10分で読める物語 二年生 Story 1 (きつねのしゃしん)

Japanese Language Reading
#104

Page 18

それに、足音まで かさなります。

Even the sounds of footsteps were overlapped on top of that.

山野さんが、つくえに むかって げんこうを 書いていると、

Yamano-san was working at his desk writing a draft when

げんぞうがかりの 吉田さんがい、

Yoshida-san, the person in charge of film development,

小さな しゃしんを たくさん おいて いきました。

placed a heap of small photographs (on Yamano-san’s desk) and left.

ごんざ山で うつした しゃしんです。

These are photos taken at Mount Gonza. (This ends with です, not でした like the other descriptions…so I thought it may be Yoshida-san informing Yamano-san?)

さて、どれを えらぼうかと、

Well then, which one should I choose, (he thought(?))

山野さんは、一まいずつ てねいに 見はじめました。

Yamano-san started to carefully look through each picture, one by one.

そのうち、山野さんの 目が 丸く なりました。

Soon afterwards, Yamano-san’s eyes became round.

「き、きつねの しゃしんだ。」

“I-it’s a picture of foxes!”

むかいあった 大きな きつねと 小さな きつね！

A picture of a big fox and small fox facing each other!

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#105

Page 19:

大きな きつねは、ひたいに 手を かざして います。

The big fox hold his hand over his forehead

一体、いつ うつしたんだ？

When the heck I took it?

しばらく 見て いた 山野さんの 耳に、「山の 日は、はよう しずむで」と 言った、松ぞうじいさんの しずかな 声が 聞こえて きました。

He was looking for a while and heard Matsuzou-Jin gentle voice “The day in the mountain ends early “

ーーそうか。

——oh, I see

たった 二ひきだけ、のこって いたんだよ。

There are only two animals remained

山野さんは うなずくと、引き出しの おくに、きつねの しゃしんを そっと しまいました。

Then Yamano-san nodded and gently put away the photo of the foxes :fox_face: inside the drawer.

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#106

Well I finally had time to read this book. The way my life shapes up, I don’t have time or inclination to read one page a day, I’d rather read several all together. (I have reading sessions 4 times a week. Mostly on different days, so I basically sit down to read 4x/week.) I hadn’t meant for it to take almost two weeks to get to though. (I’m also reading the other ABBC book, and some of my own stuff.)

I am grateful for the translations since they helped clarify some things for me, but I would say that this isn’t my preferred format. I much prefer the “ask about a sentence (perhaps trying to break it apart first) and having helpful people answer” as the main format.

So I can’t help by adding my own translations (I don’t do them for myself except for really hard sentences). For the next story I will try to read a bit more timely so I can also add my opinion/ideas to some translations without being hopelessly behind on that (and therefore it would be a bit late and disjointed).

How this story was for me (yes, I read the last page ahead of time):

It was a bit hard, because there were a lot of more descriptive language used that I haven’t seen in the other things I’m reading. That’s where translations really helped because those words weren’t always added to the spreadsheet either. (I read through the whole story last night.)

A bit more kanji would be helpful because then I could start guessing at the meaning of the words I don’t know, but alas this is a graded reader for Japanese children. XD

The story was very sweet in the end, and the picture of the foxes was very cute and sweet.

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#107

Definitely agree with the thought that more kanji would help. There were just so many words that sound the same but have different kanji and meanings. I mean, there were a few words that had the same kanji but meant ten different things depending on the context, but… just a few. Never mind how difficult it was to try and figure out where one word starts and ends. Glad this book uses spaces. Who’d have thought I’d be asking for more kanji by the end of this story?:sweat_smile:

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#108

That’s why we study these books - to make people want kanji. :stuck_out_tongue:

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#109

あっ…そうか！:thinking: much effective. am convinced.
back to my reviews I go~ :muscle::facepunch::facepunch::boom::boom::sweat::cold_sweat::sob::skull::alien::space_invader:

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#110

I guess you can just post your translation anyway without checking the spoilers. Or also why this is that, it grammar point, etc. and I believe you can also post your translation even if it’s a few days late

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#111

Eeeh, I don’t do translations. I realize I wasn’t very clear.

If I have trouble with a sentence and I can’t find a way to figure it out, I break a sentence apart and ask for help with figuring it out.

But since there are translations there is no reason to do that because I can check if I roughly understand something correctly. But it also means those helpful breakdowns doesn’t happen as cohesively. I did notice that someone (sorry on mobile so I can’t check who easily) did some of that breaking down. But it isn’t quite the same.

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#112

What I mean is that you can do the breakdowns and just don’t check the translation. I think we can all learn from both options

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#113

Ah right. Well, maybe I will. But I will admit that the translations are too tempting to ignore, especially since it takes me 30 seconds to check a translation and probably 20-30 minutes to write up a breakdown post (mostly because of formatting and switching between keyboards and looking up the different parts, etc.).

Perhaps when even a translation doesn’t help me understand how it came to mean that. :slight_smile:

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#114

At least you can copy all the Japanese from the “translation” post. It be the first to post it :wink:

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#115

–これは、なかった ことに しよう。

”This, we’ll treat it like it never existed."

たばこに 火を つけました。

He lit his cigarette.

そして、その たばこの けむりを 見ながら、

And then, as he watched the smoke from the cigarette,

–あの 二人に、おいしい ものでも おくって やろう。

“I’ll have to bring those two something delicious or something.”

–どんな ものを よろこぶかな。

“What kinds of things would they like?”

と、そんな ことを せわしく考えはじめました。

he began to busily think about such things.

aaand we’re done with the first story :smiley::tada::confetti_ball::confetti_ball::tada:
slowly but surely getting through it :+1::+1:

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#116

Thanks everyone for finishing the story. I followed along at the end but did not have the time to post. That whole process is time consuming so I appreciate the work you guys did at the end.
Now that it’s over:

Summary

Why was grandpa so grumpy at the start but posed for the picture anyway? The reporter said he would be happy just to get a picture of the den. Did I miss a part that caused grandpa to have a change of heart?
Did we ever agree on whether or not the trees were actually speaking? Given the magic foxes, it seems they were but the reporter did not seem to think it was strange. Which has me leaning toward the figurative interpretation.
Why do you think the reporter chose keep the photos a secret?

#117

I have the same doubts :joy:

The two live alone in the mountain. Then a super polite friendly reporter comes to takes a couple of pictures of foxes.

Grumpy grandpa it’s not happy about it, because humans and deseases took them, but in the end he is like f*** it, I’ll take you to the woods.

The reporter is super happy and takes a bunch of photos. Then grandpa is back and calls for the grandchild. Something about trees and a shortcut to come back.

He takes a pictures of both of them.

3 days later, while preparing the story, he discovers they are both foxes. Ok, everything cool.

The end

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#118

Did these foxes turn into humans to survive?

#119

I took the grandpa character as the “gruff on the outside, soft on the inside” type of character. So he didn’t want anything to do with the reporter at first. But after a lot of polite(?) persistence, the reporter was able to win the grandpa over.

I felt the scene where the grandpa went out of his way to call the kid and had him guide the reporter down the mountain before the sun goes down let us know he’s a big softy.

I think the reporter kept the photos to protect the foxes’ privacy. There were only two left on the whole mountain. Maybe he didn’t want to bring them unwanted attention. So that they can live in peace.

Eh… still not sure about the screaming/yelling trees. The whole story turns into horror when they come up😅

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#120

I’m currently house bound preparing for a hurricane that can’t decide which way to go. Will we start the next story soon or have a cooling off period?

#121

There should be one day between stories.

On confusing aspects

My view is this:

I didn’t read it as the grandpa posing for a photo at the end, I think the reporter just took a photo. But I might have missed something while reading. So yes, the grandpa is gruff, but ultimately kind in that he doesn’t want the reporter to go wandering around by himself nor want him to get lost after dark. Helping the reporter means getting rid of him faster, at least I’d assume so.

The trees thing seemed to be more of an story telling effect, especially since the report didn’t notice anything strange. Maybe more an indicator to us readers that something a bit strange is afoot. I actually expected the grandson to pop up and be a fox at that point, haha.

As to the reporter hiding the photos, that seemed to be out of kindness. He realized the foxes were hiding to keep themselves safe and if that photo was published then they wouldn’t be safe anymore. So he hid the photo with the foxes, and most likely used a photo of one of the dens for the article. Also the foxes were nice to him, showing the den and getting him safely off the mountain. Kindness returned.

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#122

The resting day was yesterday. We should have a new thread today for the second story

#124

Yeah, you are right. Wasn‘t at home yesterday, which confused my timing XD I will open the next thread after breakfast

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