Week 10: アンダーグラウンド

Japanese Language Book Clubs
1

Join the Advanced Book Club here!

アンダーグラウンド Home Thread

Week 10

image

Start Date: Jul 27
Previous Part: Week 9
Next Part: Week 11

Reading:

Week Start Date Chapter Start Page Page Count
Week 10 Jul 27 日比谷線 - 中目黒発 Interviews 2-4 299 37

Discussion Rules

  • Please use spoiler tags for major events in the current chapter(s) and any content in future chapters.
  • When asking for help, please mention the chapter and page number. Also mention what version of the book you are reading.
  • Don’t be afraid of asking questions, even if they seem embarrassing at first. All of us are here to learn.
  • To you lurkers out there: Join the conversation, it’s fun! :durtle:

Participants

Mark your participation status by voting in this poll.
(Please feel free to update your status whenever you like!)

  • I’m reading along
  • I have finished this part
  • I’m still reading the book but I haven’t reached this part yet
  • I am no longer reading the book
0 voters
3 Likes
2

石野貢三

どんどん接近してついには領空侵犯されてしまいました。
Well?? What happened after that? Did they shoot the foreign aircraft down? :o

Itinerary:

image
image1340×1155 272 KB

たとえばＩＲＡにしても、手段はともかくとして、その人たちの目指していることは、その立場になって考えてみれば、少しは理解できるところもあるんです
Not sure what IRA is but probably a rabbit hole I can ignore.

マイケル・ケネディー

マイケルさんは世界的にも有名なアイルランド人の騎手である。
I think it could be this guy? Age and name checks out plus all the details about his life, number of children almost (sounds like he has lost a daughter :/).

このインタビューは英語で行われたわけだが、あとでテープを再生してみて、一部分だけ非常に聞き取りにくい部分があった。
I was wondering if the interview was conducted in English or in Japanese.

Itinerary of the day:

image
image1495×571 183 KB

First person that wasn’t going to work that morning, but leaving Tokyo and going home after a party (and first person that wasn’t Japanese).

僕は倒れたところをテレビに映されていたらしいね。その映像が実はアイルランドでも放送されていたんだ。家に泊まりにきていたうちの娘がそれを見て、慌てて家内を呼んだ

Oh wow, imaging seeing your dad collapsed on TV, in a country overseas.

All in all, I really enjoyed reading the first part of the interview about his life. I know nothing about the jockey’s profession so that was super interesting. Tragic that the reason why we get to hear his story is because he was a victim of the attack, would be nice to have Murakami to tell people’s stories just because. A bit like the https://www.humansofnewyork.com/ project.

島田三郎

Very scary to see him having symptoms from just passing by the scene.

2 Likes
3

石野貢三

A soldier who happened to take one of the affected subways on his way to work.

Well, usually they don’t shoot them down immediately :sweat_smile: I think they issue a warning and then the other one probably flies home again. It’s a bit like testing the limits, I guess.

It’s the Irish Republican Army, a terror organization who wants to reunite Ireland and Northern Ireland. They were very active in the 70’s and I think that’s the reason why Murakami had them somewhat fresh in his mind back then, as there were not so many active terror groups that were visible from the first world afaik.
BTW the IRA is the reason why there is such a huge tension around Brexit and how to handle the Irish - Northern Irish border. They are still in existence, and in the past few years there have been a small number of attacks again.

Irish Republican Army (IRA) | History, Attacks, & Facts | Britannica

マイケル・ケネディー

What a great life story! I was into horseriding as a teenager, and so I immediately related to what he said. Very interesting that he thought the Japanese jockeys were more like machos and could not communicate with the horses well… I guess maybe that’s because he is mainly talking about the bubble :sweat_smile: (see also the 不機嫌な果実 book club if you’d like to know more :grin:)

Oh, absolutely! Great find :+1:

I was wondering about that as well. Interesting that he said that he drifted into Irish or a strong dialect when the story became tense…

島田三郎

All these people have such interesting professions! A screw-making company :laughing:
Incident-wise there was not that much going on, but I liked his description of the atmosphere in the station and how everybody acted (or not…)

I was not really sure whether he didn’t board the trains that was still running after they briefly mopped the floor? But not sure, really. You’re the itinerary master here :upside_down_face:

2 Likes
4

Oh cool thanks for the links!

Haha :joy: unfortunately it’s not super fresh in my mind anymore, would have to reread!

1 Like
5

And sometimes you see dogfights.

Btw, I like how honest this interviewee was.
“In winter there was nothing to do on the island. No young girls, only school children and elders. I was single at that time.”

:joy:

2 Likes