セーラー服と機関銃🏫🌺 (IBC) - Week 20

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せーラー服と機関銃
Intermediate book club
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5147UezyT4L

Week 20 29 June 2024
End page 326
End point (kindle) 4079
End phrase 第四章 end of section 4
Pages 17
Previous week Week 19
Next week Week 21
Home Thread せーラー服と機関銃

Vocabulary

Google sheet:

セーラー服と機関銃 vocabulary sheet

Please read the guidelines on the first page before adding any words.

Discussion Guidelines

Everybody should feel free to post and ask questions–it’s what makes book clubs fun! But please do not post until you are familiar with Spoiler Courtesy!

Spoiler Courtesy

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  1. Any potential spoiler for the current week’s reading need only be covered by a spoiler tag. Predictions and conjecture made by somebody who has not read ahead still falls into this category.

  2. Any potential spoilers for external sources need to be covered by a spoiler tag and include a label (outside of the spoiler tag) of what might be spoiled. These include but are not limited to: other book club picks, other books, games, movies, anime, etc. I recommend also tagging the severity of the spoiler (for example, I may still look at minor spoilers for something that I don’t intend to read soon).

  3. Any information from later in the book than the current week’s reading (including trigger warnings that haven’t yet manifested) needs to be hidden by spoiler tags and labeled as coming from later sections.

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Proper Nouns

Name Hiragana reading Notes Kindle location first mentioned
赤川次郎 あかがわじろう the author cover
尾田医師 おだいし Doctor Oda 24
目高組 めだかぐみ Medaka clan 86
Izumi’s family
星泉 ほしいずみ main character, Izumi 170
酒井好子 さかいよしこ aunt Yoshiko 172
星貴志 ほしたかし main character’s father, Takashi 179
酒井呈一 さかいていいち Uncle (Yoshiko’s husband) 201
知子 ともこ Tomoko (?Izumi’s mother) 211
マユミ - mysterious woman in Izumi’s apartment 348
土田恒美 つちだつねみ Tsunemi, real name of the woman pretending to be Mayumi 1,827
岡崎真由美 おかざきまゆみ The real name of Mayumi, friend of Izumi’s father, photographer. 2,549
Classmates
奥沢哲夫 おくざわてつお Classmate of Izumi, Tetsuo (son of an executive, smart dresser, family expect him home for dinner on time) 251
渡辺周平 わたなべしゅうへい Classmate of Izumi, Shuhei (stocky, bowlegged, loves Judo) 251
竹内智生 たけうちともお Classmate of Izumi, Tomo. (Smart, heading for Tokyo university, wears glasses) 261
和子 かずこ classmate, 433
Schoolteachers
三浦久子 みうらひさこ Miss Miura, teacher 357
保科校長 ほしなこうちょう Headteacher Hoshina 368
Yakuza
健次 けんじ Kenji, Medaka gang member, short, unbalanced (brought the doctor in the car in the prologue), chews gum 555
英樹 ひでき Hideki, Medaka gang member, skinny and unhealthy looking, wears thick glasses 556
武 たけし Takeshi, Medaka gang member, stocky and overweight 558
佐久間 さくま Sakuma, Medaka second in command, unusually tall (‘beanpole’), in 50s 558
浜口 はまぐち Hamaguchi, local Yakuza chief 1,034
関根 せきね Sekine, head of the Matsunoki clan 2,141
元 げん Gen, Yakuza henchman in the Matsunoki clan 2,306
剛 つよし Tsuyoshi, yakuza henchman in the Matsunoki clan 2,306
萩原 はぎわら Hagiwara, messenger from a ‘big fish’ 3,211
Other characters
黒木 くろき detective, head of the S section 870
浜口物産 はまぐちぶっさん Hamaguchi trading company 936
野田代議士 のだだいぎし Representative Noda, politician, waiting for Hamaguchi 1,064
岩田 いわた Night watchman at Izumi’s apartment block 1665
関根正明 せきねまさあき Son of Sekine, the head of the Matsunoki clan 2,073
円谷重治 つぶらやしげはる Shigeharu, left name on business card at Izumi’s apartment 2,665
マクシム - Maxim’s [I presume this is a reference to the famous Parisian restaurant] 2,480
三大寺一 さんだいじはじめ Hajime, ‘big boss’, kidnapper of Izumi, nicknamed ‘the fat man’, and ‘Doc’ 3326
— — — —

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week 20

Tomoo’s explanation was a little wild. Detailed, too.
Paraphrased: Real Mayumi wasn’t educated, she wasn’t pretty, and she must’ve been able to recognize heroin because she just had that vibe of being an ex-user. Yeesh, why add the mean commentary in :joy:

Also, since the package really is just heroin, I have questions. Like, was heroin really so expensive in 1980’s Japan that yakuza would fight and kill each other over an amount that can fit in a lotion bottle?? Or was the implication that multiple aramis bottles were filled with heroin? Sekine mentioned 何億円 right at the end, that seems like a crazy amount.

Maybe I’m just salty because I really thought it had to be something else other than heroin… Clearly I need to read more mystery/crime novels.

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Not implication, it’s explicitly stated that all the aramis bottles had their contents switched; p322 has マユミさんは棚にあった、アラミスのびん全部を溶液と入れかえました with emphasis dots on the 全部.

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ahhh I see, I had read that as ‘all’ the contents of the bottle. Thanks!

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Mayumi 1

I had understood that Mayumi had deliberately concentrated the heroin to fit into a smaller space.

at loc 4025

ヘロインの濃い溶液を作って、化粧品の瓶の中身を捨て、代わりにそれを入れておいたのです。

But I had a similar reaction - a. it seemed highly unlikely that even in concentrated form that $1million heroin would be able to fit in that small a space.
[from one source - the street price of heroin in the early 80s was $2200/gram. That would mean that in its most concentrated form (powder), it would be 500g for $1million.]

b. it seemed unlikely to me that Mayumi (even if she was an ex-user) would have the technical ability to make a concentrated solution. (If she was an ex-user, it strikes me that the process of concentrating a heroin solution might be an overwhelming temptation…)

Mayumi 2

I confess to feeling a bit sorry for Mayumi #2, even if she was a fake.

Maybe it is my old fashioned sexist values, but Shuhei finally got to unleash his judo moves (he has been itching to since about chapter 1), and here he is flinging the fake Mayumi around the room… Hope he gets to bully a real Yakuza some time soon

PS I haven’t worked out - maybe it will come later. But did the fake Mayumi just happen to have the same name as the real Mayumi? Or had she changed her name specially? - but if so, why didn’t the loose-mouthed photo-shoot assistant mention that… “oh yes, and I don’t know why she changed her name recently…”?

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week 20

I felt like most of what he said he couldn’t really prove. I guess we are meant to believe that he is right, but how would he know her motivations etc.?

I didn’t quite get why she decided to keep the drugs and not go to the police? She hid the heroin, because she believed the yakuza or whoever would come to get it back. Keeping the drugs feels like she prioritized the money over her and Izumis safety :thinking:

Nah, I thought the same. Imagining this 17 year old treat an unarmed woman like that was uncomfortable.

I think it is this, or maybe Kuroki looked for someone with that name once he learned of the letter? Maybe we’ll learn more about that later.

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This chapter felt really confusing for some reason.

The hiding place

So, there are several Aramis bottles? Has this been clear from the start? I always just pictured one bottle of Aramis among several other products in a little bathroom cabinet. Now I’m unsure how to picture it. I got no idea, how large an amount of heroin we’re talking about here. I also don’t understand why Tomoo thinks it was such a genius move of Mayumi 1 to use several bottles. Wouldn’t the people looking for it know that the amount is larger than what you can fit into a single bottle and also check the others?

Mayumi 2

I agree. They don’t even know how much Mayumi knew and if she played an active role in Kuroki’s plan or if he just manipulated her to do some legwork. Shuuhei beating up someone who might just have been an unwitting pawn made him and everyone else present look like a psychopath. Especially since the method is so much more hands-on and physically brutal than what Fatso is doing to Izumi. Somehow this contrast made it extra uncomfortable.

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I wondered if the judo throws were like the ones that you see in demonstrations - vigorous and dramatic, but not actually (usually)physically damaging. (He says, not knowing anything about judo).

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