セーラー服と機関銃🏫🌺 (IBC) - Week 21

[Domjcw]

せーラー服と機関銃
Intermediate book club
Home thread

Week 21	6 July 2024
End page	341
End point (kindle)	4280
End phrase	第四章 end of section 5
Pages	15
Previous week	Week 20
Next week	Week 22
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

Please follow these rules to avoid inadvertent ネタバレ. If you’re unsure whether something should have a spoiler tag, err on the side of using one.

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.

Instructions for Spoiler Tags

Click the cog above the text box and use either the “Hide Details” or “Blur Spoiler” options. The text which says “This text will be hidden” should be replaced with what you are wishing to write. In the case of “Hide Details”, the section in the brackets that is labelled “Summary” can be replaced with whatever you like also (i.e, [details=”Chapter 1, Pg. 1”]).

Hide Details results in the dropdown box like below:

Example

This is an example of the “Hide Details” option.

The “Blur Spoiler” option will simply blur the text it surrounds.

This is an example of the “Blur Spoiler” option.

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
—	—	—	—

Participation

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[Domjcw]

Several bits that I couldn’t quite make out (though the overall sense was clear)

1.構わない

はい。――ですが、構わないんで？」
ああ、構わん。つべこべ言ったら、片づけて来い。目高組一つぐらいなくなっても、別にボスは気になさらねえ」

Sekine’s underling is talking with him about going to retrieve the package from the Medaka headquarters.
But I couldn’t translate this

Yes, but, I shouldn’t take care of it? [is this, should I not kill who I find there?]
oh, take care of it (??) Stop nitpicking (?), tidy it up and come back. If a Medaka gumi member disappears, the boss isn’t going to do anything (??)

2. The fat man's inclination

何せこの体ではね……。面倒でかなわん。その心配は無用だ」

The fat man isn’t interested in sex. But I can’t work out what he says next

At any rate, this body [which body?]
trouble in coming true ???
that worry is useless…???

3. Hideki is thinking

Medaka gumi don’t handle drugs.

電話番とはいいながら、一本の電話もない。一体どうなったんだろう？

telephone call…while saying??
not a single further call?
what the hell happened?

[generalteddie]

電話番とはいいながら、一本の電話もない。一体どうなったんだろう？

「～とはいいながら」is a sort of set “grammar” phrase, setting up contrast (you can find an explanation + example sentences here for example). So it’s saying that even though Hideki is back at the office so that there’s someone there to take phone calls, there hasn’t been a single one yet. Then he wonders what is going on (because he hasn’t heard from anyone yet).

Idk what a slick translation of 電話番 would be. Perhaps “phone duty”? But I feel like I’ve never actually heard anyone say that in English. But it just means someone whose role is to answer phone calls.

P.S. I couldn’t find this thread linked from the main thread and only saw it under new topics, so it would be a good idea to link it to make it more discoverable (I think you may have forgotten to link it in this week’s post!)

[Sasabonsam]

Week 21

Good riddance to Kuroki!

Also, another Medakagumi member seems to bite the dust. I’m a little disappointed by what a tiny role these guys have played in the plot up to this point. At least, while alive. The trio have done way better.

No wait, I take that back. Shuuhei and Tomoo have been doing work. Tetsuo only has one more chapter to justify his existence in the story I’m shocked I even remember his name.

1.構わない

@Domjcw

はい。――ですが、構わないんで？」
ああ、構わん。つべこべ言ったら、片づけて来い。目高組一つぐらいなくなっても、別にボスは気になさらねえ」

Sekine’s underling is talking with him about going to retrieve the package from the Medaka headquarters.
But I couldn’t translate this

Yes, but, I shouldn’t take care of it? [is this, should I not kill who I find there?]
oh, take care of it (??) Stop nitpicking (?), tidy it up and come back. If a Medaka gumi member disappears, the boss isn’t going to do anything (??)

My reading was just a little different. I read 構わない as “to not be a problem” and thought that it referred to starting a fight within Hamaguchi’s group. I judged this from what Sekine says about the boss in the last sentence here. My take:

• はい。――ですが、構わないんで？
  “Yes. —However, there won’t be a problem?”
• ああ、構わん.
  “Yeah, It’s fine”/“it won’t be a problem”
• つべこべ言ったら、片づけて来い.
  “If (someone, presumably at the Medakagumi building) complains, tidy up (kill them) and come back”
  One of 片づける’s listings in Jisho is “to do away with someone,” so this is where they start to talk about killing.
• 目高組一つぐらいなくなっても、別にボスは気になさらねえ.
  “Even if a Medakagumi member dies, the boss won’t particularly care.”

2. The fat man's inclination

@Domjcw

何せこの体ではね……。面倒でかなわん。その心配は無用だ」

The fat man isn’t interested in sex. But I can’t work out what he says next

At any rate, this body [which body?]
trouble in coming true ???
that worry is useless…???

• 何せこの体ではね……。
  He’s talking about his own body. “Anyway with this body, you know…”
• 面倒でかなわん。
  かなわん is 敵わない, not 叶わない. “(I) can’t put up with the trouble (of having sex),” implying that he has some physical difficulties with it.
• その心配は無用だ」
  This particular worry is useless in the sense that there’s no need for Izumi to feel it. He’s not going to do what she’s worrying about.

[Domjcw]

@generalteddie

P.S. I couldn’t find this thread linked from the main thread

Oops, fixed.

[Domjcw]

@generalteddie

example sentences here for example

Ooh, that is really helpful

電話番

Aha. “On call” (or assigned to wait by the phone, maybe?)

[Domjcw]

@Sasabonsam

He’s talking about his own body.

I wondered about that, but couldn’t follow
Thanks

[Blackweather]

Lots of things going on at once - Izumi’s failed attempt to escape while almost killing a nurse, the gang heading to the rescue while figuring out Kuroki’s past actions and 松の木 going after the parcel and getting Hideki. I wonder if he survived that (I guess not) and whether the bag they retrieved had the parcel they were searching for all along. Also, I guess Kuroki might just be getting what he deserved.

[Jiell]

week 21

Well, Izumis situation is a lot more dire than before I really liked the antagonists so far (aside from Kuroki, he was a bit boring/lame later on ). They feel legitimately threatening.

Can’t say I cared for the continuation of the info dump by Tomoo. And Sakumas only role is to go “Oh, really?” “What do you mean?” … Oh well, guess the kid got it all figured out.

@Sasabonsam

He’s talking about his own body

Oh, I first thought he was talking about Izumis body. Like, she’s a teenager, so he isn’t interested at all. “Finally not a pedophile” is what I thought, but your version makes more sense

question

My dictionary translated the word 収容所 as “housing facility, concentration camp, refugee camp” among other things. Those seem like vastly different words though, can it really mean “housing facility”? That seems pretty neutral compared to the rest. I would also hope that “refugee camps” aren’t referred to in the same way as the concentration camps.
Typing the word into google gives mostly sites about the concentration camps and the holocaust, so I would think that is the primary meaning Not that the context gives room for any other possible meanings, just in general.

[pm215]

@Jiell

question

My dictionary translated the word 収容所 as “housing facility, concentration camp, refugee camp” among other things. Those seem like vastly different words though, can it really mean “housing facility”? That seems pretty neutral compared to the rest. I would also hope that “refugee camps” aren’t referred to in the same way as the concentration camps.

on 収容所

Daijisen defines it as

特定の目的で人や動物を収容しておく所。「捕虜—」「野犬—」

which is pretty wide in scope both in the definition proper and in the example compounds it gives. “Concentration camp” specifically looks like it would be 強制収容所, and there are other compound words in this group like 入国者収容所 “immigration detention centre”. I suspect EDICT includes “concentration camp” in the list of glosses because sometimes people use 収容所 as a clear-in-context abbreviation of 強制収容所.

Doc uses the word explicitly in the context of Nazi Germany; maybe it’s similar to how in English “Nazi camps” would clearly refer to concentration camps, but we also have POW camps, refugee camps, etc, and the meaning of “camp” in the sense of “place where people are brought together and housed” isn’t tainted by the more specific use?

[Boodil]

Kuroki

@Jiell

I really liked the antagonists so far (aside from Kuroki, he was a bit boring/lame later on

My thoughts exactly. He started out feeling like a manipulative mastermind type of guy, but the minute Sekine’s people started to rough him up a bit, he turned into a crying mess. It’s such a stark contrast to the ladies withstanding torture in the parallel strands of the narrative. And now BLOB instant concrete. His death felt a little anti-climactic. Also, what kind of lame villain origin story is “My job as a cop didn’t pay well enough, so I had to smuggle heroin”?