しろくまカフェ Vol 1: Absolute Beginner Book Club

While checking the first chapter in the doc I noticed many vocabs missing and some I can‘t find in the old version. :thinking: maybe the chapter are different after all?

Not in the menus, but yeah - for emphasis. I guess it’s more commonly seen in manga as it’s more expressive and they are trying to get across how the characters are saying certain words. Coming from a book like なぜ?どうして? where this wasn’t really seen at all to this type of book will be an interesting challenge. :slight_smile:

that would be great, I just shrugged it off as something Hawaiian I didn’t know. But actually doing some research and adding it to the vocals is a great idea :hugs:

1 Like

okay, there are no vocabs not present on the first chapter of the old version, but I noticed some vocabs missing, which I added. I will add page 8 later, too. Some vocabs where in the wrong order and I rearranged the list a bit. should be easier to find the vocabs now :slight_smile:

I’m damn slow in searching for the correct vocabs, though :smiley:

4 Likes

Last panel of the new version :thinking:

I agree with this :face_with_monocle:

1 Like

I’m in the same boat- ordered 28th January (before this topic was even posted!) and arriving anywhere from 6th March to 4th April! I’m sure there will be plenty of late starters hanging around the appropriate threads as we go, though.

2 Likes

I’m would add most of the katakana, as even some of the easy ones might be not obvious to everyone.

Took me a while to get this one in particular
フレッシュジュースフェアー

1 Like

I didn’t know this part, but I assumed it was"Fresh Juice Fair" :slight_smile:

3 Likes

I got an ebook Japan reader working on my phone and iPad without any App Store finagling needed, so I guess I’ll be joining this book club too!

Can you explain how you made it work?

If you search “ebook Japan” in the us App Store, the first result is the reader (iPad version is a separate app, the same logo but with HD on it). Based on the messages in the app, I think that there’s a new version of the app, but that one isn’t in the us App Store. In terms of buying the book, I was able to do so (in a browser) with a us credit card without needing a vpn or a fake address or anything.

I may have ordered something off of eBay the other day, and I may have gotten something in the mail today.

Ended up buying a set of both books because one of my friends is going to join me (well, us!) in the book club. It was a negligible difference in price to buy a full set of both prints rather than just buying the first book on its own. The eBay listing I bought had what you see in the picture above for $50 + $30 shipping.

They were even nice enough to send along some tea!

Someone had called out the difference in size between the old print and the bis books - and I didn’t realize quite how drastic the size (and font) difference is.

I’ll have both sets of books for a few days (before I ship the bis copies to my friend) - so if there’s any page comparisons, or pictures of the inside of either book anyone would like to see, feel free to let me know and I can post it!

Edit:
Oh, and I forgot to mention. I realized I’m going to be in way way over my head for this book club, seeing as I know very limited grammar. Hope y’all are ready for a bunch of questions from me.

19 Likes

You won‘t be the only one asking many many questions. I guess we are on a similar level :sweat_smile: but we will manage it with the help of all our friends here

5 Likes

I did the same in Europe, it worked well, i could buy the book on the website. I have the ebi reader HD on my ipad and also I downloaded the same reader on my android phone. The android version is in english, so i can understand, but also there is a Mac version of the reader, so I have it on my macbook too. I can read the manga anywhere without VPN or fake address :slight_smile:

I didn’t realise the bis edition made a picture like that :smiley: that’s awesome!

6 Likes

I thought exactly the same! I get why people like the originals, and I’m usually all for the more minimalist designs myself, but I actually really like the newer editions; they’re really cheery!

Still, bigger manga are definitely easier to read.

2 Likes

I bought the four book set from eBay. Since I have limited space at home for books, love small things in general, and like the covers of this set better, I’m sure it’ll be perfect for me.

I’m in the same boat as you. It was a better investment for me to buy the whole set (I paid $45, shipping included, for the Bis set), since just for the first book at most vendors it was around 20 bucks. I also am pretty old-school and don’t like digital copies of things (maybe I would if I had an eReader but I don’t), so the book is what I wanted. Just hoping they arrive safely and in good condition before the club starts. Mine are shipping from Japan.

1 Like

LOL! I’d have been warping my brain to make カメハメハ a DBZ reference and would’ve probably laughed and then been confused.

2 Likes

Just to confirm, I believe that this is the correct Android app. I looked at it pretty suspiciously when I initially searched for it, given the extremely low rating and the atrocious English translation, but as far as I can tell it does synchronize with an account on the eBookJapan site correctly, and it is able to download this particular book after I purchased it through the web interface.

Note that…

  • The app will ask you for permissions to “make and receive calls.” I assume this is just so it can read the state of your phone so it can pause when you receive a call or some such, but I can’t confirm.
  • There’s no way as far as I can tell to sign up, browse their catalog, or purchase a book through the app; you will need to use the web interface to do that.
  • And the web interface doesn’t seem to be accessible in English, atrocious or otherwise. Even if you use the Android app, you’ll probably still need to be able to muddle through the Japanese web site in order to do anything with it.

(Edit: Also, be sure not to leave it on your screen in reading view, because it will keep your display on. My phone just beeped at me because its battery had been drained by displaying a picture of a cartoon polar bear for two hours straight. Oopsies.)

OMG. This is absolutely brilliant. I just ordered my book. I hope it gets here by the time you guys get started.

This is so exciting!!

I can’t wait!!

5 Likes