Hairy Legged Crabs and Japanese Class

“If you look closely, you can see huge river crabs with hair growing out of their legs, frozen in place like stones.”

Ew.

In my mind, at least, hair and crustaceans should never mix.

This semester I’m taking a seminar-style class in Japanese translation. We’ve only met once so far, and we’re currently reading “Kinosaki Nite” (「城の崎にて」in Japanese) by Naoya Shiga, an essay/story from 1917, about him spending time recovering from an injury in Kinosaki, which is across the mountains on the north side of Hyogo prefecture:

View Larger Map

To summarize the essay, as I did in an IM conversation a few days ago, while I was still in the middle of reading it, it’s about, “this dude being all broody about how he almost died but didn’t, even though his grandparents did, and he sees a bee that lies dead on the windowsill for days even though all the other bees are busy working, and he sees these people kill a mouse, and then he accidentally kills a newt and he feels weird about all of this”

So in class, when we got to the line translated at the beginning of the post, 「そしてなおよく見ると、足に毛が生えた大きな川蟹が石のように凝然としているのをみつけることがある。」we discussed this image of hairy-legged crabs and were all presumably briefly grossed out, imagining this, but soon moved on with the passage.

However, when I went home to my RSS feeds, I was surprised to see none other than the hairy-legged crab itself!

Photo credit: Amy Nakazawa of Blue Lotus

These crabs were frozen in place, as well. More literally than the ones in the river though, I do believe. And more readily edible.

I think hairy crabs are out to get me. While I am hundreds of miles from any natural water, they have found me where they know I’d be waiting: in class, and on the internet.

Lament of the Cell Phone

This is officially my new favorite thing ever. It’s an old flash animation, but I actually hadn’t seen this one before it was posted a couple of days ago at http://www.blizzardboy.net/ It’s from the point of view of a dude really lonely because NO ONE EVER CALLS HIM. T_T

Here’s a super rough translation in case you’re wondering:

*ring ring*
I have had my cell phone for 2 years,
But recently it has stopped ringing,
*silence*
Therefore my mobile makes me sad,
But I still use it as a clock.

After I’ve had to be underground
I listen for messages as soon as I’m above ground,
But the voice that floats to my ears,
“You have no new messages”

Inside the train, “ring ring ring”
A cell phone is ringing,
I think it might be mine, and when I pick it up,
“Hello?”
It wasn’t mine!

The guy talking next to me is despicable
The girl laughing in front of him is also despicable
Even though I put my cell phone number on my business card
If only they’d go out of range

Should I cancel my call-waiting?
Even though the antenna is blinking
I have three spare batteries
And I recorded such a cheerful voicemail message

The girls I met when I went out
Gave me their numbers
But when I rush home and call them
“The number you’ve dialed is no longer in service”

In a crowded place, “ring ring ring”
My phone started ringing
I’ve achieved happiness, so I answer,
“Hello?”
No one is there!

The electromagnetic protection I bought Is meaningless
The earphone mike I can no longer use
I wish I’d never bought a cell phone
Even though I have 3 bars of service

*interlude*

Anywhere downtown, “ring ring ring”
A cell phone that’s not mine is ringing
Since I’m resentful I just try answering mine too
“Hello?”
They hung up on me!

I was just the right kind of person to have a beeper
And I got PHS for free
I wish I’d never bought a cell phone
Even though I have 3 bars of service

The guy talking next to me is despicable
Edison, who invented the telephone, is despicable
I wish I didn’t even have a cell phone
Maybe I’ll go home to the countryside where I get no service…

SCANDAL

With 9 out of 10 dramas I watch, I know in the first 30 seconds exactly how good they are. With SCANDAL, a Fall 2008 Fuji TV drama, the first 30 seconds had me hooked and I didn’t look back after that. Less than two days later I was done with the series.

Here’s the opening (this all occurs within the first two minutes of episode 1). See below for translation.

Takayanagi-san:
My profession is a full-time housewife.
What? You say being a housewife isn’t a profession?
Well, I guess some people do believe that.
Granted, when filing my taxes, I reluctantly have to write “unemployed”,
but clearly, that’s incredibly outdated.
What an old-fashioned idea!
Because, the household is the foundation for everything.
It’s the place where everyone can come home to and be at ease.
If there’s a higher calling than protecting the household, what would it be?
When I’m asked what I do for a living, I proudly say “I’m a housewife”

Daughter: Quit it! How long are you gonna keep that picture up??

Takayanagi-san: Why? It’s such a good picture of us!

Daughter: EWW.

As creepily perky and pleasantville-esque as Takayanagi-san is… well that’s what makes this opening so great (the daughter who couldn’t care less is also a nice, realistic touch).

The show is *not* however, about Takayanagi’s adventures and crusades against dust bunnies. Instead, Takayanagi and three other women are invited to the wedding of Risako, a woman they all know, not extremely closely. All four women are housewives, and while they appear extremely content with their lives on the surface, each has their own particular issues going on. Each is of a different age (ranging from 25 to a woman in her 50s) and has a totally different class/economic situation. The four women also share one more thing in common: they passionately dislike one another.

On Risako’s wedding night, she proposes that all four women try to go pick up a guy and have the guys come drink with them. The two younger women have no problem doing so, Shindou-san, the woman in her 50’s, also manages to get some middle-aged guy, but Takayanagi-san is pretty square and refuses (after all, she is SERIOUS about being a housewife, and that’s not a very housewife-ish thing to do… now is it?) So she ends of taking the bill and gets made fun of by the other three women.

The two younger girls told the guys they picked up that it was a bet, but Shindou-san failed to mention this key point, and her guy gets angry and storms out.

In the meantime Risako is nowhere to be found, and in fact goes missing as of her wedding night. The four are reunited when they’re called to the police station for questioning, by none other than Shindou-san’s attempted date! Yeah, he’s pissed. And remains pissed for many many more episodes.

The four women still dislike each other, but decide to join forces to try and find Risako, somewhat in cooperation with the police, somewhat as their own investigation. Throughout the four weeks they spend searching for Risako, their own marriages are tested and the issues there rise to the surface. It turns out all four husbands are not free of involvement in Risako’s disappearance. Secrets galore.

SCANDAL would be a totally stupid crime/mystery/detective story if it were not for the focus of the show, which is on the women’s lives as they solve this case, rather than on the case itself. A few other key points:

-Risako is entirely unimportant to the show. She is the flattest character and she never develops, even though we often see flashbacks of her life. She seems vaguely evil, and boring. (On the day of her wedding, she huddles the 4 women around and tells them that she “won”… like, won at life? Because she’s more in love with a more impressive husband than the four of them have…? That’s a pretty creepy statement)

-The four women continue to hate each other. In varying degrees of course, and by the end they’re slightly closer than when they started, but still, perhaps, not BFF-LYLAS type girlfriends. Watching them fight and get pissed off at each other while still having to work together is the most captivating part of this show. And, watching their marriages fall apart.

-The drama watches like a romantic comedy, but like the stupid crime/mystery/detective story at its core, you never know who is really good, who is really bad, and who should be trusting whom. AKA SUSPENSE.

Long Vacation

Today I finally finished Long Vacation, one of the classics. A 1996 Fuji TV drama, starring Kimutaku (Kimura Takuya) as Senna-kun, opposite an older Minami (Yamaguchi Tomoko).

I actually saw the first 20 minutes of this show in Japan, and kept rewatching the first 20 minutes over and over for a couple years before actually continuing with the rest of the show.

The first 20 minutes are SO GOOD because they involve Minami, dressed up in Japanese bridal clothes, running through the streets. She ends up at Senna’s apartment panicked, looking for her groom (Senna is the groom’s roommate) to find out that her groom has run away, never to be seen again. A couple days later she moves in with Senna (surprise!) since she correctly concludes there must be an empty room in his apartment now, right…?

The story grows from there, and we watch Senna and Minami’s dysfunctional love/roommate relationship grow as the both pursue other interests, both love-wise and roommate-wise. Kimutaku is really not very convincing as a pianist, but that’s okay because he’s not really convinced he wants to be a pianist either. He’s astoundingly young in this show (I’m used to seeing Kimutaku on SMAPxSMAP, a good 10+ years later… now quite so fresh anymore) and has amazing chemistry with Yamaguchi Tomoko, who is totally crazy (obviously, judging by her moving habits) but fun and an interesting character.

Her craziness reminds me of the leading lady of Love Generation, another Kimutaku drama, this time opposite Matsu Takako, who also appears in Long Vacation as Ryoko, a shy withdrawn pianist. So to put this in SAT analogy terms…

Yamaguchi Tomoko : Long Vacation :: Matsu Takako : Love Generation

Except that Matsu Takako is also in Long Vacation.

Weird.

If that wasn’t confusing enough, the other relationships in Long vacation can be quite complex. There were a lot of moments where I would pause and think, “Wait… so why is he giving his ex-girlfriend-slash-musical-competitor advice about how to date his ex-roommate-slash-love-interests’s brother who also happens to be his current roommate???”

But the whole thing was totally cute and 90’s. This was really right when the whole drama thing was starting to take off. Ahh classics.

To make the whole relationship thing either more clear or totally more confusing, I made a graph of it. Surprise! Click to view more closely.

You can watch Long Vacation online here at mysoju.

Room of King – 愛や I need ya

CRAZIEST SHOW SINCE 2003^*.

Three sketchy realtors in an office the size of a matchbox trick 9 unrelated people into sharing a ridiculously nice apartment, with the quasi-guarantee that whoever they determine deserves to become “king” gets to keep the place at the end.

The nine characters are:

Mizushima Hiro: A sometimes-employed florist, sometimes (seemingly randomly) in France, but also the glue that keeps the 9 potential kings together.

Suzuki An: An OL (bank worker, in particular) who gets scouted out by a strange pair of thumbs (this guy has faces on his thumbs… wtf!?) to become a sort of B-rated idol. Can’t really sing, can’t really act, but nonetheless attracts a few otaku to her pathetic gigs. Just as cute-because-she’s-realistically-awkward as she was in 2003^*.
“Stand Up!”

Igawa Haruka: Gynecologist who looks like a street-walker. Has a posse of prettyboys at her clinic.

Watabe Atsuro: MAJIMAX, a stylist who is always late to everything, and often drunk. Struggles with some Gundam-related project in the first couple episodes, and later his assistant quits on him. Often drunk and brooding.

Itao Itsuji: A cook who talks to horses. Like, that’s where he gets most of his recipes, by talking to his horse.

Ishino Mako: Single mom who ran away from home to be a mom at Room of King. More into nabe (Japanese cooking pot) than anyone I’ve ever seen or heard of. She and Itao Itsuji are a budding romance of strange obsessions and food.

Fujisawa Atsushi: fat recluse who spends a lot of time doing some tech stuff on laptop, though camps outside for several days (with laptop) and goes to the African Savannah during part of Episode 9. He eats bunches of bananas at a time, in contrast to the nabe that everyone else is downing.

Hirayama Hiroyuki: Magician in training, failed film producer.

Ookura Kouji: #1 recluse artist who isn’t found to be living in the house until the last episode or two. Oops!

Top three moments of the show:

3) Episode 6: The single mom is in the kitchen, preparing breakfast for the residents of the Room of King (everyone is still there at that point). Everyone expects nabe, since that’s what they’ve eaten for the past 37 meals or so… so one of the three at the table, the stylist (in the purple shirt) ironically asks, “Nabe again??” to which housewife mom says, “No! You don’t eat nabe in the morning!! Here you are, cheese fondue” to which stylist replies to the florist on his left, “don’t you not eat cheese fondue in the morning either?”

2) Episode 7: Everyone has bailed on the Room of King idea — they’re all depressed and have gone their separate ways. Except for the recluse artist (he never cared about anyone else in the house anyway) and Mizushima the florist… (glue, remember)? The artist is going through the fridge in what is probably his usual fashion, taking one gulp of milk from the bottle here, a handful of something else there, and is generally GROSSING THE FLORIST OUT with his habits. After scolding him for a bit they continue with their conversation, florist oblivious to the second best moment of the show, when artist takes a single stick of Pocky out from the box (WHY was the Pocky in the refrigerator??), takes a small bite off the end, licks the rest of a chocolatey part of the Pocky like a popsicle, and STICKS THE POCKY BACK INTO THE BOX, chocolate side first.

1) Episode 2 (ish?) No screenshot due to hardware failure. The OL-turned-idol is in some fancy-shmancy store, when a robbery occurs and she’s held at gunpoint by the perpetrator. She doesn’t want to die, and there is a massive crowd at the scene of the crime. Suddenly, an old woman fights to the front of the line, “let me past!! I’m the mother!” The police are like, “it’s the mother of the victim!”… but no, “I’m the mother of the perpetrator!! Don’t do it, honey!” Uh… okay… and then, another guy (the cook!) shows up, and says, “I’m a relative too!” who is it now? “I’m the cousin!” “of the victim?” “No, of the perpetrator!” and he sings a heartwarming song, inspired by his horse, which persuades the gunman out of committing the crime. Then he comes out and the cook realizes he’s got the wrong guy — they’re not cousins after all! Um….what?!

I haven’t given away any of the actually important parts of the show (like who ends up being King), so I recommend you go watch it. Cute theme song (Ai need by Kimaguren), fast-paced at only 35 minutes per episode, perfect to finish up during a sick day in bed with your head throbbing and fever soaring (me yesterday).

The year my favorite crazy drama ever, Manhattan Love Story, was aired.

The year Suzuki Anne was in Stand Up!!, another crazy awesome show.