Reading Challenge 漫画に挑戦しよう！ (intermediate)

[Jembru]

I'm copying this over from the old forum. This manga is great for those of you who are maybe behind with their kanji knowledge, but want to be exposed to spoken, casual style Japanese. The kanji used is very low (mainly grade 1 and 2 kanji), but there is lots of interesting vocabulary and as it's aimed at native speakers, it contains lots of cool grammar that you wouldn't usually see in intermediate material, which means there is plenty for the advanced learners to get their teeth into too. 

Chibimarukochan is a popular manga and anime series in Japan that has been running for many years. I've heard it compared to the Simpsons, as it is aimed at all ages, with jokes for the adults as well as children. In my experience, the Japanese get very nostalgic and enthusiastic when talking about this show. As this book is aimed at school children learning kanji, I think it's a great way of getting a sneaky peak into the lives of those who grew up in Japan..






Each manga is just 3 or 4 pages long, so we'll be able to translate entire stories. 


So, we're reading:

まるこちゃんのおにたいじのまき

The kanji being practiced are: 遠、近、内、外、太、細、多　and　少


We're now on page 3

Panel 10



Panel 11



Panel 12 and 13



Panel 14



Panel 15



Just in case I'm slow to update, here's a preview pf the next page..

SPOILER: Click to show

You can't really translate this, well, you could give the title maybe...

Panel 16



Panel 17



Final Panel

For those who want the entire story, here are the panels from the previous forum:

SPOILER: Click to show

First 2 panels:



Panel 1, translated by me:-  Maruko-chan: [chanting], 'Good luck in, oni out!'

Narrator: 'Today is setsubon'.


Panel 2, translated by me:-  'Come to mention it, the dream Maruko had on the night of Setsubon was...'


3rd Panel;



Translated by Bokusenou:-  Narrator: A dream where she was a demon slayer.

Dream Maruko: I'm off!

Dream Grandfather: Be careful out there, Marutarou!


4th and 5th panel;



4th panel translated by me: Maruko-chan:　'I may have set off on this journey in high spirits, but in my heart of hearts, I'm not sure about going this alone.' 'Going on a journey alone, will probably be boring.'


5th Panel translated by Bokusenou:-  Maruko: Oh look, a dog, and a monkey are fighting.

Well they do say "fighting like dogs and monkeys"...


6th panel;



Translated by me:- Maruko: Now if you'll just get get along as friends, I'll give you this dumpling skewer.

Monkey: oo (monkey sound.. I dunno how you write that)

Dog: bow-wow

The note says:

はまじサルと関口くん犬
Hamaji monkey and Sekiguchi-kun dog.

Hamaji and Sekiguchi are two of Maruko's classmates. The dog and Monkey are drawn to look like them and the footnote is pointing that out for those who didn't notice right away.

Bokusenou also shared some useful information on the old site, that I think is worth bringing over. 

Bokusenou said:

Useful references:

anime-manga.jp/CharacterExpressions/

Click on the site above, and then on "Character Line-up" > "Old Man" to see the grammar behind some of the old-style Japanese Maruko is using. The site is geared towards anime, but I've found the character phrases, and grammar majorly useful for Japanese in general.

Momoko's dream is based off the old Japanese legend of Momotarou.
There are versions of the story in English, as well as Japanese online.

Okay, I'll be back with the rest of the panels as soon as I can. This was just time consuming to copy over, so I wanted to get the hardest part out of the way. 

[Bokusenou]

Panel 1

Great thread Jembru! I'm excited to see it start up again!


Panel 1:
"Huh? The road splits here! It splits into a wide road, and a narrow one. I wonder which one is the shortcut?"

[Jembru]

Yey!! Thanks for joining in Rin. Sorry it took me so long to update it.

Panel 2:

Jack: 'The shortest road, is the opposite one to that which you think is shortest'
Maruko: Huh?

Funny story about this one.. While reading it through the other day, I was all excited because I knew every single word. I was like, 'wow, my vocabulary really has come on since I last read this'.  I was even going to come to gaiwa and boast about it somewhere. Then I realised that this is one of the chapters I've already studied, so I added the words I didn't know to anki months ago! Honestly, I'm hopeless sometimes ^^

[Bokusenou]

Jembru Don't worry, I do that too sometimes.

Panel 3:

Maruko: Who are you?

Jack: My name is Jack Amano.

[Jembru]

Panel 4



Maruko: Jack? So you're a foreigner?

Jack: Actually, I'm an alien from a distant planet!


Do you think I should pick a harder one next time?

[Bokusenou]

Panels 5 & 6

Monkey: You're a space man?

Dog: An alien?

Maruko: Well, he does have an antenna-like horn.

Jembru
Hmm, maybe. I sort of feel like I'm taking these from someone else who it would be more of a challenge for, though I think it would be good practice for intermediates, if any felt like posting...

[Jembru]

Yeah, I'm sorta reluctant too, because it would be nice to let some intermediates have a go at this. I think it could be a combination of the kanji being too easy for some, and the fact they can't use rikaichan/kun for others, that might be putting people off.

I personally thought this manga was ideal for starting out reading on your own. It really was amazing for me to find something with easy kanji yet natural Japanese I could learn from instead of the 'this is not my bag, this is tanaka-sans bag. My bag is brown' type Japanese that you usually get stuck with if you're reading is a bit behind. I moved beyond the kanji in the manga (although there are still kanji in the glossary I haven't learnt yet) a while ago, but I still learn really cool compounds that are easy to remember, and pick up cool expressions. For me, it's the panels at the end of each chapter that are the most fun to read. I wasn't going to share those, but here's an example from the entry for 遠 from this chapter. After the stroke order and so on, it then has a selection of compounds and example sentences like;

いみとことば

①はなれている。とおい。遠近・遠足・遠方　②とおざける。遠回し・敬遠
「さくらさんの絵は、遠近感が大変良く出ていますね。」
「今度の遠足は、森林浴をかねた『山登り』だって。」
『大野くんは強打者だから、敬遠しようブー。」

That one is shorter than some, but I love how the words they present tend to stick to kanji you'll know, or at least know by the time you finish the book, and bring up awesome words like 森林浴. This word is so me ^^!

Once this one is done, I think I'll post a slightly harder chapter and see if that was the problem. Maybe it's better to wait until the community is larger though.

[魔]

Panel 6

I've had psychic powers since I was a boy.

I can show you the way to the oni's house.

Second line is a guess. After Oni's house I became lost. At first I thought he was telling them how he got his psychic powers at an oni's house.

[Jembru]

Hey Demonhead! Thanks for joining in. Actually, I think you were exactly right. 案内（あんない）する does mean 'to show the way'. There is just one thing you might have missed. The past tense of 持つ is an alternative to saying 持っている. You probably already know this, but you see this a lot with verbs that express a change of state from one to another such as putting on clothes. so for example, めがねをかけた人 and めがねをかけている人 both mean 'a person wearing glasses. However, you were probably thrown by motsu because it's not usually that kind of verb. I've no idea why motsu comes under this category, but I suspect it could be because when the Japanese speak of having natural abilities, they use the expression を持って生まれた (をもってうまれた). So Jack is a boy with (natural) psychic powers.

Panel 7:

Maruko: This is the end of the road, shall we try heading a little more to the East?

Jack: No, it's west!

[魔]

Panel 8

Maruko: Isn't the Oni towards the top of the mountain?

Jack: No, towards the bottom.

[Jembru]

I'm doing the last panel so I can upload the next page of images.

Panels 8 & 9 



Panel 9;

Maruko: 'These dumplings are yummy and scrummy.' (look, I spoke like this as a kid, it's a great translation and you know it.. ah okay, okay.. 'these dumplings are superb'. happy now? I'm not ^^)
Jack: 'They're horribly salty.'
Narrator: This kid guiding them seems to have a lot of issues.