Week 14 done! I found this week’s reading challenging. I had to look up so many words… what’s worse, in some cases, even when I looked up the word, I still had to look up the definition in English ! how did I get this far in life without knowing what a 変温動物（へんおんどうぶつ）was? Well, thanks to page 228 and Robert Clarks “A Visual Record of Evolution” (plus some googling), I now know the frog and the naked mole rat are poikilotherms…
thoughts
Plot-wise, I was glad to see Hiroya didn’t just do a surgical strike on his class reunion just to grab the time-capsule note before anyone could see it. Otherwise he would not have learned about classmate Seitaro’s situation. I really liked Seitaro’s ever-moving goalpost for success, by selecting an author who debuted his first novel at 30 years old (Murakami), and then 40 years old (Jiro Asada). [Edit: FYI it seems that Michiko Aoyama’s first novel (木曜日にはココアを) was published in 2017 when she was 47]
Also, Seitaro’s bespoke approach to success was sort of echoed by Nozomi-chan on the next page when Hiroya asked her why she attended school at the nurse’s office: 「なんかね、みんなと同じようにできなくて。」I interpreted these both as “You do you” (hopefully I didn’t misunderstand this!)
Speaking of attending school at the nurse’s office - 保健室登校(ほけんしつとうこう) - I had not heard of this concept before. I used google translate to skim a Japanese wiki article and it said it was where students may attend some classes, but primarily they spend most of their time in the nurse’s room and learn from there. Apart from the reason Nozomi-chan gave, it seems a lot of kids take this route if they experience bullying. It is the better alternative to the child leaving the school altogether and the goal is for the nurse to work with the child on reintegrating back into the regular classroom. (in public schools in my area, I think school libraries were used this way…?)
It seems to me Komachi-san did play a specific role where she was entrusted with children who were struggling, had to identify the issues and help them to find their own way, so they could thrive in a regular classroom. Skills she now uses when people randomly show up in her library! (she seems less magical and more like a keen observer knowing this fact)
And my favorite idiom of the week is something i’ve come across several times in this book. It’s 足を運ぶ. Which I understand to mean “to make your way” or “to visit” with the emphasis on the fact that you are doing it with intention (I may be wrong though). It’s a funny expression. I imagine it as a person who is so keen to go to X place that they are too impatient for their legs to take them there. So they just pick up their legs and carry them to the destination.
I found this children’s video explaining the idiom. I don’t know what the girl is holding in her two hands (pink batons?), but she seems very keen to get to her destination!
I got a little behind last week for one reason or another, and finished the second half yesterday. Agree this was a tough section with all the science talk. I like that we’ve learned a bit more of Sayuri’s background, and that before she was a librarian she was helping kids who were struggling getting to a good place again. In the UK I see kids on phased school returns, special units, etc but it’s quite sweet the idea you go to the nurses office and hang out with this kind supportive lady.
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