@Nemuitanuki it looks like you’ve leveled up!
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All I can think is is the middle pronounced iiii, iiii, or iiii?
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㋃21 – Day 21
Hah! You expected JoJo, but instead it was me!
more JoJo but of a different flavor
- 岸辺露伴は動かない
I read the new chapter, approx 32p iirc
At first I was upset upon skimming because I thought Izumi was having a lot of bad luck, but it was actually a random, cheating kindergarten teacher. phew.
This chapter was still upsetty spaghetti to read though because the beginning comes off as Araki reflecting on his own experiences as a writer, particularly finishing works, which upsets me because, is he just referring to finishing Part 8 or is he considering finishing JoJo after Part 9 (which he announced he will make with a smile on Xmas last year)(or god forbid, rethinking doing Part 9 at all)? The thought of JoJo ending completely makes me sad. I really appreciate how it’s a long-running series that doesn’t feel like it’s overly outliving itself because of the independence of the Parts from each other and their variation in themes and characters.
I also skimmed Crazy Diamond’s Demonic Heartbreak Nightmare or whatever the title is. It continues to feel mediocre and off tone from the original. I’m still waiting for it to wow me. So far, I’ve only enjoyed the art and seeing old characters again. The designs are nice.
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You can use a VPN to buy the book at BookWalker, and then you can read it on mobile devices without a VPN connection. (I‘m doing this with my current book, and it works well.) If you want to read in the browser, though, you might need a VPN all the time (or maybe just when you open the book?). Can check this if that’s your reading scenario.
For the VPN, I can recommend Tunnelbear. It works with one click, and you get 500 MB free per month, which is not enough to watch a movie but plenty for small tasks like this.
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Thanks!
I might have a look at SP and give it a try - I should probably leave Clannad a bit longer until trying it again 
I used a texthooker with Clannad so I should be able to manage to set it up with SP (the first time took me way too long, I didn’t realize Windows needed to be set to Japanese locale for it to work lol)
Yeah, buying VNs in Japanese seems to be a nightmare in most cases - when I eventually can go to Japan I’m going to come back with a suitcase full of VNs and books, they’re so much cheaper there than online 
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I’ve been reading for the last couple of days but not reporting.
Well finished the first booklet of vol 3. So many pictures of tasty Japanese food. 
I need to learn how to cook all of it myself so I can have it. Other Japanese food than sushi need to get popular here.
Also finally did some regular reading again yesterday. After my trip, getting into a good routine at home can be so hard. Sometimes I just find it easier to do certain things while traveling.
Today I started the second booklet and it uses a lot of vocabulary I don’t know, and has more challenging sentences. Or maybe I just need to get used to the author voice. Something along those lines. This one is a short story called 坊ちゃん by 夏目漱石 (a popular author according to the description on the back). It has been simplified apparently, but how much I do not know.
I read the character description pages (2 of them) and the first two pages of the story before giving up (for the day) about one sentence into the next page. This one might take a looooong time to read, especially since it is a 上下, aka it takes two booklets to finish the story.
Since I was writing this, I looked closer at the sentences that just made me go “don’t wanna deal with this now” and here they are (and my understanding) although the first sentence is just for context:
Hard sentences
(Protagonist, 坊ちゃん, have just hurt his brother)
親父はとっても怒って、「家から出ていけ！」と言った。
言われたとおりに出ていこうと思っていたら、下女の清(きよ)が泣いて親父に謝った。
親父も仕方なく許してくれた。
(I’m not trying for pretty English)
Dad very angrily (and/or he is very angry, but whatever) said “Leave the house/home”.
So said (by dad) I thought I’d leave, (but) Kiyo the maid cried (so) I apologized to dad. (Or possibly as I thought about leaving in the way dad said, Kiyo cried (so) I apologized to dad.)
Dad reluctantly/unfortunately (in dad’s mind) forgave me.
That is my rough translation now that I looked at it closer and looked up needed grammar. These were/are the sticking points for me:
- I have not internalized yet that くれる is given/giving to me, so double checked that.
- 親父に謝った, I had to think about whether it was the father apologizing to protagonist or the protagonist apologizing to his father. (Because it depends on transitivity and conjugation, right?)
- たら structure in sentence two. I probably need to go look it up again because I seem to be missing one kind of use in my internal understanding. Or maybe some nuance I’m missing. Hadn’t known it could be used like that, or I’m misunderstanding the sentence.
Aren’t the sentences nicely smashed together so tightly? In English I think the middle sentence would probably have been at least double the length, or possibly multiple sentences to truly make sense. 
I think I got the right idea of what they meant. Probably missing nuance. But at least I think I got the main pieces of information right, please let me know if I didn’t.
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清, the maid, cried and apologized to my father. She is the one doing both of the things connected by てform here.
The meaning of ~たら here is captured nicely with the ‘as I…’ you translated it as in English.
夏目漱石 is really famous and allegedly difficult to read. He’s been on my list to read for ages.
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But that makes no sense. 
(Also, yeah, me so confused. て form is binding the two things together, I totally ignored that て form, I guess I need to brush up on that too.)
Writing out my thoughts, to make my confusion clearer (or more muddled :joy:) Feel free to skip
Is this suggesting that the maid is taking responsibility (I don’t think it is clear whether the dad saw the protagonist hurt his brother, or just came running at the screaming/crying)? Or is it a cultural thing that a maid can apologize for something their employer did (although, technically, wouldn’t the dad be the ultimate employer of her, since he pays her wages and such?)?
Especially since the dad 仕方なく-ally forgives.
It feels like there is some cultural thing I’m missing. Is the maid apologizing for the protagonist’s actions, and despite the protagonist himself not apologizing, the father is forced to forgive anyway?
Great. xD
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Day 21 
Read: 終遠のヴィルシュ -Error:salvation-
Finished: 1 ending
Time: 2 hours 40 minutes
Finished another route in ヴィルシュ, just one left to go and the game is fully cleared. This time was actually a pretty happy ending especially compared to the last one, I think this one is one of my favorites in this game. Hopefully the last one ends on a similar note. Saw the phrase 喉から手が出る today, which is a really funny image to think about literally.
New Vocab
所以 （ゆえん）reason; grounds
形勢逆転 （けいせいぎゃくてん）the situation reverses itself; the table is turned; the shoe is on the other foot
雪崩れ込む （なだれこむ）to rush into; to surge into; to crowd into
喉から手が出る （のどからてがでる）to want something desperately; to want something (so badly one can taste it)
打ち首 （うちくび）decapitation; beheading
鳩尾 （みぞおち）pit of the stomach; solar plexus
所謂 （いわゆる）what is called; as it is called; the so-called; so to speak (never knew there was a kanji for this)
英知 （えいち）wisdom; intelligence; intellect
メス scalpel; surgical knife
傀儡 （くぐつ）puppet; marionette; dummy
持論 （じろん）one’s cherished opinion; pet theory
デマ false rumor (rumour); false alarm; misinformation
即ち （すなわち）that is; namely; i.e.
冤罪 （えんざい）false charge; false accusation; misrepresentation
毎に （ごとに）one by one; each; every; at intervals of
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22nd of April
Day 22
I ended up rereading from the first page to page 26 of かがみの孤城 today, which did actually help with my understanding of the events. There were a few details I’d missed before.
Was going to read right after I finished work, but I was exhausted and didn’t have the energy. And then afterwards I realised I felt a little lightheaded when I shook my head and my body was aching, so I think I’ve caught a cold : (. I’ve been feeling fatigued all evening (good thing not while I was at work).
I nearly fell asleep on the couch at 8pm, but then woke myself up for my online Japanese tutor session at 8:30pm. And right after finishing that, commenced to procrastinate for another 45 minutes, did WK reviews, then finally began reading
I initially wanted to read かがみの孤城 at a pace of 5-10 pages per day, but I have not managed that at all this week 
. For now, I’ll stop thinking about my pace and instead merely read for half an hour each day (or fifteen minutes, if I’m busier than usual).
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Probably something like the first one in my recording (I had fun)
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This is coming from a place of minimal context so please take it with a grain of salt. I believe this is what’s happening, yes. I suppose she might have been tasked with taking
care of the son and so feels some responsibility, or maybe feels sorry for him and so apologizes on his behalf. Similar to how sometimes family members or Co workers/ superiors will apologize for someone else’s actions.
Under that pressure, faced with a crying and apologizing 清, the dad feels he has no choice but to forgive his son.
At least it’s been simplified a bit? 
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Trust me, I don’t have more context either. (Maybe it’ll come clear later, but considering the protagonist’s childhood is only covered in one short chapter, probably not.)
Thanks bunches! Appreciate the help a lot.
Good thing too, I don’t want to imagine what it is like un-simplified. 
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Tanuki Den (aka Homepost): Date 20220422 
Tanuki Scroll XXII: 弥陀ケ原の弘法清水 
Read today’s folktale, from Toyama Prefecture! About our good monk friend 弘法大師「こうぼうだいし」.
Just an iddy-biddy read today, I had planned to read something more substantial but completely ran out of time, oh well, tomorrow!
Japanese found in the tall grass
New Things
当時「とうじ」ー At that time; in those days
錫杖「しゃくじょう」ー Khakkhara (staff with metal rings that is traditionally carried by monks)
Places
立山「たてやま」ー Tateyama, Toyama prefecture
弥陀ヶ原「みだがはら」ー Midagahara - wetlands located near Tateyama
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April 22nd
・薬屋のひとりごと (40% → 46%)
Finished chapter 16 & 17, and read a few pages of ch 18 (turns out it is super long).
Thoughts: So Maomao’s secret is that she does indeed use make-up after all. To paint freckles across her face, as a defense mechanism against… men unable of controlling themselves. And then there’s the garden party. I’m just going to mention whatever I remember: four wives, four themes (colors&gems), Jinshi being weird again (what did he want? I hope that’ll be resolved later), tiny princess baby was super cute. One of the “wives” being a whooping 14-year old??? wtf. And she actually belonged to the previous emperor who died 5 years ago… yeah, that’s effed up. And then we have Maomao scaring Li Hua’s maids with just one stare, that was hilarious. oh! and nameless Gyokuyou maids have names now: Guiwen and Airan / Ai Lan (?). Good call of author to not drop all their names in one go, I wouldn’t be able to tell them apart.
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April 22 Home Post
Well, I’ve finally done it: I finished VLR today! 
Like for real this time, alternate endings and all And hm I have many questions, but that’s what Zero Time Dilemma’s for huh?
Reading-wise though… things got a little weird at the end but honestly I think that was more to do with the content itself being confusing than anything with language; it’s reassuring when the characters are also like “what?” But stats: I finished VLR in just over 80 hours which is pretty wild actually. 999 took me around 100 and it’s supposedly shorter so yay improvement!! Thinking about how I’ve properly finished two full games in Japanese now is wild too, I never would’ve imagined that even like a few months ago feels pretty good!
obligatory VLR thoughts
Wow there was so much I found out so many things and yet I feel like I have more questions than ever, as is the spike chunsoft way.
My crackpot theory track record!! Incredible The main thing I’ve learned from Zero Escape is truly no theories are crackpot, anything can happen. But this: it sure was 淳平 huh! No wonder he knew so many things! I’m amazed he kept his cool about the whole 茜 thing as much as he did, though. Honestly the main doubts I had with him being 淳平 were that and the way he talked, but he’s just an old man lmao. I can definitely buy it being him though, like the スコッチ stuff really sounds like something he’d say
But シグマ… yeah I was definitely suspicious when they kept showing him like shoulders down and never any face ever but I wasn’t quite sure what direction we were going with it, and um it was us the whole time? We did this?? Well maybe not us but like… a different us? God Zero Escape It’s very good at making you go from “wow ゼロ is so evil and awful” to like “wait is… is ゼロ not actually the bad guy?” and those are complicated answers certainly but man. There’s so much lmao
And then the like “alternate ending” happened and I’m more confused than ever, there’s so much temporal nonsense that I’d be struggling to keep track of in English so it was an absolute trip ファイ was even more weird and cryptic than usual, 茜 is always like that, and I really don’t know whose consciousness was actually in カイル at that point. Like… シグマ is occupied, I suppose it could be 茜 or ファイ, but like… ahhhhh maybe I’ll find out in the next game or maybe I never will! I wouldn’t be shocked either way lmao
Another thing I’m very curious about: what happened to ニルス and サンタ huh? I suppose 八代 as well but like she doesn’t have a literal sibling here that just never brought her up. ニルス came up a bit in 四葉 and アルス backstory organization stuff but um a lot of time has passed since then, so like… did he just get left behind? And same with サンタ, last we knew he was on the run with 茜 but clearly some stuff happened, so… idk. It doesn’t feel like there can be any happy answers here really but we heard about everyone else to some extent so 
Now it’s just a matter of time until I attempt the challenge of Zero Time Dilemma; probably a matter of like hours but hey exciting times!
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April 22
Final Fantasy VII
Vocabulary
- 突き止める = つきとめる to ascertain, to determine, to find out.
- 欠かす = かかす to fail to do something, to miss doing something.
- 定時 = ていじ stated time, stated period.
Back to FF7. Overall feeling pretty tired today so only played for a little bit.
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Day 20-22 / Calendar
So I couldn’t create posts yesterday or the day before that, not because I didn’t read, I actually finished this week’s chapter of 夜カフェ (just in time for next week), rather I just didn’t have the energy to write these up after the fact (read: I feel asleep at an inhumanely early time of almost midnight, oh the agony).
On the 20th, I barely got any reading done, this is my first (and hopefully my last) excuse day, I’ve read about 2 or 3 sentences, they were all terribly difficult to parse with my tired brain, so I didn’t continue.
To make it even, yesterday I’ve read 3 or so pages in a mere 1-1.5 hours, which I call a very good pace, at least for myself (I’m still 10x as fast even reading in English, which isn’t my native tongue, but baby steps). This left me a single page left to read today, which I’ve just finished doing.
I actually do feel a slight increase in my reading ability, sometimes I have actual sentences I can just read through and not even worry about needing to translate them, because I get the meaning of it.
I’m slightly worried, that I don’t actually understand the grammar, rather I get the meaning from context, but tbh, I don’t understand all grammar rules of English either and I can use them fairly well, so hopefully understanding what the text is saying will give me the foundation to instinctively know these,
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This kind of thing is happening to me more and more where I’m pretty confident I get it but if I really break it down to small parts and scrutinize the sentence there are parts where I just don’t quite get why it’s phrased like that. I…guess it’s fine? Seems pretty natural to happen at times anyway. Hopefully we really can just get a feel for it in the very long term.
My head aches a bit, but today was better. I actually read 9000 characters! And I did manage to return later yesterday some to do more. I’m making a strong effort at getting through Summer Pockets a little faster, as much as I can manage. Have also read the first 4 sections (of 60) in スマホを落としただけなのに, and it’s still a pretty good simple side read.
I’m curious how this was translated, because this route existed in English, and there’s at least one riddle in the aforementioned treasure hunt that plays on presenting words in kana that are ambiguous homophones. Then again when it comes to kanji puzzles and the like I’ve regularly seen VN translators just sort of give up, present the Japanese word, and give whatever context we need in parenthesis. Can’t blame them, the only real way to work around that is to somehow write out your own totally different riddle. Come to think of it, apparently the Witcher 3 (not a visual novel, but a game with loads of writing) is held as an example of excellent translation into Japanese, and they did take what we’d consider a more traditional riddle at one point and turn it into a unique kanji puzzle.
There’s Kamome’s childhood gang. I think this different presentation style is pretty cute.
I feel like reading is getting more comfortable, my main issues today were just related to how Japanese casual conversation (well, as it’s written in a VN…) flows. I mostly followed things but there would be times with these super simple almost nothing statements that I couldn’t really work out what they were even referring to or meaning. Sometimes there’d be 3 or so responses back and forth like that, but they were always sort of jokey dead ends before the conversation went back to the important stuff so that’s… fine for now?
Spotted another N2 grammar today! つつある, “to be doing/in the process of doing.” Appears to hook onto -masu stems. It’s not that much of a stretch from つつ, which I already know.
The cool new word of the day, cause how could it not be, is 海賊船 (かいぞくせん), pirate ship. Yarr. 
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