First of all, (belated, I guess?) Happy Birthday to @Beyond_Sleepy and @Daisoujou! Birthday in April is nice, hehe (mine is on Saturday, so we have kind of an April Birthday team here, it seems )
For my reading, I have returned to 大聖堂 and it’s currently a bit more difficult than before, so it takes some time. My Japanese friend is also struggling with the English text quite a bit, so we had a chat the other day to set things straight. It is sooo hard to explain an English text in Japanese especially when it’s not clear to me initially where the misunderstandings lie exactly. But I’m also getting better at pinpointing them.
Funniest thing was that he struggled with this bit of direct speech:
„It is clear, is it not, that…“
Now the fun part is that in Japanese I usually struggle a lot with these casually inserted negations that don’t indicate negation but rather emphasis, confirmation or other things. And now he was struggling with the same thing in English! That somehow put my mind at ease. Yes, language learning is hard! And we can all be proud of what we achieved, even if it feels like a tiny drop in the vast ocean of Japanese knowledge.
I love that! The April Birthday Reading Crew? Mine’s on Tuesday, so another one for the team
A very happy birthday to you, too!
That’s the one! I’m in Europe but looks like it’s available in America as well. I know this because I went on twitter and saw some very heated discussions about the show lol. I wish there were more episodes! I’m already halfway through the season.
So I have a grammar question, and I know I probably should ask in the grammar thread, but since this thread is full of readers, and there’s a small group even reading the same book as me, I thought I’d ask here first. I keep coming across ときて/ときた. I can sort of deduce its meaning, but I haven’t been able to find any specific reference in a dictionary or grammar resource. In JLPTsensei it’s listed as N1 grammar meaning “because”, but this doesn’t fit with my sentences.
Example sentences from 三毛猫, not really spoilers in isolation:
深夜の実験室、ボコボコと音を立てているフラスコ、ときてはなおさらである。
しかもそのほとんどが無駄骨ときていますからね。
女マッサージ師の次は女占い師、予言者ときた。
(bonus question: Is 女 pronounced おんな when used as a prefix like this?)
Day 13
Read: ジャックジャンヌー夏劇ー
Finished: 24 pages (story 1: just one life)
Time: 1 hour 5 minutes
Finished the first (and longest I think it was like 70 pages) short story in the ジャックジャンヌ novel. Next one’s is Suzu’s story 涙かんざし, which is quite a bit shorter at 39 pages, so hopefully that one will be a bit easier to get through. I like that this book is broken up into short stories because when I read I always tend to read until the conclusion, but I don’t have the endurance or reading speed to do that in Japanese yet so its nice to have a bunch of little endings in one book.
Reading Thoughts
Came across the sentences 「努力を続けていれば、いつか同期に近づけるのだろうか。間に合うのだろうか、ユニヴェール歌劇学校生という短い時間の中で。あの華に、才能に、持たざる者が、持てる者に。」and it took me a while to figure out what was going on, I’ve never seen so many particles with nothing following them at once.
Storywise, I liked by how the end of the story Kai was able to change his way of thinking in a little bit of a more hopeful direction. It was interesting to see that this is the point of the story where he really started thinking about this before it became a much bigger issue during the winter play in the game.
New Vocab
さらなる even more; still more; further
かたや on the one hand … (and on the other …); on one side
さながら just like
はたまた or
豪快 （ごうかい）hearty; tremendous; magnificent; glorious; splendid; heroic; stirring
独擅場 （どくせんじょう）field in which one acts unchallenged; unrivaled sphere of activity (unrivalled); one’s monopoly
灼く （やく）to tan (i.e. suntan); to burn
肩幅 （かたはば）shoulder width (breadth)
全うする （まっとうする）to accomplish; to fulfill; to carry out
舞踊 （ぶよう）dancing; dance
立ち居振る舞い （たちいふるまい）movements; behavior; behaviour; bearing; deportment; manners; demeanor (heard this one but never seen the kanji)
帯びる （おびる）to have a trace of; to be tinged with
殻を破る （からをやぶる）to break up and start anew; to break out of one’s shell; to make a fresh start; to go outside oneself
爽快 （そうかい）refreshing; exhilarating; invigorating; bracing
息づく to live
見出す （みいだす）to find out; to discover; to notice; to detect
精悍 （せいかん）virile; tough; masculine; intense
I read 8-15 yesterday and I was going to go back and reread since I didn’t know a lot of the vocab and kanji used, but I think I’ll ultimately skip. It’s all stuff related to Jack the Ripper, so I don’t think I’m missing out on too much.
So I did some googling and it seems like it’s one of those expressions that’s hard to give an exact meaning for in English (because of course )
But yeah basically it’s と + 来る, where と is like quoting and capturing the essence of whatever it’s attached to as it likes to do. Meaning-wise, it seems to mostly be a form of emphasis: 来る（くる）とは？ 意味・読み方・使い方をわかりやすく解説 - goo国語辞書
As far as differences in nuance between specific different forms of it, I think it’s another one you get a sense for with time. If you’re reading stuff that uses it at least, I don’t know that I’ve ever seen this before But yeah it seems to be mostly different from (though possibly related?) ときている, so that might help clear it up!
(Also yes I would think so? I think おんな is the typical way to go for that, though I’m sure people change it up sometimes for one reason or another )
Back from my trip!! There was practically no service in the camp, but I still managed to get some reading done. Since I couldn’t access the internet at all and I have nothing on my phone, I tried reading かがみの孤城 raw (because there are far too many words and phrases I don’t know in 君ノ声). It was surprisingly not too hard to understand! Of course there were words I didn’t know, and some parts I didn’t get, but not overwhelmingly so, and I could get what was happening. I read up to page 19, but I’ll probably reread them quickly later with a little help for unknown words/phrases.
I got lots of reading done today, in both Japanese and English lol. This evening I really felt like getting immersed in a novel, so I picked up a book (in English) and couldn’t put it down until I finished the whole 315 pages. Three hours gone .
I just finished reading half an hour of 君ノ声, from page 50 to page 80. Which is less than it sounds, because a fair amount of pages didn’t have many words.
Little summary
Page 51-52 was a sort of interlude, and page 53 the start of Chapter 2, apparently.
I was referring to the businessman as Kyougoku, but maybe I should use his first name. So Kazunari and Nana are at his place. It starts off with Kazunari rethinking his actions (intervening between her and her mother)… and here I realise I missed something: he was going to Nana’s house to break off the engagement. So he’s thinking: Why did I say Nana would be staying at my house from then onwards…
Mostly the chapter is about him trying to interpret her hand signals, and also giving her a piece of paper and a pen to write her feelings on.
Then he and someone else (who came bursting in) ask Nana to write her name on the paper. She writes「諏訪部名無」 (Suwabe No-name) — and so they think up new names for her, and ask her to pick which one she likes best. She circles all seven with her finger… then Kazunari wonders how he can use all seven names in one. He writes 「七名」.
Nana’s reaction:
Thanks for going to the trouble of finding this, I appreciate it! This 来る verb is just too versatile for my sanity.
I’ve seen とくる/ときたら like in the example sentences in your quote, and it’s almost always “when it comes to” in my mind.
Searching a little better in my Handbook of Japanese Grammar Patterns I found ときているから after all (it’s in this exact form in my second sentence), and it’s:
Used to talk about a person, thing, or situation with extreme characteristics. Expresses that the present state of affairs is a natural outcome of those characteristics. Means “since it (s/he) is so…what else can be expected?” Used mostly in spoken language.
So basically more or less what JLPT sensei said. But this still leaves the other two. It’s certainly emphasis of a kind, but the exact nuance is still escaping me.
April birthday crew represent! Mine’s at the end of the month (29th) and by that time everyone’s tired of April birthdays and the May birthday peeps want to get started
Last night I read 19 pages putting me at midway through 4.3 or 89% done. I admit I kind of skimmed the big scene being hinted at last night. I think the story overall has not been shaping up very satisfyingly for me, haha. It’s not bad, but my impression is shaped heavily by the author’s later works - it’s not what I thought I was walking into.
Unfortunately the chat last night with the new language exchange partner (which sucked up some of my reading time) was a bust. I really wish people didn’t treat language exchange apps as dating sites.
omk3 replies which I wrote up before seeing natarin's better one but I wrote it already gosh darnnit
(Because) even more (something, probably previous sentence) with the sounds of the burbling flasks in a late night laboratory.
Like sorta…the atmosphere was even more because of the above.
しかもそのほとんどが無駄骨 ときて いますからね。
Again, can’t check where in the book this came from but I think: “And even more so because the majority of it was wasted effort”
女マッサージ師の次は女占い師、予言者 ときた 。
I think it’s read おんな rather than じょ for both but I’m far from an expert on that I think this roughly means like “Next after lady masseuses’ are lady fortune tellers and prophets.” Just an emphasis one here I think.
About ama divers「海女」who can’t go out to sea because of sharks and a big snake that’ll eat them, there’s also a magical princess who lurks at the bottom of the sea.
Japanese found in the tall grass
New Words
鮫「さめ」ー Shark.
(I’m sure I know this, but I don’t recognise さめ being the reading at all, I thought it was はじ for some reason) 磯「いそ」ー Rocky shore 御輿「みこし」ー Portable shrine (usually found at festivals being carried along)
Places 城ヶ島「じょうがしま」ーJogashima island, Miura
Lone word from earlier 鑿「のみ」ー Japanese style chisel
You cannot escape the birthday wishes
Happy birthday for yesterday!
Today I had a bit of time and it turned out I spent all of it reading.
In the morning I read from page 30 to 37 in 魔女の宅急便. Kiki now left home and the adventure is about to start. I still have trouble with the book but it is getting better very slowly.
Later on I decided to continue レイトン教授とふしぎ！なぜ？科学の話２年生. I read question 22 and it was about why iron is magnetic. Maybe I’ll continue reading one per day so that I can finish the book and eventually sell it again.
In the afternoon I also read the three episodes about ジャム屋さん on Satori Reader, which was a quick and easy read.
Actually your reply (and link) was very useful to me, thanks for posting it. I think I’m gradually getting a clearer picture of ときて. I’ll need to look at it all again more carefully, but for now, the rough translation “on top of that” (rephrased as required) works well enough for me.
Finally a single-day update. Today I had a lot of energy and time, which is the ideal condition. I’ve read 9 pages of 夜カフェ in about 1.5 hours, which is a great pace for me, a page every 20 minutes, with me doing other stuff at the same time even.
Replying to the post before last since I broke the reply chain with that one… Last one is here.
It been a bit over a week, always a bit of a struggle to post again after a long break like that.
I have been reading every day though! To keep it a bit less bulky, I’ll just do a summary of what I read in that time rather than daily breakdowns.
7.-14.4.
I have continued reading La quête d’ewilan intensively, and I do feel like it is getting easier (mentally - I still have to look up way too much! ) I’ve been reading at least a little bit of this every day.
For Le petit Nicolas, there was only one day I didn’t read a chapter in this time frame, and that was a very busy day. I didn’t read my joker, the graded reader, at all. Which is fine, let’s keep that for emergencies!
Today, on the 14th, I actually hit 2 ‘milestones’ or major happenings of sorts.
For one, in La quête d’ewilan, today for the first time I read beyond my initial extensive listening. I then listened to the part I’d read afterwards. Currently thinking about whether it might be a good idea to listen to a full chapter first and then re listen to the chunks I read on a given day. Re listening felt good before, but it is a bit more of a time investment.
For another, I finished Le petit Nicolas! The story part at least. There ~20 pages of quizzes on the stories and related subjects that look like fun, so I’ll still be doing those (In fact, I did a couple of them already ), but it does feel like I finished something. With that, I’m about 2 months ahead of the goal I set myself at the beginning of the year, to have finished one book in French within half a year. At this pace it honestly looks like I might be able to finish another by then, too! So, new goal, haha. And then when I’m in Paris for the JLPT in July I can pick up a couple new books and begin a new pile of 積読.
My progress since last time
Le petit Nicolas (95→157/148p)
La quête d’ewilan: d’un monde à l’autre (48→53/334m) (3→17%)
A1 5 Minuten-Lektüren Où est le thym (2→NA/20 stories)
Also started reading ハピネス with the current ABBC: 0% → 29%. The thread kept popping up in my forum feed, and I was frustrated as I wasn’t participating in it, and there’s still a month before the next ABBC. So I decided to jump in. This manga is much more interesting than graded readers for first year school students
I feel like I should start doing something about the new words I encounter, because I feel like an impostor otherwise . Maybe start with learning 1 new word per day?
About that… When I first started reading, I did nothing at all about all the new words I encountered (so many!). After a while I started adding them to lists in my dictionary app(s), and from then every once in a while I conscientiously load them to Anki. And then… Yeah, that’s as far as I ever got. Many books later, I still haven’t actively reviewed even a single word. I do run into many of them all the time though, and many have ended up sticking. And many I’m sure I’ll keep looking up forever, getting sick of them before I even remember what they mean. But reading a lot is its own srs in a way, right? Or at least way more fun.
)
especially when it’s not clear to me initially where the misunderstandings lie exactly. But I’m also getting better at pinpointing them.
Day 13 
)
)
I think this roughly means like “Next after lady masseuses’ are lady fortune tellers and prophets.” Just an emphasis one here I think.
Japanese found in the tall grass 
), but it does feel like I finished something. 
With that, I’m about 2 months ahead of the goal I set myself at the beginning of the year, to have finished one book in French within half a year. At this pace it honestly looks like I might be able to finish another by then, too! So, new goal, haha. 
(48→53/334m) 
(3→17%)
. Maybe start with learning 1 new word per day?