The 🤼 プロレス thread! Learning Japanese through pro wrestling

Ahh, there it is! I was pondering for a while what the perfect Bread Hart joke to make would be, but got stuck on “the crust there is, the crust there was, the crust there ever will be.” Yours is much much better! :grin:

It’s a pity the transcription I assume went with a parenthetical here. This isn’t physically happening (they’re both standing at opposite ends of the ring at this point and Yuka isn’t motioning actively to leave), and I really like Yuka’s deadpan "断る"s. I dunno if you want to stray too much from the transcript but it seems like:
“Please listen to what I have to say” → “No.”
could be closer / funnier.

This is really really picky, but for “イッテンヨンだよ?”, I don’t know if “, right?” feels exactly right to me. The だよ is still asserting strongly it’s イッテンヨン, the questioning tone/mark (if that’s what was in the transcript) is with よ more I would say like “(so what are you going to do about it?)” than “(right?)”
I would probably slightly prefer “It’s Ittenyon!” Not really a big deal and neither is exactly perfect though.

Your reasoning had me convinced for a moment, but I don’t… think so… どうしたらやってくれます I think would mean like, “how can I get you to do it for me” like どうしたら is how and if I やってくれます, I receive you doing something for me. so “how can I get you to do it for me?” which makes sense in context.
Whereas if I やってあげます, I’m doing something for someone. But here, Miyu doing something for someone isn’t the end goal that she’s having trouble with, so どうしたらやってあげます? / “how can I do something for you?” doesn’t make sense, I think.
I googled the phrase for an example, and found a yahoo answers page that uses the phrase どうしたらやってくれます to ask about like, how to get a boyfriend to play a thumb game with them, I think. Which seems about in-line with what Miyu is asking (but with Yuka instead of a boyfriend and an important championship match instead of a thumb game)

My guess is the 逆に is about how like, she’s turning the tables on the negotiation. Like instead of cajoling her she’s asking how to butter her up.

My guess is it’s an extremely half-hearted echoing of Miyu’s よろしくお願いします!ありがとうございます!
Like what she would be saying here if she felt good about the match was something like that ending in ます but because she’s very wary it just ended up “'ます…”
That’s my guess anyway! Or she trailed off. She says it very unnaturally either way so I don’t think it’s a complete unit.

Haha, she’s just noticing she’s been saying やっぱり a lot in this promo!
Like やっぱり - hey, I’m sure saying やっぱり a lot! - (back to what I was saying)

This one has the same nitpick I made earlier about “,right?” and it’s a good example I think of what I meant since her tone changes super suddenly and pronouncedly here! Like her answer has a very “DUH??, it’s Miyu Yamashita!!” sort of tone that I don’t think is conveyed with “, right?”

For this bit also I think my feeling is the 名前の単語だけで is like, “Miyu Yamashita” as a word only (beyond what it signifies). Like something like “just the sound of her name is unpleasant to me”

I think the reporter asks with the context of like, “looking at recent matches of hers, do you have plan to counter Yamashita?”
And so I think that Yuka’s saying like – her impression watching Miyu’s matches recently is that (in contrast to further back matches she had with her) Miyu smiles a lot during them now.

Also I think it’s Yuka raising the voltage of her own anger, probably. (since the おく connotes like, preparing in advance. What’s the countermeasure to maybe being thrown off guard by a smiling Yamashita → steel herself with rage beforehand so it has no effect).

I guess I don’t really have justification for it, but I think you got the sense right.

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Also, some brief thoughts on various shows I’ve watched, for my own notes. (I guess I don’t need to post these, but hey)

Stardom 第12回 ゴッデス・オブ・スターダム・タッグリーグ

I… haven’t actually been watching this!
I made a 星取表 and watched the opening show, but beyond that nothing… I’ve been following the various storylines running through it fairly well on twitter though, and it seems like a really fun tournament! I remember saying some time ago that Stardom didn’t have consistent tag teams, and I don’t think that’s really true anymore, because any tag team division with FWC, Meltear, Black Desire, and Maihime in it has an extremely solid core foundation, and then there’s plenty of fun on top of that of various combinations and tag team outfits (like Giulia and Thekla’s team, Mafia Bella looks super duper cool, and the odd couple learning to be work with each other storyline between Lady C and Mai Sakurai looked like so much fun). I should endeavor to watch at least say, the Korakuen show(s) and the final because I bet they’d be a lot of fun even if I know how it ends.


NJPW Battle Autumn '22

I watched one show from this tour: the one with that Tomohiro Ishii / Ren Narita match that sounded real cool. It was cool! Although I think I was working at the time and got distracted…
The biggest thing I remember from that show was cheering being okay, and watching Young Lions get cheers for the first time! I think there was a thing where like… Nakashima maybe? Was pulled in to like, be the Sayuri Nanba style “super cool 選手” for the crowd to practice cheers and boos on, and it was oddly really touching.


NJPW Wrestle Kingdom IV

This is the 2010 イッテンヨン and I decided to just watch the whole thing on my slow Shinsuke Nakamura career retrospective, pretending that the TNA-related matches (that are the only ones not on NJPW World) don’t exist.
At this point these Wrestle Kingdom shows still heavily have involvement from other companies (if I knew that was basically the norm rather than the exception I mighta been less shocked about that NOAH crossover earlier this year). In this case, there are a lot of NJPW vs. NOAH matches, like Tiger Mask vs. Marufuji, Tanahashi vs. Shiozaki, etc. I think I enjoyed most of these, although honestly I don’t have specific memories (maybe I was doing something else).
One thing I do definitely remember: there’s a match with old-timers on here where Abdullah the Butcher gets a hold of Iizuka’s Iron Finger. Momentous!
Also – this is a little embarrassing, but in my head, not really knowing anything about him, I thought Muhammad Yone’s name was like, a joke, for a funny disco man. You know, like, “Muhammad, よね?” But here he has the same name and is more like, an angry cornrows fighting man. So I was completely misinterpreting that.

The highlight for me was definitely the Shinsuke Nakamura match! It’s with Yoshihiro Takayama, and this process of looking back through these enhanced it a lot for me because it was easy to see the echoes and import of their match together that launched Nakamura’s career trajectory as a super rookie, and how different this match is now that he’s an established equal fighting Takayama on his own terms instead of desperately eking out a win. Takayama is also a great big wrestler - he’s SO intimidating.


NJPW Wrestle Kingdom V

This is the 2011 イッテンヨン and again, I watched the whole thing pretending the non-njpwworld TNA matches didn’t exist.
I actually surprisingly super enjoyed this one! Out of all the older/non-contemporary wrestling shows I’ve watched (including all the old WWF and WCW shows I watched the year I got into wrestling when I had way too much freetime and a WWE Network subscription I wasn’t jaded about yet), this is the first one that I feel like passed the marker from “enjoyable from a filling-in-history perspective” to “enjoyable as just a really good show.” There’s been individual matches that have passed that line, obviously, but usually especially with those WWF/WCW shows, there’s some not great or mediocre and low-context elements preventing a show from cohering without the element of “this is important to today’s landscape which I’m actively following.” And this is just close enough to the NJPW I know and got into, I suppose, and the general quality is high enough, that it just slipped past into the “just enjoying wrestling” part of my brain.

Part of that is definitely because the card’s filled with first appearances (in this set of shows I’ve been watching!) of some exciting names! The Jr. Heavyweight title match for the show is Prince Devitt vs. Kota Ibushi, Kenny Omega is on a lower card match, Tama Tonga is there in a very “Superfly” gimmick I didn’t know he had pre Bullet Club, La Sombra is there, and there’s a jarringly Goto-y “岡田かずちか”

Yuji Nagata vs. Minoru Suzuki (and Jushin Thunder Liger being around) also reminds me how much I miss matches with them being reliable big matches. I ~ LOVE ~ peak swirls and rooster tail hair Minoru Suzuki.

The match that sticks out most in my memory though, is again the Shinsuke Nakamura match. His match against Go Shiozaki here, I thought was great! Nakamura is in Chaos and has the Boma-ye by this point, and while I’m usually not super conscious of limb-working storylines, I thought Go Shiozaki trying to disable the Boma-ye by chopping constantly at Nakamura’s knee worked great here, and made me appreciate Shiozaki more.

The last element I liked about the show was – I mentioned this a little elsewhere but – this is the first show of these NJPW ones I’ve watched (and still only – the ones I’ve watched since, including partial ones, they go back to how it was before) where at the end of the show they just give Tanahashi a mic instead of having a reporter there to blandly ask questions prompting the stuff he would just say anyway. Maybe it’s just because I’m used to the style today, but the interviewer version almost always feels awkward to me, and there’s little better in wrestling than just Tanahashi talking from the heart to a super vocal crowd and ending with 愛してます.


Stardom 広島女神祭り~きんさいスターダム~

You know, I sometimes like to pretend to myself that by watching a lot of shows quite late, I’m protecting myself in a way from bad things happening, with the logic being that if something truly horrible happened on a show I probably would have heard about it beforehand or they wouldn’t show it at all.
Anyway, this isn’t to that level or anything, but it does put a lie to that line of thinking on a smaller scale, since I was idly browsing twitter enough to have figured out who won all the important matches on this show beforehand, but I hadn’t heard about the very unpleasant injury on the show. So while I enjoyed the show okay, it was definitely heavily hampered by that worst of both worlds situation, and by far my most lasting memory of the show is the injury, where Saya Kamitani went for a phoenix splash and landed at a bad angle, missing, so she went for it again and landed at a bad angle again, this time landing her knee DIRECTLY on Mina Shirakawa’s mouth. While obviously I feel bad for Shirakawa in that situation, honestly I felt as much or more bad for Kamitani, since I have to imagine that was one of those “whoops! One more time! Oh fuck I didn’t stop and think and I made it exponentially worse” type of situations, and that has to be a way worse and more guilt-inducing feeling since you can point exactly at that momentary decision as where things went wrong – all while involving a move tied directly to her wrestling identity, that exclusively gets used at already incredibly tense and exhausting moments. Just really rough all around!! It made me realize: A) Oh right those moves where the person taking it just lies there, still involves trusting that someone flinging their entire body at you really really precisely is gonna nail that perfectly, and B) as much as I like post-match promos, it does add another thing the performers have to keep track of and be responsible for… It wasn’t fun watching them both still go through the planned promo interaction while obviously shaken by how the match ended…

Anyway, Syuri and Maika definitely did their best and helped raise the spirits after. I’m also glad Natsuko Tora’s recovered!


Stardom Gold Rush 2022

Is this the first one of these they’ve done? I feel like I have a vague memory of something money related in the past… The one way I will whole-heartedly agree with the sentiment that Stardom is “fast-paced” is the way a show like this will come and go in the space of like a month, tops, like “HEY WE’RE DOING A MONEY TOURNAMENT NOW OK JUST SO YOU KNOW.” The big drama definitely simmers, but the small “here’s what we’re doing this week” dramas go by real quick.

The main thing I think about the Gold Rush tournament is it’s weird that storyline-wise, Giulia was the only one with a concrete and laudable end goal for the money, but Stars won – like… yay these protagonists I like a lot won the money!! But I wanted to hear more about that cool employment company idea??
One thing I like about Stardom trying these gimmick matches is it seems like they aren’t afraid to mess around with the rules to see what sticks, in this case with that “press the button to raise and lower the money ball” rule, which was kinda fun but seems like a lot for the wrestlers to keep track of, leading to the very choice impromptu “symbolic remaining plastic half of the money ball” match moment. That’s definitely the thing I’ll remember from this show. In an endearing way!

It’s a little weird in retrospect that KAIRI/Kamitani and Syuri/Hayashishita were overshadowed by the silly moneyball match! I remember liking them. It’s still a pity the KAIRI title shot got delayed from when it was originally slated - the IWGP championship coming up made it clearer no titles were gonna change hands.

Hanazono seemed fun.


TJPW All Rise '22

I enjoyed this show! I find with the middle-size TJPW shows I enjoy them plenty but don’t tend to have much specific to say about them.
With this one, the thing that stood out to me the most was how well TJPW spotlights visiting foreign wrestlers. I was really impressed with how well the three commentators provided context for Millie and Billie. Maybe it’s just since I still had that AEW Dark Regina di Wave match that I watched in the back of my mind, but I really enjoyed how all three commentators felt knowledgeable and informed and could each provide slightly different perspectives on why, for example Billie Starkz is a big deal and will be a future star so this match is important. There’s a lot of ね!s back and forth as they provide info. Really nice! I also enjoyed Yuka having to be bribed into a challenge acceptance.


NJPW/Stardom Historic X-Over

I recall I was originally going to watch this as like a special occasion wrestling day following Gold Rush… but I didn’t realize it was still a timed PPV at the time (and I had a headache all day that day anyway), so I ended up putting it off until after All Rise. Since my sleep schedule doesn’t remotely line up with showtimes in Japan, I kinda wish watching shows live wasn’t the main carrot on a stick to go with the PPV version, if they’re gonna go with that model. But I guess I don’t know what carrot I would put in its place, and it is probably fair I guess to not put every single thing instantly on the subscription sites…
I enjoyed this a lot overall I think! Trying to compare it to another NJPW crossover show in recent memory, I think this felt a lot less like, “special one-off festival day” type of vibe, than Forbidden Door was… and I actually think that was to Historic X-Over’s benefit. Because while Forbidden Door counter-intuitively kinda broke my AEW PPV stroke, since instead of “it’s continuing from the last show, which I bought and had a great time with!” now I feel “the last AEW show I watched was Forbidden Door, a one-off that I thought was pretty fun but probably not as good as just a NJPW (or AEW) show ultimately” and then I don’t get around to buying the PPV – so Historic X-Over… kinda just feeling like a regular Stardom or NJPW show, doesn’t have that drawback. If that makes sense.
I was trying to think what it felt like, and I think it felt like… like 75% of a regular NJPW show and 25% of a regular Stardom show, that got mixed together a little. Since at least in the back half, it sure felt like they were weighting things a little heavily towards NJPW. Which I mean – if the goal was to make a show with a gender ratio aligned to the expectations of American fans, knocked it out of the part with 3:1 amirite!! But truly though if I’m grumpy about anything it’s that I learned a lot about like, whatever the United Empire is doing, but all the ongoing Stardom storylines seemed to be subsumed into the crossover matches – like a NJPW fan would surely be forgiven for not getting that Syuri/Giulia was the most important story thing going when they were paired with Lawlor and ZSJ.

… But I did enjoy the crossover stuff. I knew we’d get a double manji-gatame Zack Sabre Giulia moment and was not disappointed! (although I slightly wish she stayed in her Spider Web version instead of transitioning to his – I think the Spider Web is just the coolest). The Starlight Kid and El Desperado in matching masks were incredibly cool, and Hayashishita and Tanahashi doing air guitar together was incredibly cool in a completely different way. The gender interaction stuff I thought was mostly ok - like I liked that El Desperado is exactly the kind of character to hassle Natsupoi and still seem cool somehow. Taichi/Tam is a really weird dynamic though.

They should have Iida or Super Strong Stardom Machine win a Ranbo one of these days. They both put in so much work! They should have Iida win a bunch of matches one of these days, just in general. That’s what I think.

So I felt mild to pretty positive about the show, but I thought Mayu/KAIRI was really great and tied everything together! I was rooting for Mayu, but with a match like that you really can’t go wrong either way. KAIRI vs. Tam should also be one hell of a Wrestle Kingdom main event amirite! – I can already feel that frustrating “hey this seems like it should be way more prominently featured” feeling simmering… that’s still the one main thing I like about the separated promotion model, quelling that feeling.

Oh yeah! P.S. I was gonna mention the commentary positively – Miki Motoi and Milano Collection AT both on color commentary are a dream team in my book, and I liked that it wasn’t structured at all like “here’s the NJPW commentator, and here’s the Stardom commentator” since they’re both completely knowledgeable about either.
I was a little miffed when they swapped out Motoi for Tanahashi though!
Also – seeing Waka Tsukiyama on English Commentary made me tempted to switch over to that a little! That would surely be fun.

P.P.S.: I completely forgot to mention the Ospreay/Umino US title match! I enjoyed it quite a bit. I think Shota Umino is probably the first returning young lion where I can remember him specifically (at least in name) as a young lion when I was watching, and it seems like there’s a whole lot riding on him being cool, so I guess it’s a good thing he’s a Death Rider har har. I’m glad he does seem like he’s got the makings of a star.
I was curious if maybe in kayfabe he wasn’t Red Shoes’ son, but it was part of the drama of the match and they talked about it directly on commentary, so nope. I don’t want to impugn anyone’s impartiality, but I feel like if I were the International Wrestling Grand Prix, I probably wouldn’t sanction a match where the referee was one of the wrestler’s dad, no matter how red his shoes are.


Stardom in Showcase Vol. 3

Boy the way they do streaming shows does not play well with these Stardom in Showcase shows! This time they uploaded it as a single video so I thought for a brief moment maybe it would be uncut, but then the very short runtime betrayed that it’s got the “cut all pre and post match” worst type of archive video editing style applied to it. Perhaps someday I will know what is behind those airhorns that they don’t want us hearing… But again I’m just not time-aligned with the live shows and it feels weird to go out of my way to buy a PPV when I’m already subscribed and it wouldn’t even be live.
I thought it was pretty fun though! I have no specific memories. I mighta been a bit wrestled-out by this point…

P.S.: on further reflection, I remember that I enjoyed the paint-heavy hardcore match with Prominence a lot, and I thought that the 髪切り match where the winner gets the haircut (from a collaborating stylist) was a neat twist on the concept. There were plenty of fun soccer-related antics as well.


NJPW G1 CLIMAX XXI ~THE INVINCIBLE FIGHTER~

I watched the whole final show of this 2011 edition of the G1 Climax. It was a pretty good time! There’s two Shinsuke Nakamura matches, against Minoru Suzuki (which features Suzuki looking scary with a profusely bleeding nose post-Boma-ye), and Tetsuya Naito, which were both really good, especially the latter (I loved the missed Stardust Press into immediate Boma-ye to the back of the head spot!), and the show is bookended by two Shinsuke Nakamura / Hiroshi Tanahashi matches (on different, relatively minor shows where I only watched those matches) that are so good I’m pretty sure I own an entire non-fiction book talking about them (in the latter one Tanahashi loses a front tooth early on, and the crowd is going absolutely wild by the end of it).
And hey, there’s a Golden Lovers match! As they challenge for the jr. tag belts against Apollo 55, the team of Prince Devitt and Ryusuke Taguchi.

One thing that shocked me during the show, was I spotted a familiar face:


The head of Bushiroad is in the front row, a year or two or so before they buy NJPW outright. If I’d been more observant, I would have notice the huge “Bushiroad presents” attached to the name of the show, as looking into it, Bushiroad was a major sponsor of the tournament so clearly they were already giving NJPW lots of money and eventually buying it wasn’t out of the blue… but my headcanon is definitely that it was this moment of delight at being front row to a Toru Yano / Giant Bernard spot that clinched the decision.

Something else I was amused by on the show is there’s a wrestler just called “Strong Man” who is probably the most ridiculously muscular and out of proportion professional wrestler I’ve ever seen, which is really, really saying something. That’s not remotely my aesthetic, although he seemed fine enough as that I guess, and here beats Hirooki Goto, which I also find amusing.


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This is an amazing thread! Note sure how I missed it until now.

I’m starting to get into Ice Ribbon recently. Watching it makes me wish I was fluent in Japanese which is good motivation!

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Welcome! :slight_smile:

One Ice Ribbon-related post I remember that you might be interested in is this one with a Shupro feature for Ice Ribbon’s 15 anniversary running down its history. I keep meaning to get more into Ice Ribbon but haven’t really gotten around to it, even though some of my favorite things going in wrestling originated there!

Welcome! And welcome to the forums! :blush:

I haven’t seen much Ice Ribbon, though some of their shows look really neat! It’d be great to add Ice Ribbon to the info section at the top of the thread, but when I drafted the post initially, I didn’t know enough about it to add it :sweat_smile:. Feel free to add it (or anything else!) to those posts!

And, yeah, feel free to post about any Japanese pro wrestling here! And don’t get scared away by the long posts! The thread is a little TJPW heavy because I accidentally ended up becoming a fan translator for it this year and I’ve been getting some extensive help from rodan on the translations :sweat_smile:, but I think almost all of us watch at least a few companies, haha.

I can definitely confirm that wanting to understand wrestling is great motivation for learning Japanese! It has repeatedly inspired me to really push myself to learn more.

Finished TJPW’s December 3 show! Short and sweet one this time! It’s 甘い in a very literal sense.

Kamiyu teamed with Millie McKenzie against Shoko and Suzume. The backstage comments to this one were hilarious because Millie spoke in English, and then Kamiyu translated for her. I wondered how faithful Kamiyu’s translation was, and, well…

naitoyikes

Kamifuku: (in English): “We won!” (to Millie): “How were your TJPW days?”

Millie: (in English) “I loved it. I’m so grateful to be back here, and hopefully… I’d love to be able to come back, I’m so grateful for the opportunity, and I want to prove what more I can do here.”

ミリー「(上福が通訳)また日本来たいし、日本もサッカー勝ったことだし波に乗ってんじゃね? 東京女子に帰ってきて何回目かだけど、またサッカーがあるたびに呼んでください」

Kamifuku: (translating for Millie) “I want to come to Japan again, and Japan also won the soccer game, so I’m just going with the flow, huh? I’ve come back to TJPW I don’t know how many times now, but please call me whenever there’s soccer again.”

Kamifuku: “From Yuki: I really hope that everyone is healthy and happy, and I sincerely hope that Millie-san is able to leave and return home safely.”

I had a bit of trouble with Kamiyu’s middle chunk of lines there, but I understood enough of it to laugh, haha! Fun bilingual bonus with this one!

The main event of the show was the only other match with comments. The match was a six women preview tag: Miyu, Itoh, & Moka vs Yuka, Hikari, & Arisu.

After the match, the winning team spoke on the mic:

Yamashita: “It feels like it’s started. After Korakuen, I brought her a box of cream puffs, with the challenge at Ittenyon attached. Today, having that match with Yuka-chan, I felt the beginning of that exhilarating excitement.”

Itoh: “That’s great!”

Yamashita: “For sure. But Arisu and Hikari are also really strong, and Moka and Itoh are getting stronger and stronger. I’m the EVE champion, though, so I want to do my best not to lose.”

Itoh: “Congrats!”

Yamashita: “Thank you! Do you have anything to say, Moka?”

Miyamoto: “It has been a long time since we’ve been able to wrestle in Yokohama…”

Yamashita: “You’re right, it has been a while. Itoh, do you have anything to add? You went to America, right?”

Itoh: “Yes, I did. Oh, I’m going to Malaysia next week! Because of that, I won’t be here, sorry.”

Then Miyu said, “久しぶりの横浜で、もう年末に…なってきてはないか。でも近づいてきて.” I wasn’t exactly sure what to do with the “なってきてはないか,” haha.

Yamashita: “We’re in Yokohama for the first time in a long time, and it’s already the end of the year… Well, it’s not here yet. But it’s getting closer. Looking ahead to Ittenyon, I’m going to do my best, and for the remainder of 2022, we’re all going to work hard. To close, Moka is here, too, so the three of us will do it together, okay?” (to Moka) “Nice smile, great job!”

They close with: “Limits?” “Don’t set them!”

In her post-match comments, Miyu starts by saying, “私はいろいろシュークリームの押し問答がありましたけど、まぁ承諾してくれて。そこからの初めてユカちゃんと絡むということで、久しぶりに絡んで始まった感というか.”

I was a bit confused by the 初めて in the second sentence. I couldn’t quite figure out what/when she was referring to. I think everything else went okay, though?

Yamashita: “We had a long back and forth over the cream puffs, but, well, she agreed. That was where I first feuded with Yuka-chan, so this feels like beginning anew and feuding with her again for the first time in a long time. We don’t have much time until Ittenyon, but I’m really excited. Of course, there are some things I have to take countermeasures against, but today, I think I started off just feeling excited. I was able to win! Well, WE were able to win, thanks to my teammates. I want to keep my momentum and win the belt at Ittenyon, and I’m aiming for becoming double champion.”

Miyamoto: “Today was a 6-women tag match, and teaming up with these two has given me a lot of encouragement. I really want to become stronger, too. I’m going to work even harder!”

Itoh: “Itoh will be in Yamashita’s corner, at Ittenyon.”

Yamashita: “Wait, before that, I just remembered something. In Hamamatsu, I have an EVE title match, against Rhio who is coming from England. Last time she came to TJPW, I was in another country and I didn’t get to meet her. So we’re facing each other for the first time, and the match was set very quickly. That’s happening before Ittenyon, so I have to psych myself up. If I don’t overcome this, I won’t be able to become a double champion, so I want to do my best.”

Itoh: “I won’t be there next week.”

Yamashita: “Hey! You should come!”

Itoh: “I’m not going!”

Miyamoto: “I’ll go!”

Yamashita: “Please!”

Itoh: “It’s okay, Moka-chan. You don’t have to force yourself.”

Here’s the second part:

(This is your first match against Rhio?)

Yamashita: “It’s the first time, yes. I met her the last time I was in England, but this will be my first time fighting her.”

(What was your impression of her?)

“Well, I totally haven’t seen any of her matches. When it gets a little closer… I mean, it’s already happening next week…”

Itoh: “Hey, I had a title match with her!”

Yamashita: “Really? Tell me about it later.”

Itoh: “She’s just big and really strong. That’s all I can really give you.”

Yamashita: “I’m going to go home and watch that match, and come up with a plan. So I don’t have any impression of her at the moment.”

In the other team’s comments, the last part of Yuka’s first line confused me: “今回は負けちゃったけど、おのおの力つけていこうかなと思います.”

Sakazaki: “I feel like the three of us were a good team. Thank you. We lost this time, but I think we should all work on improving our strength.”

Hikari: “I really wanted us to win the first preview match together. Whenever Yuka-san has a preview match, I’m never able to be useful.”

Sakazaki: “That’s not true!”

Hikari: “I’m really frustrated. But I’m still going to follow after Yuka-san.”

Sakazaki: “I’m glad, about today. What a relief!”

Hikari: “Arisu-chan did her best, too.”

Endo: “I’m often asked to wrestle in preview matches, even though I’ll definitely lose. It really makes me feel like I have to keep growing.”

Sakazaki: “But, you know, it’s also good experience to face someone who is preparing for a title match.”

Endo: “That’s true…”

Sakazaki: “It all adds up.”

In the second part, I think I got the first half:

(You got the cream puffs, but are you feeling optimistic about the title match?)

“No, not at all! But I can’t give back what I already ate. It can’t be helped, so I will do my best.”

(Were they good?)

“They were delicious!”

Then Yuka says, “なんかシュークリームって中にぶちゅって入ってるじゃないですか。なんかはみ出んばかりのカスタードが上にドーンって乗ってて、心ばかしのシューの皮の部分が乗ってて.” I can tell that she’s describing the cream puffs, but couldn’t really figure out a lot of the specifics, haha. DeepL actually had some pretty good metaphors in there, so I just used what they had without really knowing how accurate it is :sweat_smile:.

“There’s just something about the filling in cream puffs, isn’t it? There was a big dollop of custard on top, and a hearty portion of puff pastry wrapped around it. Proportionally, it was about 120% custard. I was totally satisfied. It was so good! There were four of them, and I gave one to Yamashita. They were 120% custard!”

Translating this made me really, really crave cream puffs…

And that’s it for this show!

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I would maybe nitpick that “going with the flow” could be more literal here – I think “riding that same wave” would be literally the same and would convey the meaning better - like I think the idea is being sympatico somehow with Japan’s national team who won helped contribute to her victory today.

In 行ったり帰ったり, the 行’ing and 帰’ing are separate. And she says また and makes this going-back-and-forth hand gesture:
image
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So I would say rather than hoping Millie san safely leaves and returns home, it’s hoping Millie san safely leaves and comes back sometime.

I think you’ve got the feeling. My impression is the もう年末に…なってきてはないか。is commenting
/ confirming with the others on how it’s already the end of the year, and then でも近づいてきて is softening it, and that merits a quicker confirmation.
Only mentioning anything here at all just because I don’t think the “Well, it’s not here yet” is literally there and so mentioning it in case that was for the “なってきてはないか。” I think it’s two beats, like something like “It’ll already be the end of the year… isn’t it? Well, getting closer to it anyway.”

For そこからの初めてユカちゃんと絡む, I think an Xの初めてY would be a Y that’s first X, like an example I found is a book called パパからの初めての手紙/“First Letter From My Dad.” So in this case I think it would be the first time she’s 絡む’d with Yuka starting from a cream puff negotiation.

After that, watching the video I don’t think she’s got a fully formed train of thought as it seems like her tone noticeably changes as she thinks of something. So it ends up kinda different between the video and the transcript I’d say – the 始まった感 part in the video is in reference to like, the match they just had rather than the verbal reasons before it, since she mentions 前哨戦.
I feel like there’s three ideas that didn’t quite hook up to each other directly:

  1. it’s the first time she’s 絡む’dwith Yuka そこから,
  2. It’s the first time she’s 絡む’d with her in a while.
  3. it feels like it’s begun, the 前哨戦 have begun

and so it just kinda ends with the というか in the transcript.
That’s my impression anyway.

Out of curiosity, did you mean “be in Yamashita’s corner literally”? It sounds like she says 応援行くto me which sounds like maybe she’ll just (showing up to) cheer for her, in which case it might not be the best expression to use when there’s a literal corner she could be in :sweat_smile: - but I’m not really sure (and I don’t know who usually seconds for whom) so if it was meant literally that’s fine.

I think that seems fine

I think she’s talking up the cream puffs she got like saying – 大体, cream puffs are like this, with something inserted in the middle:
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but the cream puffs she got are like this:
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… with a huge dollop of custard ladled onto an open pastry…
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… and then a little thing of pastry put on top to simulate what in your average cream puff would be the original top/lid of the pastry.
So you open it up and are like “dang! This is proportionally 120% custard!”
image

大満足!
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A thing I think I’d correct specifically is I would say the 心ばかしのシューの皮の部分, is like, a token of a piece of pastry. Rather than a hearty one! It seems like 心ばかり is most often used a as a phrase for like, talking down a gift you’re giving someone. And in any case it certainly seems like she’s emphasizing the relative smallness of the pastry in comparison to the custard!

Her description seems accurate!
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I know what you mean… I might have to stop by Beard Papa’s this weekend…

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:sweat_smile:

Post cream puff photos in the chat if Yuka’s psyop worked on you!!

I actually wasn’t quite sure what to do with this! Itoh has been literally in Miyu’s corner for matches since they started regularly tagging together, so I sort of just assumed that’s what she was referring to here, though I wasn’t sure if this was the exact expression generally used for that or not. Since Miyu was upset that Itoh wasn’t going to be at the show, it seemed to me that Itoh was referring to physically being there and seconding her during the match. But if the phrase doesn’t necessarily imply that, I might just change it to cheering for her.

Thanks again for all of your help!

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not as decadent as Yuka’s but still pretty good

I checked the sources I could remember, the wrestling dictionary:
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and the parts of the Nakamura biography where he talks about being wedged as a “super rookie” between expectations to second people as a rookie and expectations to not deign to second people as a main eventer, and there it seems “セコンドにいく” and “セコンドにつく” are both used for “to second someone (literally being in their corner supporting them).”

I think I would say probably while 応援にいく might encompass / be a part of セコンドにいく, I think you could 応援にいく for your おし as a fan. I get the impression 応援 is support in terms of cheering/sending energy, or relatively abstract support activities from the sidelines of whatever is being supported. Which fits with figuratively being in someone’s corner, but I think literally being in someone’s corner is more of an actual role with duties in addition to just 応援.
So I suppose we’ll see if Itoh is literally in her corner or not in January (and I could be wrong about all of this either way), but I think probably they’re bickering about like, whether Itoh will show up in general support for her friend, or Naito-style absolutely not bother .

Unrelated to any of that: just for fun, since the issue with it came in today and it will be mid-2023 before I get to it, I filled out my end-of-the-year ballot for Shupro as if I were going to actually send it!

Commentary
  • When I picked Kenoh, not actually really watching NOAH, I was under the impression somehow that he had beaten Kiyomiya and successfully defended the championship – and it appears I was completely wrong about this. Nevertheless! The hair at cyberfight festival deserves it if nothing else, and arguably his column was some of the most consistently I’ve been entertained by men’s wrestling this year. Plus, やっぱり, it is a 朱世界, after all…
  • I was gonna pick Giulia/Tam for best match figuring a longer one might have a better shot at widespread recognition, but I noticed the magazine listed this one with Suzu so I went with my heart and because it was easier to write off of their example.
  • I was a bit tempted to pick someone other than Syuri for the women’s grand prix, since her reign I don’t think storyline-wise has involved as much like, growth and import as Hayashishita’s was, and technically they act like the Red and White belts are the same level so arguably Saya Kamitani has as much claim to it if we’re talking about championship reigns… but nah! Syuri deserves it!
  • I would probable still consider my #1 faction allegiance, so to speak, to be Donna Del Mondo, but God’s Eye is new and great! It’s the world’s nicest badass plus the growing list of her proteges. It’s a perfect faction!
  • I honestly do not like the Mad Max movies so aesthetically they’re not so much for me, but Max the Impaler’s run in TJPW has been oddly heartwarming and certainly has made a big impact there.
    Tama Tonga’s babyface run would probably be the runner-up for me but I feel like that hasn’t ended up going anywhere quite yet.
    I guess Jay White should be the right answer here but I guess I haven’t been keeping much track of the IWGP World Heavyweight Championship this year, which is a bit sad.
  • The only other debuting wrestler who I both recognized and could remember seeing matches from was Juria Nagano, and the choice was pretty much arbitrary.
  • runners-up to 好きなプロレスラー include Hiroshi Tanahashi, Suzu Suzuki, Koguma and Hazuki, like all of God’s Eye, Tomohiro Ishii…
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Finished TJPW’s December 10 show shockingly quickly! This one was a short one!

The big thing of plot importance was Miyu successfully defending her EVE belt against Rhio in the main event.

After the match, Miyu spoke in English at first (with a little help):

Yamashita: (in English) “Rhio! Thank you so much!” (loud applause from the audience) “I hope you come back to Japan again. Please! See you again next time in the UK, OK? Thank you!” (loud applause for Rhio as she exits)

Her first line in Japanese after that confused me, haha! She said, “あー…ちょっと、私のこと人間だと思ってないみたいよ.” I got a bit of help from Mr. Haku to make sense of this. :sweat_smile:

Yamashita: (in Japanese) “Hey, I don’t think she thinks I’m a human. But I’m glad I was able to defend my belt. That’s a relief! I missed the last Hamamatsu show, but I’m so happy that I was able to come here with a belt like this. Thank you all so much for coming.”

Then she said, “私、12月はアレなんですけど、年明け早々にこのベルトじゃない、東京女子のプリプリを懸けて坂崎ユカに挑戦するんですけど.” I wasn’t exactly sure what to do with that first part?

“There’s this in December, but right at the beginning of the year, I’m challenging Yuka Sakazaki not for this belt, but with TJPW’s Princess of Princess belt on the line. If I win that, I’ll have both the EVE title and the PoP belt, and I will become double champion. I declare riichi! Or checkmate? Anyway, I’m so close, so please keep supporting me. I’ll come back to Hamamatsu, so please wait until then. Thank you all very much!”

In Miyu’s comments, this chunk near at the beginning confused me: “やっぱり力も強いし、発想というか。こうくるんだ、っていうのが多くて。今日も外に投げ飛ばされたじゃないですか。あそこからけっこうきて、動けなくなるのは自分の弱さでもあるし。意表を突かれるのが…ミリーの時もそうですけど、海外の選手とやると多いので.”

Yamashita: “I was able to defend the EVE belt for the second time. But she was powerful, and her way of thinking, or I guess I should say that coming here, she has a lot of ideas. Today, she threw me outside the ring. After a certain point, I couldn’t move, which was a weakness she could exploit. It catches me off guard… It’s like that with Millie, too. It happens a lot when I fight foreign wrestlers. I took a lot of damage there, but I was somehow able to win the match. I was able to land a kick at the end when my opponent couldn’t see it coming, and I think that’s what led to my victory today. I think that’s my last title defense this year, so I’ll be able to challenge at Ittenyon while still holding the EVE belt. That makes me really happy. I’m closing in on the double championship. After that, I will probably participate in the EVE show in England on January 7. I want to beat Yuka-chan at Ittenyon and go to England as a double champion. I have a lot more to look forward to.”

The first half of the second part went alright, I think?

(It’s a short span of time between defenses)

“I haven’t had this feeling in a long time. If I think back on it, when I was the first Princess of Princess champion, I was defending the belt in a very short span of time. Or was I the second champion? Either way!” (laughs) “I really remember that part of it… but I’m someone who enjoys that. I think I enjoy it more when it’s harder, so I’m having a lot of fun now, and even though my body hurts all over, I’ll recover quickly. I want to make the most of my strength and defend the belt again and again. That’s how much I enjoy this.”

Then there’s this whole chunk that the video cuts out, but which shupro has. I don’t think I had trouble with it, but I’m including it anyway just for posterity, haha, in case I made some terrible mistake :sweat_smile:.

(海外からの挑戦を待つ形?)EVEに関しては自分が日本にいる時に海外選手でやりたい選手がいれば来てくれるって、団体ともそういう話をしてて。なので来たいっていう選手がいればできるかぎり日本に呼んでやると。東京女子のスケジュールに合わせながらね。そこで目の前に立ってきた相手と闘っていきたいなと。

(Are you awaiting challengers from overseas?)

“Concerning EVE, while I’m in Japan, if there are foreign wrestlers who want to face me, they can come. I’ve been talking to the company about that. So if there are wrestlers who want to come, I will do what I can to invite them to Japan while keeping to TJPW’s schedule. I want to face whichever opponent stands in front of me.”

(What do you want to do after becoming a double champion?)

“It can be a challenge to hold two championships. It happened in I believe my second reign. I won the SHINE belt in the U.S. and became a double champion. There is a view that you can only see from that position, and it’s something that can’t be expressed in words. It only extends out before you when you’re the double champion. I want to win another belt in the U.S., not just in England. I’m looking forward to holding more and more belts, which is different from how I’ve done things in the past. I think I will be able to show a new image of myself as a champion, not the one that I have shown up to this point. In that sense, I think the Princess of Princess belt is essential for me right now.”

And Rhio’s comments were in English! The video did not include any Japanese translation, which is a little unusual, haha! Sorry to the Japanese fans, I guess!

Rhio: “I enjoyed that match so, so much. Miyu Yamashita is one hell of a champion. Although, I can’t help but be disappointed. I wanted to leave Japan with the EVE championship, take that back home. Unfortunately, that is not to be for today. But I won’t give up on this. Miyu, I want you to come to the UK. I want to fight you in England. For the championship or not, we will fight again. Thank you, so, so much.”

That’s all!

With this translation, I have officially been doing this for an entire year! I’ve translated 62 shows/press conferences/contract signings/etc. over the past year :scream:! 9 of them were for DDT, and the rest were for TJPW. 25 of the TJPW translations were “full text” translations (or as close as I could get). That’s pretty wild to think about!

My goal for next year is to get faster at this and better at Japanese so that I don’t need as much help, haha!

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I would try to inflect this more with the like, weary catching her breath tone of the original. I think that + the audience laughter + I think she says like ボロボロですが or something like that between sentences in a way that probably didn’t get picked up in the transcript = the “geez! She really gave it to me!” sense that Mr. Haku gestures at with the "I’m so beat up; " – without it it sounds like just a weird thing to say!

It sounds to me from googling around (example, example) that calling something アレ like this is a way to like, vagueify what you would say about it either because it’s not good or you don’t have the right words.
I think I’d probably go with something like “December’s one thing, but” based on that. (which I can enjoy imagining confusing a non-native English speaker in a similar way :sweat_smile:) I would say rhetorically she’s just putting December aside to talk about January here, so it fits.

王手 would appear to be more “check” than “checkmate” - and check would fit better with riichi, as they both mean being one step away from winning (rather than having won already).

I would say that the こうくるんだ、っていうのが多くて。 connects with the 発想. There were lots of times when Rhio’s 発想 ability led her to think “こうくるんだ.” I watched the video on 2x speed, and there were quite a few times where Miyu went for a kick and Rhio braced or dodged, causing Miyu to reconsider, or times when that happened and Miyu still went through with it and got countered for her trouble.

I think the rest is ok. I think the あそこからけっこうきて might be like literally it happens pretty often from that spot (she was put on the corner and thrown out of the ring after charging in with a kick - she gets put on a similar corner in the Millie match I checked just to see if literally the same thing happened, but there she countered Millie and sent her out instead).

(I feel bad for people transcribing Miyu… she talks so fast…)

Where did “feeling” come from? Did the transcription by any chance put 感覚 when it should have put 間隔? :sweat_smile:

Congratulations! :tada:

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What exactly does “こうくるんだ” mean in this context? At first I thought it meant “come here,” but that doesn’t really make sense with the んだ, and I can’t quite make sense of how Miyu is using it here :sweat_smile:.

Yes, this is exactly what happened! Shupro has: “この感覚すごく久しぶりで.” I thought it was a bit of an odd word to use there, but unfortunately I’m still at a point where I see a typo and assume that the confusion is on my end, haha.

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I mean… I don’t really know myself :sweat_smile:

I was reading it at the time (I notice now I wasn’t clear who I meant by “she”, sorry about that!) as like, Rhio thinking “Miyu will come at me in this way” with the んだ as like, the inference from context kind of flavor of like, Rhio is able to visualize what Miyu is going to do next from observation. Which seemed to fit maybe.

That said – your mentioning んだ doesn’t fit as an imperative reminds me that んだ can actually be used as a sort of imperative! It’s one I feel like I’ve absorbed from movies without coming across it in grammar study books so much (which seems to fit with this Tofugu article associating it with action movies – I would say the two kinds of んだ I’ve mentioned here are “for Realization” and “for Commands” in that article, respectively)

That said – even then I feel like it would be more like “come in this way” rather than “come here” and I agree it feels hard to see how that connects with what Miyu’s saying.
When I google around for examples of people saying “こうくるんだ” it seems like they line up with my initial impression more. The best example I found is this negative movie review:

バレバレなんですよ、これが。
こうくるんだろうなぁ、という予想通りに展開し、あげくの果てには子供の霊の大暴走

(I blurred the spoiler for the movie just in case :sweat_smile:)

The こうくる in that sentence seems to mean like – it’s going to develop this way / these kinds of things are going to happen.
Like if stuff transpires outside your control – that’s the くる, the outcome comes to you. But the specifics of how it ends up transpiring - that’s the こう

As another example, this tiktok appears to me to be someone challenged to text the 3rd person in their contact list as if the contact were their mom – and they’re surprised that the contact completely played along, texting back mom-style things.
With the caption: こうくるとは、
which I would say is like roughly “omg it went down like this? :scream:” with the trailed off とは as a way of expressing like, shock/amazement/at a loss/ that kind of thing (which I have seen in a grammar book)
The first result for my search was also “こうくるんだ!?” with no context - but the interrobang at least wouldn’t make sense if it were an imperative. :sweat_smile:

So I think I feel okay with my original interpretation. But as always I could be completely wrong about all of it! There’s always the grammar question thread if more opinions would be helpful!

P.S. come to think of it – I suppose if Miyu is the one thinking こうくるんだ it could fit with that surprise these other examples seem to often be expressing - like it’s Rhio’s 発想 in coming up with innovative strategies that causes many points where Miyu’s like “dang I wasn’t expecting it to go down like that, ok”
That might resolve the issue I had with my original interpretation - that the switch to Rhio’s perspective didn’t seem well supported enough.

That’s one case where it helped to be listening to the audio first! :grin: I could form my opinion about what かんかく meant first, so I was primed to catch it.

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Not a TJPW translation post this time!

I finished writing a short guide to learning Japanese with a pro wrestling focus! It’s based on what I’ve learned over the past couple years. Very little new information in there, probably, to anyone who has been following this thread and/or my study log, but I wanted to put it together in the hopes of saving other folks some time. It’s now linked at the beginning of this thread :blush:.

I shared it on twitter and on reddit (pro wrestling reddit and not language learning reddit :sweat_smile:), and it has surprisingly taken off more than I expected. I guess there is in fact a lot of demand for this!

The other big wrestling news for me is that there are lots of hints that we’re getting very close to a true in-ring Golden Lovers reunion :sob:.

Kenny made the cover of shupro again for the first time in years, and they did a big feature building up to his match with Ospreay on ittenyon. Here’s a translation of it! And yes, Kota Ibushi does come up.

Kota also answered an interview question in English, seemingly by machine translating his own answer and just sending it like that. According to Dark Puroresu Flowsion, Kota always responds to them in English, which is why some of it is a little off. There are some really funny machine translation quirks in it, because Kota’s Japanese is a bit notoriously difficult for machine translation, haha.

They asked him if he still has the desire to start his own promotion, and this is what he answered:

Dark Puroresu Flowsion also posted a photo of Kota, Kenny, and the Young Bucks with their Golden Elite “change the world” shirts and captioned it “I’ll leave this here. Make of it what you will.”

So it’s a little hard to say what Kota’s exact plans are at this point, but I think it’s very, very likely he will show up at AEW in some capacity, though I don’t necessarily think he will sign a contract. He seems to want to keep doing his own thing and freelancing.

Regardless of his specific plans, though, he’s definitely going to be doing something with Kenny in the near future :smiling_face_with_tear:.

The other thing I wanted to mention was Chris Brookes and Drew Parker’s anniversary show, Baka Gaijin + Friends on December 13, which is one of the few (maybe the first?) independent produce shows in Japan to be arranged and booked entirely by non-Japanese wrestlers.

I was going to link the youtube video in here so that folks could watch it, but youtube took it down because they “played the Chainsaw Man theme one too many times” (according to Chris). So instead, here’s a bootleg link (which Chris himself shared on twitter, so I feel like that’s about as sanctioned as you can get :sweat_smile:). Chris vs Drew gets a bit intense, so heads up for that, but the matches before that are easier to watch.

It’s a fun show that made for some pretty pleasant listening practice for me! It’s like a standard ChocoPro show in that the commentary is a mixture of Japanese and English. I noticed that I was actually able to understand quite a bit of the Japanese, and that made me happy!

I also meant to share this a while ago, but completely spaced it, haha! Here’s Yukio Naya vs current KO-D Openweight champion Kazusada Higuchi from DDT’s D-OH Grand Prix tournament! Higuchi’s had a sort of quietly awesome reign as DDT champ this year, and this match was a lot of fun.

I still need to go looking for more TJPW stuff to add to the beginning of this thread, haha, but most of my favorite matches aren’t available for free, unfortunately… They need to be more like DDT and upload some of their bigger matches!

Also, my apologies for responding very late, but I meant to comment on this a few weeks ago:

Yeah the phoenix splash in particular is just… well, I got into wrestling in the first place because of Kota Ibushi (more specifically, I got into wrestling because of a tag team involving Kota Ibushi and a wrestler whose entire career basically happened because of Kota Ibushi :sweat_smile:). So, yeah, I totally understand where Kamitani is coming from there.

I spent a lot of time thinking about the phoenix splash when Kota dislocated his shoulder doing the move in 2021. Kota has always been someone who sort of just follows his heart, and I don’t think he put a whole lot of intent, necessarily, into choosing the phoenix splash for a signature move. I thought I’d remembered reading an interview where he talked about it, but I couldn’t find it, haha.

I did find this quote from a July 2010 interview:

The unshakable will to become a pro wrestler gave birth to a new feverish devotion to his everyday play-wrestling. He threw himself like a fanatic into developing better technique too, and once he mastered back handsprings and backflips, he completed [mastering] moonsaults, Firebird Splashes, shooting star presses and Phoenix Splashes…aerial maneuvers of the highest difficulty. All the same, he didn’t have the courage to try them out against human opponents. So he only did presses [and such] by landing on his feet or the ground. But because he had “wanted to give everyone a show” at least once, he gathered just twenty people around the platform for the morning address, and performed a Firebird [Splash]. The end result was that he broke every bone in the left side of his rib cage…This is where his “Firebird Curse” began.

Joe also wrote about the move in his essay on Kota’s entire career:

More importantly, it’s the move that best exemplifies Ibushi to me: it’s risky and difficult, requiring an unparalleled fine-tuning of the body and absolute focus of the mind, and as great as its damage is in kayfabe, it’s often a ringing of the knell as well. Having your back turned to the ring and your opponent is like throwing yourself into the world blindfolded. You can hope that others will be there to cushion your fall, but in the end, you have to trust yourself and only yourself, even if it’s scary. And after you land face-first in the dirt, you have to pick yourself up after, no matter how much it hurts. As we have already seen, Ibushi is nothing if not the master of burning up and rising from the ashes a hundred times over.

The thing that I think gets me the most about the move is when I think about everything that followed from Kota’s choice to incorporate it into his moveset at the very beginning of his career (he used it in his debut match, even). That move led to him dislocating his shoulder in the Best of Super Juniors final, and then last year in the G1 final.

But it also led to so many moments in so many other wrestlers’ careers. Kenny has brought it out in multiple big matches, including his G1 victory and the match where he finally beat Okada for the IWGP title. He has brought it out a few times in AEW, even, most notably against Jon Moxley in their unsanctioned match in November 2019, when they pulled away the padding on the ring, and Kenny did a phoenix splash off of the turnbuckle and faceplanted directly on hard wood, which he later said was one of the most painful bumps he’d ever taken. Mox hit a paradigm shift and pinned him almost immediately afterward.

I think about that moment all the time, even though I often struggle with watching hardcore/deathmatch type stuff. Kenny was able to withstand broken glass, he could withstand barbed wire, but the one pain he ultimately couldn’t come back from was the pain of a broken heart.

(Kenny always goes for the phoenix splash when he’s most desperate, and he always misses it. Every time.)

And, yeah, with Kamitani using it because of Kota, too…

All of these choices, all of those really rough moments in those other matches, they all stemmed from Kota just so happening to pick that move at the very beginning. It’s so interesting to think about the legacy of a move like that, and how it’s tied to all of these different stories, and how it has caused all of these turning points where if things had gone differently, who even knows what these stories would look like now… Kota would likely still be with NJPW, for one thing.

From purely an aesthetic standpoint, I love the phoenix splash. It takes my breath away every time. It’s one of my favorite things about Kota’s style of wrestling. But at the same time, it’s a really scary move! I guess that gets at the central contradiction of pro wrestling, for me. I am both compelled by it and repelled by it. I want to look at it and look away at the same time.

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Finished the December 15 TJPW show! This one was Mizuki’s 10th anniversary show!

They did a “Full of Mizuki Battle Royale” featuring Yuki Aino, Suzume, Misao, Pom, Miu, and Miyu, where all of the wrestlers entered in Mizuki’s old gear, except for Miyu, who could not fit into it haha (Kiso disqualified her for this). This match was so much fun! I think my favorite moment was Misao tricking Suzume into attempting Toy Story 4 with her, then pushing Suzume off the top rope to eliminate her haha.

Unfortunately, shupro didn’t transcribe the comments after this one, and the twitter caption was similarly not helpful :sweat_smile:. I tried just listening to it, but couldn’t really make out much, unfortunately!

Then Moka and Arai teamed up to face Itoh and Rhio. No transcript for these comments, either!

From what twitter gives us, here’s what I had for the first part of Moka and Arai’s:

Arai: “This is my last TJPW event of the year. I still want to do my best next year!”

Moka: “This is our first time tagging since Arai-san won the belt. Tagging with Arai-san gives me so much encouragement! I hope to become as strong and undaunted as she is!”

And the second part:

(Looking toward Ittenyon, what are your takeaways?)

Arai: “I was afraid of fighting foreign wrestlers. But after fighting an overseas wrestler today, I’m not all that afraid about the title match anymore.”

Itoh’s and Rhio’s comments also did not have a transcript, but I… think I might have actually got them? I don’t think Itoh pulled a Kamiyu, at least :sweat_smile:. This is very tentative, and I’m not super confident, despite having Rhio’s English and the twitter caption to help me, but:

Itoh: “We won!” (in English) “We won!”

Rhio: (in English) “We make a good team! Definitely! We should do that more often.”

Itoh: “OK.”

Rhio: “UK, Japan, me and you?”

Itoh: “OK, yes, yes!” (translating) “She says, ‘So, in England and Japan as well, let’s team up a lot!’” (to Rhio, in English) “More?”

Rhio: “Thank you very much for having me in Japan again, I’ve had an amazing time. Hopefully I’ll be back, and hopefully I’ll see some of the Tokyo Joshi Pro girls in England as well, and we can carry on doing what we’re doing.”

Itoh: (translating) “She said, ‘Thank you, everyone! I had so much fun, and I want to come back again.”

Itoh: “And for Itoh: last time Rhio was my opponent, so I’m really happy to be able to fight as her ally today. I want to do something if we get another opportunity.”

The main event of this show was super fun! Mizuki teamed up with Rika against Yuka and Nao. There was a lot of stuff with Rika that was funny, haha. Yuka got so jealous! It reminded me a bit of that one Golden Lovers tag match in DDT where they got put on opposite teams, because just like in that match, at one point, Mizuki and Yuka forget that they’re on opposite sides and start hitting tag moves together. But of course, the Yuka vs Mizuki stuff is the biggest draw here, and they certainly deliver on that. I’d forgotten how intense it feels when they face each other…

After the match, Rika starts off on the mic:

Tatsumi: (to Sakazaki and Kakuta, who are leaving) “Hey, wait a minute! It’s a celebration! Let’s celebrate together! Mizu-pyon, once again, congratulations on your 10th anniversary! I’m so happy that you chose me for such an important 10th anniversary show, and that you teamed up with me, and we got a win together. Thank you!”

Mizuki: “Rika-san, I really put a lot of feelings into who I chose for this match. I enjoyed tagging with you for the first and last time. Thank you so much!”

Then Rika says: “違います。また見たいよねー? 見たいよー! ほら!(「いままでありがとう」の声に)ヤダー!” That “ヤダー” at the end was tricky! I tried looking it up, and I had a bit of trouble finding a clear answer, but someone said that it can be used basically like すごい? So I think maybe it’s along those lines? :sweat_smile:

Tatsumi: “No! You want to see it again, don’t you? I want to see it! Look!” (to the voice saying “thank you for everything you’ve done so far”) “Yes, truly!”

Mizuki: “I want Nao-chan and Yuka-chi to come into the ring, too.”

Tatsumi: “For the time being, we’ll put it on hold.”

Mizuki: "I didn’t really expect anything in particular from Nao-chan. I asked her because I wanted to work together with her since we both transferred to TJPW. But… you kicked me in the face a whole bunch of times, didn’t you? I won’t let that go! And, Yuka-chi, please wait a moment.

Then Mizuki says… this long, tricky chunk, haha! “私はね、いろんなことを一緒に乗り越えてきたSAKIちゃんとデビューして、尊敬できる先輩たちに囲まれて、東京女子に出会って、たくさんの仲間が増えて。そんななかで、プロレスができて幸せだなって思いました。10年っていっても何一つ、応援してくれる人からしたら誇れるようなことはないかもしれへんけど…瑞希はやっぱり応援してくれてる人のみんなのためにこれからも闘ったいきたいなって思ったので、いっぱい応援してほしいなって思いました。これからもよろしくお願いします.”

"I, you know, debuted with Saki-chan, and we overcame so much together, and I was surrounded by so many senpais that I respected, and I happened to find TJPW, and I made so many friends. And I thought, ‘being able to do pro wrestling makes me happy.’ There might not be anything in these ten years for my supporters to take pride in, but… I’d like to keep fighting for everyone who’s rooting for me, so I hope you give me your full support. Please keep supporting me!”

I think I got this next part, thanks in part to Mr. Haku’s live translation thread, but it’s pretty important, so I just wanted to double-check, haha: “そしてユカっち、闘うこともイヤやなってちょっと思ったけど…なんか闘ってみて、いっぱいこれからも組んでいきたいなって思ったし。ユカッチは瑞希のことを分かってくれてて…自分が分からんくなることも多いんやけど、ずっと支えてくれて。ユカッチの…何があっても瑞希はユカッチを守れるって思うくらい大好きです。だから、今回組まへんかったことを許してほしいな.”

“And Yuka-chi, I thought at first that I didn’t want to fight you, but… after fighting you like this, I want to team with you as much as possible from now on. You understand me even though I often don’t even understand myself, and you’ve always supported me. Yuka-chi… I love you so much, I want to protect you no matter what. So, please forgive me for not teaming up with you this time."

Then Yuka said, “コイツ卑怯やなー! コイツはずるいな~。ホントそういうとこやろ、みんな好きなんやろ? これからも仲良くしてな.” I had lots of trouble figuring out to do with this! Especially the “卑怯” :sweat_smile:

Sakazaki: “It’s so unfair! You’re so crafty! You do stuff like this, and we all still love you, huh? Be friends with me forever.”

(The two of them embrace, but Tatsumi tries to pull them apart. Kakuta prompts them, “Hey! Happy happy!” and somehow gets the situation under control.)

Mizuki: “The crowd can vocalize today, so when I say ‘eat hamburger steak,’ please say ‘happy happy!’ with all of your might. Okay? Rika-san, you, too.”

Then Rika says, “聞いたか、お前ら! 絶対だからな!” I stared at that last part for so long, haha, trying to figure out how to translate it :sweat_smile:. I’m a bit pickier about wanting my Yuka and Mizuki and Rika translations to be as good as they can be…

Tatsumi: “Did you hear that, you guys? It’s unmistakable!”

They closed the show with, “Eat hamburger steak!” and “HAPPY HAPPY!”

Mizuki and Rika’s comments after the match were pretty funny. I liked Yuka chiming in from offscreen, haha.

Mizuki: “Thank you very much!”

Tatsumi: “You’re welcome! Being able to get the win together at a show commemorating such an important event… Thank you! Thank you so much for keeping this up for ten years! Above anything else, Mizu-pyon continues to wrestle with a smile on her face and bless us with her presence… For us, as a representative of the otaku, that’s what makes us the happiest. Thank you!”

Mizuki: “I’m glad I got to team with you, Rika-san.”

Tatsumi: “Did I do my best?”

Mizuki: “You helped so much. You were very reassuring. For once…”

Tatsumi: (to Sakazaki saying “You can let go of her now” offscreen) “I won’t let go!”

Then Mizuki says, “また…来世くらいでよろしくお願いします” and Rika replies, “長生きする!” I wasn’t quite sure about this? :sweat_smile:

Mizuki: “Also… in my next life, please take care of me.”

Tatsumi: “You’ll live a long time! Let’s team up for a bit again, for any reason. I’ll team up with you!”

The next chunk went pretty smoothly:

(You faced Sakazaki for the first time in a long time)

Mizuki: “It’s the first time in two years, or something like that? I had some mixed feelings, as it turned out. But she’s the person I want at my side the most, and she’s also the person I most want to see me grow. I wondered what she thought after we fought, but I felt at home next to Yuka-chi.”

Tatsumi: “Why? Isn’t it good to have a day like today once in a while?”

Mizuki: “Maybe it could happen about once every ten years or so.”

Tatsumi: “Your 20th anniversary, huh? I’ll do my best! That’s a promise!” (linking their pinky fingers together) “I want to celebrate your 20th anniversary with you!”

They ask Mizuki about her 11th year, and I wasn’t confident about her first line here: “10年やってきて、胸張って言えてない自分がいて。10年やりましたってことに.”

(Thoughts as you look toward your eleventh year?)

Mizuki: “I’ve been doing this for ten years, and I feel like I can’t say that with pride. I don’t have much to show for those ten years. But, I have amazing people supporting me, and beloved friends at my side, and that makes me happy. There are still things that I have to do in this space, and no one understands that more than me. I’m going to keep running towards that goal.”

(There were a lot of streamers thrown)

“That made me so happy! Moments like that, you realize that you’re not alone. I’m loved by so many people. It’s thanks to everyone that I’m able to look ahead, so I hope that everyone keeps loving me!”

Yuka and Nao’s comments had a few confusing patches, haha. I think I got the beginning:

Kakuta: “Thank you so much! I never thought I’d be involved in Mizuki-san’s anniversary show like this. But she’s super tsundere toward me. That’s why in front of the audience, she has nothing to say, and she only shows her tsun side.”

Then she said: “実際は転校生って言ってくれたけど、転校生として理解してくれるところとか、相談に乗ってくれるところとかいっぱいあるし。頑張ったねってひっそりご褒美くれたりとかすることあるんですよ.”

“To tell you the truth, she called me a transferee, but as someone who transferred here, she’s so full of understanding and advice. It was like she was quietly rewarding me for my hard work. So I think Mizuki-san maybe likes me, or something. The show itself, with the full of Mizuki match and the main event… I saw the atmosphere of the crowd, and I could feel the warmth precisely because Mizuki-san is loved so much. I don’t really set a lot of goals, but I made one: Just like Mizuki-san, I want to celebrate my 10th anniversary, so I’m going to do my best!”

At the end, she said, “ユカさん、今日2人で組んだのが初めてなので、最初のことはちょっとアレですけど…” I wasn’t exactly sure what she was referring to, here, but I think she’s talking about the two of them having a little trouble gelling as a team?

“Yuka-san, this is the first time the two of us have tagged, so the beginning’s a bit awkward…”

Sakazaki: “That’s because we didn’t have a good opponent.”

Kakuta: “Yes, since it was Rika-san, that’s wrong, isn’t it?”

Sakazaki: “Yes, yes, yes! Because it was Rika-san, I was sooo angry!”

Then Nao said, “それが私にきちゃった…ってことですね。っていうことにしておきましょうかね.” I also wasn’t exactly sure what she was referring to here, haha, or if I was translating it correctly.

Kakuta: “That’s why you came over to me, and… let’s just leave it at that.”

Sakazaki: “Nao-chan was fun.”

Kakuta: “Thank you!” (laughs)

The first part of the next chunk went alright:

Sakazaki: “I’m sure that the people coming to the venue and the folks watching it on Universe felt it, but there was such an outpouring of love. It made me so happy, it felt like I was melting. The fact that Mizuki is loved like this, it made me think that if this were happening on a bigger scale, lots more people would have come, but the show still turned out really good!”

Then Yuka said, “だが! だが、でも選ばれなかったことに関してはちょっとあるが…最後卑怯なこと言ってきたから、許してやらんでもないんだが…でも、リカは許さん! アイツだけは許さんぞ.” This was tricky because 卑怯 was still confusing, haha, and I was also having a bit of trouble figuring out exactly how hard the translation needed to go to match her tone here. I know that 許す is one of those notoriously tricky to localize words, haha, so I tried my best! :sweat_smile:

“But… But! I’m still pissed off that she didn’t pick me! Since she said all that cowardly stuff at the end, I won’t let her off the hook! But, Rika? Over my dead body! Not on my watch!!”

Finally, in the last part, I think I got the first half:

(Have you grown as a tag team by fighting here?)

“Yes! In the end, Mizuki has her own special presence. We can fight with a different atmosphere than when we face other wrestlers. That’s good for us, too.”

I wasn’t quite sure about this sentence, though: “その分もいいですし、またタッグ組んだ時に瑞希のこういうところをもっとこう使ったらもっといい連係になるな、とか考えられたので.”

“I was able to think about how when we tag again, if we use this quality of Mizuki more, it’ll make us a better team. I think MagiRabbi will get even stronger.”

And there we go! Just one more show in 2022 after this, and then イッテンヨン!!

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My listening comprehension isn’t great either, but I think the gist is Miyu declined to ぴょん so the others objected to her Mizukiness, but insisted theirs is just superficial but for her 心がみずき!They ask her what she had for breakfast and I think she says something high in protein (mince?) since I have a vague memory of Miu being disqualified from Mizukiness for a similar reason or something like that (?) and the others I think say they had yogurt? The most Mizuki of breakfasts, I suppose. (after that it’s more of a normal backstage promo) (PS - maybe I was off base here I don’t know how this squares with the hamburger thing)

Looks perfect to me!

haha, no, it’s just regular ol’ やだ! As in (それは)いやだ
In this part: “また見たいよねー? 見たいよー! ほら!” she’s trying to get the crowd to declare they agree with her and they want to see them team together more.
So the person in the crowd saying instead 「いままでありがとう」- that elicits a やだ! Ugh, no way! Because in this context that’s いままで in the sense of… いままで, thanking you for all you’ve done up to now which is pointed in this situation where she specifically wants it to be いまから not いままで.
The crowd is playing along with the joke about her being desperate for it to continue, by teasing her into further desperation.

Oh huh! She’s talking here about like, that SAKI, SAKI. The カワイルド one. She was in the 5 Star GP. Maybe go with all caps on that name then to differentiate her from the many other less capitalized Sakis.

My only nitpick here is in the original I would say the overcoming the various things happened before their debut. Looking at their wikipedia page, it looks like they debuted together as the second class of an idol/wrestler project, where the entirety of the first class of applicants ended up dropping out before debuting. So anyway – I’d say it’s that kind of pre-debut logistics and difficulties etc. that she overcame together with SAKI in this sentence. So “debuted with SAKI-chan, who I overcame so much together with” or something might be slightly more technically accurate.

A nuance here that might be difficult to preserve, is she’s talking to Kakuta/the audience here.


My attempt is something like:
“How underhanded! She’s so crafty!! Truly though, we all love that about her right?”
She’s talking about like, saying really sincerely nice things to Yuka before giving her the mic so Yuka can’t be mad at her. That’s the (joke) 卑怯ness - that nice speech being an underhanded tactic to ensure Yuka and everyone will like her.

In fairness, I feel like Tatsumi was less trying to pull them apart and more just trying to attach herself to Mizuki :sweat_smile:

I would say in the context of things like orders, 絶対 is more like “absolute”. It’s an order, so the audience had better heed it and take part in the cheer!!
“That’s an order!” would probably fit perfectly fine.

I think I would say it’s more like – よろしくお願いします to the extent of また来世. Like, Thank you for the help, let’s work together again… next life!
As opposed to like, 来週 or 来年 or the like if they were going to work together again this way sooner.
So Mizuki’s “You’ll live a long time!” is like “Nooo!! We’ll live a long time!!” (so that’s too far in the future)

I think I would say in context this is more like “I think you want to celebrate your 20th anniversary together!!”
image
It’s a pity the transcript looks like it cut off:
:dragon:: や・く・そ・く で!
:rabbit:: こわい

I suppose there’s probably no great way to get this across more, but I thought I’d mention that she says the “But she’s super tsundere toward me.” super sarcastically, like a full-on lean in and extra emphasis on ほんとうに to make it clear she’s joking, in a fake bragging sort of way.
image

Also – I didn’t mention before but I noticed in ring when Mizuki started talking about Nao Mr. Haku had “I have nothing for you” and you had something like “I expected nothing from you” and I didn’t mention anything at the time since it felt like a plausibly ambiguous には, but I would say Mr. Haku’s interpretation gets additional support from connecting up to what Nao’s saying here - “that’s why in front of the audience, she has nothing to say to me” - she’s explaining that moment with a joke.

She’s still running some with the joke of explaining away Mizuki’s outward coldness towards her as tsundereness here (the “ことあるんですよ” is VERY jokingly insistent),
so at first I interpreted this I interpreted it too fair in that direction I think, so I’m a bit turned around,
but I would probably still just put “transfer student” literally for 転校生 – Mizuki is 生え抜き and Nao isn’t and I don’t think that’s a term used outside of schools, so I’d say it’s a term of endearment (or maybe condescension depending on your perspective / how it’s used) for a non-生え抜き wrestler in this case, calling them literally a transfer student.

And to be clear I would say the one 転校生として is Nao, and the one 理解して is I think Mizuki, as in like, speaking as a transfer student, she understood me / she understood my transfer student perspective, or something like that. (this is where I got turned around incidentally, at first I thought this whole chunk was leading up to the って but I don’t think so anymore)
“as someone” → “speaking as someone” is the one word I’d insert into yours I think to clear it up, it’s worded a little ambiguously.

(the later part has a sincere tone, incidentally, confirming she was joking not about the Mizuki being kind part, just the tsundere part)

Yeah pretty sure this is that “アレ as intentional vagueness to say something wasn’t so great with discretion” that I think has come up before. I’d say it would be similar to saying like, “At first it was a little…” (but that might not be clear enough in a transcript without a tone of voice)

Yuka: “I got really mad!”

Kakuta: それが私にきちゃった…ってことですね。
“and so that got directed at me, is what you’re saying”
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The leaving it at that, is leaving “Yuka walked over and directly attacked Kakuta” as “Yuka let her anger at Rika teaming with Mizuki get the best of her and it just happened to end up directed at Kakuta. Oops! しまった!” :sweat_smile:

What’s probably confusing is Yuka is the type of person here whose go-to deflection is to pretend “being nice to me” and “卑怯” are synonyms, like in English a friend who responds to sincerity with “WOW RUDE How dare you be nice to me!!” in the kind of not serious tone where you can tell they’re a good friend and are happy about it too. very tempted to tag somebody here :grin:

The other confusing part is: 許してやらんでもないんだが
The やらん here is like a smushed やらない
so if you think of it as: 許して(やらない)でもない
it may be clearer that it means like, “it’s not that I won’t forgive her / I might forgive her”

Putting it together – Yuka was mad that Mizuki didn’t choose her to be her partner, but because in the end she came to the ring saying those underhanded (read: extremely nice) things, Yuka’s going to end up having to forgive her.

That’s where the でも comes in after: Mizuki might be forgiven, but Rika? No way!

I think I take this more as like along the lines of something like:
“Fighting Mizuki has a different atmosphere (for me) than fighting other wrestlers, and that’s a good aspect, so when we tag together again I can point out things to bring this or that out more from that perspective”

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Thanks for your help as always! :blush:

You should totally tag them!! Drag some poor unsuspecting soul into the weird and wonderful world of Tokyo Joshi Pro Wrestling!

misao_shoko_let_s_do_this_fair_and_square

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Oh, all I meant was I suspect @valkow would agree that being friends is the height of 卑怯さ :sweat_smile:

As translation advice, of course.

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DE8y

reaction eternal foes

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The December 24 TJPW show was a small one, as far as translation work goes, but I got really distracted this weekend trying to work on translating stuff for the BJW Shakespeare shows, since the DVDs I ordered just arrived! I’ll make a separate post about those later! I have a non-WK friend helping me track down some of the people on the cast list whom I couldn’t identify from the back of the DVD, haha. We’re trying to get the card/cast for each show translated, and Romeo vs Juliet also came with what appears to be the original program. It’s way more work than I can handle, at this point, but my friend has been translating that, too!

For TJPW, I had some help from Mr. Haku’s live translations again. The main event was an 8 women preview tag match (Yuka, Mizuki, Shoko, Suzume vs Miyu, Itoh, Misao, Moka), which Yuka’s team won.

She started out with, “…3人とも、ありがとう。最高すぎた。助かった。いや、お前(山下)とか大っ嫌いだけどさ、仕方ないから。年末最後だし、上がってこいよ。お前以外なら快く、なんだけど.” I had a bit of trouble with that last sentence there, haha! I cheated by more or less using what Mr. Haku had :sweat_smile:.

Sakazaki: “To the three of you, thank you. That was too good! You saved me! Well, I really hate you (Yamashita) and all, but that can’t be helped. It’s the end of the year, so come on up. The rest of you, I have nothing against. Yes, this December 24 was our last show of the year. Lots and lots of people came, and truly thank you all so much! We haven’t said ‘Merry Christmas’, have we?”

Then she said, “今日はな、イブだから浮かれパンチですが。わしさ、ちょっと今日マイクダメだ…” I couldn’t exactly make sense of the line, but Mr. Haku had, “I’m too high off of Christmas I can’t speak Mizuki,” which did seem to be the sentiment. I also wasn’t sure about Mizuki’s part, but then he had more or less what I had, haha, so maybe it’s just a bit of a strange thing for her to say? :sweat_smile:

Today is Christmas Eve, so it’s a big festive punch. I’m not so great on the mic today…"

Mizuki: “Wait, I’m also not particularly… I got it! Everyone wants Santa to come, right? I’ve been a good girl, so please be my Santa. Please! Watching Mii-chan and Yuka-chi fight made me think ‘Wow!’ so can I give the mic (to Yamashita) for a bit?”

Yamashita: “I absolutely will not lose next time, at Ittenyon. Today is the last show of the year. Merry Christmas! It’s a day for everyone to get together. So come on in!” (all of the wrestlers gather in the ring)

Sakazaki: “Do you have any regrets this year? Everyone, do you still have work to do? Forget about work!” (laughs) “It makes me happy to see you all on a day like this.”

She closed with: “Thank you all for your support in 2022, and I look forward to seeing you again in 2023!” And the last show of the year came to an end with a shout of encouragement and then a single synchronized clap.

Yuka’s team’s comments weren’t too bad, though I went down a romanization rabbit hole trying to remember how to romanize “マジラビあんず”, haha.

Nakajima: “Last show of the year! Merry Christmas! We won! It was a hard-fought win, as you’d expect.”

Sakazaki: “No, no, it was really the power of having someone to help you out when you’re in a pinch.”

Nakajima: “Today, I really felt the champion’s strength… I say that because I’m the one who lost (the belt) to her, but I once again experienced the strength of the champion. It made me want to do my best, too, in all sorts of ways from now on. It feels like the year is ending on a good note.”

Sakazaki: “I hope happiness is delivered to everyone.”

Nakajima: “Please deliver it!”

Suzume: “I’m so happy to be part of the MagiRabbiAns. I tried my best not to drag them down.”

Sakazaki: “Good assist!”

Suzume: “You helped me so much, and were really dependable.”

Sakazaki: “Promising, promising.”

Then Mizuki said, “今年いっぱい試合みんなでできて、また来年ってみんなに言えてすごい嬉しいなって思うし.” I couldn’t figure out exactly what she meant by this, so I wasn’t confident in my translation, haha.

Mizuki: “I’m really happy that we were able to have so many matches with everyone this year, and that we’re able to tell everyone that we’re doing it again next year. Next year, Yuka-chi will be gone for a bit, so I won’t be in the tag team tournament. But in the meantime, I’ll do my best to shine brighter than anyone else. Good luck! But you have to defend your title first, huh?”

Sakazaki: “Yes!”

(This was the last preview match)

“It’s been a while since I’ve felt this while fighting, and suddenly… that was the moment I realized that this was going to be an even more heated match than the first CyberFight Fest. So with that expectation, please look forward to Ittenyon!”

In Miyu’s team’s comments, I think there was only one main thing that gave me pause. Things started off alright:

Yamashita: “It was really fun teaming up with the three of you in the last match of the year. But we lost the match, so I also have some frustration, personally. There’s a part of me that knows everything about fighting Yuka-chan, and she’s so strong. But I was so fired up! I will definitely defeat her at Ittenyon. I want to win the PoP belt and aim for three titles!”

Misao: "I also have an opponent at Ittenyon… it’s become an annual tradition. I’ll be having a singles match with Nakajima-san. Today was supposed to be our one and only preview match, but my first strategy was a bit… I don’t want to say it was a failure, but…

Then Misao said, “まぁイッテンヨンは今日の中島さんの乗りやすさを見て考えられることがあったので”, and I wasn’t quite sure what to do with 乗り!

“Well, concerning Ittenyon, I had some things to think about after seeing Nakajima-san’s incredible energy today. I want to win!”

Miyamoto: “I’m really disappointed that I lost. I’m going to do my best to get stronger next year. Ittenyon is Uehara-san’s debut match, so I will try my hardest to bring out the best in her.”

Itoh: “I still have GCW left this year, so it’s a bit hard, but I’m going to do my best. Itoh will leave her claw marks in the US and come back to Japan and do (Ittenyon’s) rumble, for the PoP. Well, Itoh is determined to win, but so is Yamashita. So, let’s do it. Let’s make a pact!”

Yamashita: “OK”

Itoh: “That’s what I’m talking about.”

And that’s it! That’s the last show of the year! I’m fully expecting them to do a press conference before イッテンヨン, so when that happens, I’ll try to jump on that as soon as possible, haha.

Oh, also, for anyone who has been watching TJPW this year, they’re collecting fan votes on twitter for the best matches of the year. Since I have a public account for once, I’m thinking of suggesting things for the first time, haha. Here’s what I’m currently leaning toward:

  1. Miu vs Miyu in the Tokyo Princess Cup
  2. Misao vs Sanshiro Takagi at Grand Princess
  3. Rika, Aino, Max the Impaler vs Aja Kong, Raku, Pom at Wrestle Princess

I still haven’t committed to my third choice yet, though, which is why I haven’t submitted anything :sweat_smile:. I have a hard time making decisions like this, so we’ll see if I actually manage to get any sort of vote in on time…

I’m really looking forward to the week of shows at the beginning of January! Lots of exciting stuff happening! :blush:

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