Advent Children (not much anymore..but). I searched up Cloud and Aeris on google and i found the link to this site.

I find this beautiful forum when I've joined Devotion in ACForums ! :P

Hmmm! I didn't respond to this topic!

Nothing really special to say though...I went on Google, read every single little thing on Destiny Fullfilled, saw the link to the forums, and lurked here for forever. Eventually I got guts and joined the forum, and I'm very glad I did! :huggle:

That's basically my story as well! ^_^

Google. :D

Google = luff. I was looking for information on Final Fantasy; because I was interested in Cloud because he looked cool. After a while of reading a LOT of random stuff about Cloud from Google searches I was like "Cool! Cloud and Aerith have such a tragic romance...I must learn more!" So I stumbled on here. ;P

I went on to Destiny Fulfilled once, but then I lost the link to it -_-;
So then after a couple of google searches and a couple of months later... I found the site again! And then I found a link to the site and I joined ^_^

I think finding this Forums is very easy. here how I find it I go to google and type aerith that it.