Im a hesitant starter too, so I’m looking forward to beginning this book. I’m hoping it will be the start to a new direction in my learning Japanese.
7 Likes
Good morning, everyone! Today is the day we start reading and discussing, right?
I went through and added just about every word for page 6 because I’m so new that a majority of words are new to me. So please let me know if I added something with the wrong formatting.
So, first question I would like to discuss:
At the end of page six, “ふうせんなんかないよ。”
I know what each particle and word means individually. My best guesses at the meaning are “The balloon? It isn’t.” or “There is no such thing as a balloon.” But that doesn’t seem right. Thoughts?
4 Likes
Morning! Yes, what usually happens is whoever is running the book clubs will start a new thread per reading week, which will be linked in the top post in this thread, to make it easier to keep track of the discussions per week. I imagine that’ll be up at some point in the next few hours 
I’m still trying to get my head around なんか myself, so perhap someone with more experience can help as well, but my understanding is that one of it’s uses is as a filler word, similar to how we use “like” in English.
So you could possibly translate is as “The balloon is like, gone.”
3 Likes
Hello everyone!! It’s great to see so many people excited to get started, here is the thread for week 1! I’ll cross post any questions above over to this week’s thread.
Ask questions, talk about your favorite scenes, or just say hello and let us know how you’re progressing. See you there!
8 Likes
Yay, the bookclub has started! I need to sleep soon (I’m in australia) so I’ll need to start tomorrow. I hate being even the slightest bit late, but I’m guessing that’s normal for a bookclub? It’s okay as long as I read it within the week, right? Sorry if I’m stressing over nothing 
6 Likes
You’re not late until the next thread is up, and even then it’s still okay to participate in the club if you’re behind.
5 Likes
Waiting on mine to ship/arrive but can’t wait to start!
4 Likes
First book club！Probably not advanced enough but screw it, its good practice right？I was going to try to knock it all out at once, but after spending an hour on 2 pages this will now become a multi day project (the first time book club wasnt kidding about deciphering were they :P)!! I have a couple of questions I would like answered as well if anyone could be so kind.
- On panel #1 what is て doing at the end of the verb もたせる, is this a tense thing? Or the emergence of te forms which i have only heard about so far lol. my guess translation was “Let me hold it for a bit”
- On panel #3 だ is used as a particle. From what i can find online it seems to mean “it”, what are the rules behind placing it in a sentence/i thought Japanese generally leaves that to inference, “It’s your fault you dropped it/You have the fault for dropping it”
- Similar question to panel #1 except with だして this time
- Still on panel #5, just needing a breakdown for what Doraemon is saying here.
- Panel 6 stumped me a little
- Panel #7 what is the う at the end of つくるう, doing? It seems extra, is doraemon trailing off?
- Panel #8, whats da doing at the end here? + i dont understand what もの is doing. Guess translation is “using this makes it float”
Thank you and I am looking forward to the rest of this book club!
1 Like
Howdy! I’m also pretty new, but allow me to try to help. I spent a while reading the first page lol.
Firstly, we’re posting in the wrong place now. Please use the thread for Week 1.
- . On panel #1 what is て doing at the end of the verb もたせる, is this a tense thing? Or the emergence of te forms which i have only heard about so far lol. my guess translation was “Let me hold it for a bit”
From what I understand, Japanese te-form turns a normal verb into an “-ing” form verb. Te-form makes it clear that you’re doing the action right now, or continuously. It’s not in the future, but an action you’re working on at this moment. So I did took that part to mean “Let me hold it a little now”.
- On panel #3 だ is used as a particle. From what i can find online it seems to mean “it”, what are the rules behind placing it in a sentence/i thought Japanese generally leaves that to inference, “It’s your fault you dropped it/You have the fault for dropping it”
だ is just the casual/informal form of “desu”. I don’t think of it as a particle, just a word meaning “is”.
- Similar question to panel #1 except with だして this time
You’re right, it’s just the te form of the verb again. So I took it to mean that the balloon is currently getting out.
- Still on panel #5, just needing a breakdown for what Doraemon is saying here.
I asked about that same thing. It’s the first answer over on the Week 1 thread I linked above.
I haven’t gotten as far as your other questions yet but I hope that helps.
1 Like
ty for your help sir!
2 Likes
Great! Have a look at the Bookwalker preview linked in the first post - the whole first weeks reading is available there free I believe
1 Like
Thanks! Yeah this has been nice for this week. Bookwalker seems to glitch out for me on the paid versions a lot but it’s working surprisingly well for the preview.
1 Like
Hi everyone - new ti0o the idea of a japanese book Club. Will joint for the first time. Will get the book on bookwalker
3 Likes
Great, welcome to the club!
1 Like
I just got my digital copy! I can’t sleep because of the emotion!
Cannot wait to start reading it.
2 Likes
I just got my copy of the book, and am about to be traveling, but I’m looking forward to starting this up a little late and following along! I’m so glad this is here and thank you!
1 Like
This was cute, very fun story. I think the inventions will be great for picking up vocabulary. By the way, does anyone know if there’s some significance to the name “Doraemon”? Is it a pun or something
1 Like
My Japanese teacher told us once “Doraemon loves dorayaki!” and I always thought that’s what his name came from (like a contraction of Dorayaki-monster 
) but searching a bit on google it seems like I was wrong haha
I found this on the Doraemon wiki:
The name “Doraemon” can be translated roughly to “stray.” Unusually, the name “Doraemon” (ドラえもん) is written in a mixture of two Japanese scripts: Katakana (ドラ) and Hiragana (えもん). “Dora” derives from “dora neko” (brazen or stray cat), and is a corruption of nora (stray). “emon” is a component of male given names like Goemon, though no longer as popular as in the past. “Dora” is not derived from dora , meaning gong, but due to the homophony, the series puns on this, with Doraemon loving grilled Dorayaki.
5 Likes
I saw this thread and got so excited - I’ve had Doraemon on my bedside table since I was gifted the first two books a couple of years ago. From the 1998 printing. 
3 Likes
I had found a list of what volumes of the original edition stories the club edition has, but now I can’t find it! I’ll see if I can find that and maybe there are some stories the club will read from the books you have!
The version we’re reading is easier than starting from volume 1 of the original, so if you can, get the club copy and join in, it will help you to jump into the ones you have (I don’t know your level though so sorry if that’s not relevant to you!)