We are reading the first volume of 夜カフェ as the Beginner Book Club!.
This thread is for chapter related discussion. We are reading together from the aforementioned date on, but this thread will be kept open mu~ch longer (like 10 years longer). So don’t be shy to ask questions even if you are late to the party
Vocabulary List
Feel free to add any words you looked up as well! Page numbers may be off by one or two because of differences between physical and digital editions, but we try to keep the words roughly in order of appearance
The book is also available over at koohi.cafe (formerly known as floflo).
Discussion Guidelines
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Can’t say I’m mad about it. It’s pretty light on unknown vocabulary but because of what you mentioned I feel like all the vocab I don’t know is really useful to know ^^.
This week was a quick read again. I’m starting to like reading the book more, even though I didn’t like it much in the beginning. It’s not like a lot of stuff happened, but the atmosphere and problems of middle shoolers just somehow feel so chill, 癒し系 for me.
The ティナ Info in this chapter was somehow super random. I was expecting something more to happen but it was just a giant tease that they went to the dentist clinic. Not sure what kind of implication this will have on the future o_O? I can’t even speculate anything.
I’m glad Hanabi gets along with Yamato now. I also appreciate that she didn’t suddenly become a good cook from one quick lesson. Hopefully she keeps at it and eventually improves.
A lot of vocab I feel like I should have known but have somehow never come across before in this chapter.
I liked this one, it was cute to see Hanabi and Yamato cook together after all the more sad things so far. This chapter kind of makes me want to try making omurice, I wonder if adding mayo to the egg actually works well.
Well, Aiko-san joked that “From here on, Yamato and Hanabi should do the cooking.” Hanabi excitedly replied, "Let’s do it! Let’s do it every day! And Yamato-kun responded with that, so I think that scene was all just a bit of banter. Presumably, yes, she will have to cook by herself at some point, though.
When looking at it from a command form perspective, the difference between 待て and 待って is essentially a level of politeness. 待て is a bit more rude and impatient. I would assume that in this instance, the difference between 待てない and 待ってない is the level of which one can’t wait. 待てない is presumably more excited.
Regardless, it is very casual to use 待て, so yes, it’s probably “more” correct to use 待って in almost all instances.
Literally “No debt” But I interpreted it a bit more liberally (in the vocab sheet as well) as “Nothing owed.” I do sometimes go back and adjust chapter titles after reading the chapter though, if something comes up that gives me a better phrasing.
I’m a bit confused by your answer. One is potential “Can’t wait” 待てない and the other is is continuus “isn’t waiting” 待ってない (with the い dropped for casuality). Not sure what you wanted to explain with that.
Ah, okay, I was mistaken in that case; I was taking the 待て vs 待って (both imperative) and applying some lateral thinking. You are definitely correct, though!
(To explain the mistaken lateral thought in more detail: 待て as an imperative is just a less polite version of 待って. I just tacked the ない on and assumed the same rule because I pulled a brain fail and didn’t even think about continuous form vs potential form. )
Now, it’s the case that Jisho (from JMdict) lumped literal and metaphorical meanings together, as well as sentence search (from Tatoeba) failed to capture required examples. Akebi gives less sentence examples than Jisho, but still none is satisfactory.
I hope it was banter! It was nice reading about Hanabi being so happy with Yamato, and I wasn’t sure if that ending sentence there was him being back to his old ways.
“There’s a woman with sunglasses in a taxi in front of the supermarket.” - Did I read this correctly…? That seems like such a random thing to mention.
“She’s getting out of the taxi.” -
“A girl is getting out too. She also wears sunglasses.” -
“It’s Tina-chan.” -
“They’re not even going into the supermarket, they’re going into the dental clinic that’s coincidentally next to it. That’s it, that’s what happened. We now return to our regularly scheduled programming.” - I see.
I’m sure it will all make sense… eventually. It’s almost as mysterious as the titular Night Cafe.
This week’s instructions were a lot easier than the sewing ones!
I’m reading a lot these days and I noticed that when reading novels while looking at the computer screen, the line I’m currently reading, vertically, seems to be more pronounced white in my head than the other lines in the novel… As if it was highlighted. This is happening over several days now.
I don’t know if I’m explaining this properly, but when I look away and back it’s not there anymore.
Is that weird?
The original plan: I use the break to start already reading chapter 8 already, so I have a bit of a buffer.
The reality: Not only have I not started with chapter 8, but I hadn’t even gone over the sections in chapter 7 that I had problems with yet. Whew.
(At least I have a good reason: I finally got a Nintendo Switch, and have been playing Yo-Kai Watch in Japanese! I’m surprised how well that is going. Seems like a perfect first game for a language learner!)
Anyway - here are are my questions for the first half!
ebook page 72:
公園でのヤマト君の言葉は、それからのあたしの力になっている。
What are those のs after 公園で and それから respectively doing there?
「じゃあ、どこかで、お弁当でも買っちゃおうか。」
Does anybody know what’s the nuance of it being 買っちゃおう instead of 買おう here? Neither of the usual “doing something by accident” nor “finishing completely” seem to make sense to me here.
ebook page 73:
「じゃあ、お願いしちゃおうっと。よろしく～。」
What’s the っと there?
あたしが作ったことのあるものといったら、くずれた肉じゃがと、ハムエッグとみそ汁くらいだ。
Is that first fragment there “If I had to say what things I have made, …”? DeepL spits out “The only thing I’ve ever made is”, which fits really well, but I don’t see how to get there, so I wonder if it maybe is a grammar pattern I don’t know yet.
Also, rereading that chapter… it sure starts with a pretty deep self-analysis, huh. I was honestly a bit surprised to read that it seems like she thinks that her main problem is that she tries (too?) hard to be a good child (which I can see a little at least), and then feels deep in her heart that she’s no good when things go wrong. I feel like the latter hasn’t been shown much in the story so far. I had more the impression that her problems are that she isn’t open enough about her feelings at home and some external problems like her home situation and that she’s being bullied, but I guess there might be more to that which we haven’t been shown yet?
公園で の ヤマト君の言葉は、それから の あたしの力になっている。
What are those のs after 公園で and それから respectively doing there?
Those are the regular のs.
The Yamato at the park and the me from now on. How else would you use a non-verb phrase to modify a noun?
「じゃあ、どこかで、お弁当でも 買っちゃおう か。」
Does anybody know what’s the nuance of it being 買っちゃおう instead of 買おう here? Neither of the usual “doing something by accident” nor “finishing completely” seem to make sense to me here.
I’m not sure about this, but I felt it maybe indicated a sense of doing something sort of… Not naughty, but… luxurious? てしまうcan also just give a lightly guilty connotation to an action, like there’s a better course of action that you won’t/didn’t take.
ebook page 73:
「じゃあ、お願いしちゃおう っと 。よろしく～。」
What’s the っと there?
Can’t help you on that one.
あたしが作ったことのあるものといったら 、くずれた肉じゃがと、ハムエッグとみそ汁くらいだ。
Is that first fragment there “If I had to say what things I have made, …”? DeepL spits out “The only thing I’ve ever made is”, which fits really well, but I don’t see how to get there, so I wonder if it maybe is a grammar pattern I don’t know yet.
Do you know the grammar pattern ~たことある to express things you have experience doing?
Chapter 7 (Beginner Book Club)
Next week is a catch up week so there won’t be a new thread!
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