Star Guardian almost killed me. Not the game — the repair. It was 1991, and the CRT went out. Just died one Tuesday afternoon. No warning, no flicker, just — dark. Now, this wasn't a standard monitor. It was a specific model, the H19-C, and by '91 nobody in the States was carrying them anymore. I called every parts supplier I knew. Nothing. I called guys who knew guys. Nothing. Dead ends everywhere.
Three weeks into the search, a buddy of mine who ran an arcade in San Francisco says he heard there's a supplier in Akihabara — the electronics district in Tokyo — that still stocks these things. He gives me a phone number. So now I'm making an international call to Japan, which in 1991 costs roughly the same as a mortgage payment. I get a guy on the line who speaks maybe twenty words of English. I speak zero words of Japanese. We go back and forth for fifteen minutes getting absolutely nowhere. Forty-seven dollars that call cost me. Forty-seven dollars.
So I hang up and I send a fax. I draw a picture of the monitor. I write the model number real big. I draw an arrow pointing to it that says "NEED THIS." The guy faxes back a drawing of the same monitor with a checkmark and a price in yen. We did the entire transaction through fax drawings. I wired the money — the part, customs fees, international shipping — it all came out to about six hundred bucks, which was insane for a single component in '91.
Six weeks later a crate shows up from Tokyo. I install the new CRT and I swear to you, the colors were better than the original. Brighter blues, sharper whites, the star fields in Star Guardian looked like you could fall into them. Whatever they were building in Akihabara, it was a cut above. Every penny, every headache, every fax drawing — worth it. That monitor ran perfect for another twelve years.
INTERNATIONAL SHIPPING MANIFEST
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Shipper:
Akihabara Electronics Supply Co.
3-15-5 Soto-Kanda, Chiyoda-ku
Tokyo 101-0021, JAPAN
Consignee:
Galaxy Zone Arcade
Attn: Sal Martinez
14208 Sherman Way
Van Nuys, CA 91405, USA
AWB #: JP-NRT-91-440287
Item Description:
CRT Monitor Assembly — Model H19-C
Manufacturer: Sanyo Electric
Spec: 19" Raster, 15kHz horizontal
Qty: 1
Weight: 22.4 kg (49.4 lbs)
Dims: 56 x 48 x 52 cm
Ship Date: June 12, 1991
Est. Arrival: July 28, 1991
Carrier: Nippon Express / USPS
Customs Declaration:
Item Value: ¥38,500 ($289.00 USD)
Customs Duty: $41.50
Shipping Fee: $187.00
Int'l Handling: $23.00
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TOTAL: $540.50
Notes: FRAGILE — GLASS CRT ENCLOSED
"Please do not drop. Thank you."
"Forty-seven dollars for a phone call. In 1991 money, that's like a hundred bucks. The guy in Tokyo didn't even speak English. We communicated through fax drawings." — Sal "Pixel" Martinez
_____ | _ | | |_| | - Sal "Pixel" Martinez | _ / Galaxy Zone Arcade |_| \_\ Est. 1982