Do you have an Amazon JP account? It does need to be a SEPARATE account from whatever your main Amazon account is.
When setting it up, ensure that you enter a fake shipping address that is IN Japan. The address doesn’t really matter, but it does need to be in Japan. It won’t let you buy anything unless you have an address added. For what it’s worth, the fake one I use is:
105-0001
東京都, 123 Kyoto
Japan
And I have no issues purchasing anything even though I’m positive that’s not a real address.
The second issue I found is that after so many purchases outside of Japan, it will tell you that you need to be in Japan or contact Amazon support, so I now use a VPN to spoof that I’m there whenever I purchase anything, but that won’t be a problem for your first few purchases.
Yeah, I made an Amazon JP account some time ago so I could order a Japanese Pikmin plush that hadn’t been released in the US yet, haha. It shipped to my American address and that’s been the only purchase I’ve made on it, so I haven’t put in any other address.
I’ll look into adjusting my account to be able to access digital books, but for now I don’t feel like going through all the trouble so I just ordered a printed copy. Amazon will send that to my American address but not the Kindle version…whatever.
It’s scheduled to arrive on the 11th, so even if it’s late I can work with the free chapters on Pixiv.
Digital copyright law is a tiger of confusing regulations that makes it necessary for Amazon to limit digital purchases or risk losing their distribution rights. Print copyright law is no kitten, but much easier for wholesalers to deal with.
That’s great that it should arrive beforehand, but as you say, there’s an alternative for you in the meantime! As before, I look forward to having you in the club!
I’m quite nervous, but I’m joining! I have no expectations of being able to get through this with even a modicum of ease, however, I do hope to come out the other side having learned a lot.
Thank you to everyone involved for providing such an enticing and welcoming club. This is truly a beautiful thing.
Going to take the plunge for the first time. Luckily the reading schedule works in my favour. Thanks for organizing @ChristopherFritz! I have a digital copy.
Just got my digital copy from Bookwalker. This is my first ever reading club. Thanks to the explanations from @ChristopherFritz I expect this to be a difficult. I intend to stick to it and look forward to everything I’ll learn by reading this manga.
I completely agree with your list! The only thing I would probably add is https://ichi.moe. I find it helpful for understanding the structure of a sentence as well as the meaning of vocabs.
ichi.moe is also great for catching when multiple consecutive words/particles form an expression, giving a meaning that is more than the sum of its parts.
Maybe it’s already too early but I tried the first two pages and I’m not really sure WTH is going on. Here are my attempts:
I don’t understand the はあs in the first two panels. What are they trying to express?
大変みんなっ This is bad, everyone.
うんこか! Is it poop?!
えっ、なんでうんちなのさっちゃん? uh, why would it be poop, Sacchan?
I don’t know if Sacchan is a name, but I couldn’t find it on jisho.org.
IIRC なの is the (female) colloquial version of なんだ?
冗談だよ結衣それよりアジトにこんなの落ちてたぞ It’s a joke, Yui. Apart from that, such things have been falling into our hideout (??)
Really not sure what is happening here, my translation makes no sense. Again, I assume the one thing is a name (Yui). Don’t know if that それより is “apart from that”, jisho lists several meanings for より. こんなの = such a thing? (I know that の can be a replacement for nouns).
変なメガネ Weird glasses
I don’t get why she’s saying that, though, as she’s the one wearing the glasses and there is no context about glasses?
なにそれっじゃなくて大変なの What’s that… that’s not it, but it’s bad.
(Not sure about that initial なにそれ)
パンダ… ううん、猫! Panda… no, cat!
I assume she’s just guessing now.
パンダみたいな猫がいたの! There was a cat that wanted to see a Panda. (?)
I somehow assume that this isn’t correct unless the character is just making up weird things. Also, I seem to recall that たい only works for statements about yourself… but I don’t otherwise understand how the panda and the cat are related in this sentence.
The はぁs are expressing heavy breathing because she is running.
さっちゃん is a name, yes.
なの is really just an explanatory の. The な only comes in when it follows a noun (うんち in this case), but it is functionally a colloquial なんですか.
結衣 is a name, yes.
The next two are a little harder to explain.
落ちる can also mean “to fall into one’s possession.,” and I think that’s the intended meaning here. The そりより is an “Aside from that,” meaning we are moving on from the うんち discussion.
I would break it down like so:
そりより = Putting that aside
アジトに = in (our) safehouse
こんなの = such a thing/this
落ちてたぞ = falling into the (speaker’s) possession, with ぞ adding emphasis
So, roughly, “Putting that aside, inside our safehouse, this has fallen into my possession!”
A more natural English interpretation that doesn’t perfectly preserve the Japanese words would be, “Putting that aside, I found this inside our safehouse.”
Then she follows up with the glasses, clarifying that こんなの means the 変なメガネ.
I read なにそれっ more as one would say, “What the?” in English, expressing surprise at the glasses.
みたい is also a phrase that roughly means, “similar to, resembling.”
So the last phrase パンダみたいな猫がいたの! would be, “There was a cat that looks like a panda!”
As always, if somebody more experienced corrects me, take their word over mine!
This is normal at this stage. By the end of the volume, you’ll be able to look back on chapter one and (while not everything will be clear) find a lot of it has come to make sense.
When the club begins in just over a week, we’ll have weekly threads to post questions and answers in.
If the suspense is too strong, I recommend typing up questions in a text document to have available to post once we have our first weekly thread. Questions (and answers) will be the backbone of the club =)
