#It’s hard to find in depth articles online in English

[passions-and-pupils]

*vibrating* look what I got from my local library

[nateconnolly]

Hozier Reading List of Free Texts You Can Finish in Less Than A Week

Another Hozier reading list is floating around the Internet, and it’s very thorough. Huge respect to @notmysophie for putting that together, they put in a lot of effort and research and it really shows. This is an alternative reading list for people who are too busy or tired to read all the entries on a complete list of Hozier’s literary influences. This list is incomplete—even after finishing it, there will be some very prominent literary references in Hozier’s music that might go over your head. But this will definitely help you appreciate the depth of thought in his songs, and if you read just five pages a night, you’ll be able to finish this reading list in less than one week. 

ONE: ICARUS

Hozier puts the myth of Icarus to song in I, Carrion. You could very easily argue that Sunlight is also a response to Icarus. Many classical writers have told or mentioned his story, but I’ll let my own personal tastes shape this list, and recommend Ovid’s Metamorphoses. He tells the story of Icarus in Chapter 8 Lines 183–235. If you can afford it, I love the Charles Martin translation. You could consult the free Brookes More translation, or the one by A. S. Kline. Remember, you don't have to read the whole chapter--just find the part named "Daedalus and Icarus"

TWO: DOOMSDAY CLOCK

The title track Wasteland, Baby! is such a gentle love ballad, I almost have trouble remembering it’s about the apocalypse. Wasteland, Baby! finds hope and love in the face of annihilation. Hozier wrote this song as a direct response to the Doomsday Clock moving two minutes in 2018, one year before the album was released. 

THREE: GENESIS 1-3

I also recommend reading Genesis Chapters 1-3. You’re probably familiar with the plot, but I think From Eden is such an ingenious twist on the familiar story that you’ll appreciate it even more after consulting the original. Hozier takes the symbols of Genesis 1-3 and uses them to make his own radically different point. The stories of Eden also come up in Be. 

My favorite translation is by Robert Alter, but it’s currently not free online, so you might want to check out the Sefaria translation or the New King James Version (NKJV), both of which manage to capture the beauty of Genesis without becoming difficult for the average English reader. The King James Version (KJV) is also roughly the same level of difficulty as a Shakespeare play. I definitely think the KJV is beautiful, but at the end of a long hard day, you might be better off with the Sefaria, the NKJV, the NIV, or the NRSV. You can Google “Genesis 1” followed by any of those names/abbreviations, and you’ll find it right away. 

FOUR: A MODEST PROPOSAL

Jonathan Swift’s A Modest Proposal, written in 1729, might be the most gutting satire in history. UCLA students put together a very thorough explanation of the economic suffering and the proposed “solutions” that inspired Swift. References to A Modest Proposal form the skeleton of Hozier’s Eat Your Young. 

FIVE: SEAMUS HEANEY

Before learning about Seamus Heaney, you’ll need some background information on the Troubles. I recommend this National Geographic article. I also recommend looking through these Chris Steele Perkins photographs of life during the Troubles.

During the Troubles, Heaney wrote a series of poems about bog bodies. His poetry directly inspired the corpse imagery in Work Song, Like Real People Do, and In a Week. 

Disclaimer: I cannot read Hebrew or Latin. I am evaluating these translations solely by 1) how difficult they are to read and 2) how beautiful they sound. I cannot independently review them for accuracy. Just know that all the translations I’ve listed are widely respected among academics and/or religious leaders.

Anyways if you liked reading this go check out my Substack where I originally posted it. 

[rapidfly369]

How to Prepare for IBPS Prelims English Paper?

IBPS Prelims English is one of the more accessible sections in the IBPS exam, but some students find it hard because they don’t have the right strategies or guidance. With a good plan, you can score more points in this section than in others. Also, studying English can be enjoyable so you won’t get bored. This blog will help you for IBPS prelims English paper preparation and give you some tips on how to do well. The English section has three main parts: reading comprehension, grammar, and vocabulary. Let’s start by looking at the syllabus and how many questions you can expect for each topic.

Essential Preparation for IBPS Prelims Exam

In the first two months, focus on building a solid base. Learn basic grammar, grow your vocabulary, and practice reading comprehension often. Use practice tests to spot weak areas and work on them.

In months three and four, focus on topics like reading comprehension and finding errors. Spend time on each topic and practice different question types to get better.

In the last two months, I have taken practice tests regularly to get used to the exam format. Review your results, find your strengths and weaknesses, and work on improving them. Go over your knowledge and sharpen your strategies for the IBPS prelims English paper preparation. Joining the best online bank coaching gives you more extra knowledge to clear your exam.

Reading Comprehension

Practice at least two Reading Comprehension exercises every day. This will help you read faster and answer questions more accurately. Using past exam papers can give you an extra boost.

Cloze Test

The cloze test is essential in most English sections within bank and government examinations, such as SBI PO, IBPS PO, and EPFO Assistant. It challenges your knowledge of how grammar and vocabulary are used in a language you might be more used to speaking than writing.

Word Meanings, Idioms, and Phrasal Words

Such questions are commonly seen in Reading Comprehension, Cloze Tests, and Fillers. Memorise ten new words or proverbs/idioms/ phrases a day, and record them. You can also download an eBook listing 100 vital verbal phrases for free.

Also, regularly practice other related topics like One Word Substitution, Synonyms/Antonyms, and Misspelled Words.

Descriptive English

For the IBPS prelims English paper preparation, depth preparation is essential. The best way to get better is by practicing a lot. Reading different materials will help you gather ideas, but practicing writing is what will really improve your skills. Try summarizing articles in your own words after you read them. 

The Descriptive section includes writing an essay, a precis, and comprehension, all within 45 minutes. Focus on understanding the topics well and practice writing clearly and quickly. You can actively follow your bank exam preparation to clear exams quickly.

Practice with Time Limits

Preparation and practice should go together. After learning a topic, practice it within a set time. The IBPS topic Tests can help with this. Once confident with individual issues, you can try the IBPS prelims English preparation to practice all topics together in a timed setting.

Here are the critical English Language topics for the IBPS exam:

Cloze Test

Sentence Correction

Para Jumbles

Fill in the Blanks

Reading Comprehension

Spotting Errors

Sentence Improvement

Para/Sentence Completion

Whether you’re preparing for the IBPS PO Prelims or Mains, practicing with Mock Tests is essential to assess your readiness. Try the IBPS PO Free Mock Test. It simulates the natural exam environment, and you’ll notice how much it has improved your preparation on the exam day. Joining the best bank coaching will give you more knowledge and ideas to clear preliminarily.

[gertlushgaming]

Persona 3 Reload Review (PlayStation 5)

Persona 3 Reload Review, Dive into the Dark Hour and awaken the depths of your heart. Persona 3 Reload is a captivating reimagining of the genre-defining RPG, reborn for the modern era with cutting-edge graphics and gameplay.

Persona 3 Reload Review Pros:

- Anime graphics. - 27.35GB download size. - Platinum trophy. - You get the PlayStation 4 and the PlayStation 5 versions of the game. - English and Japanese voice choices. - Five game difficulties - peaceful, east, normal, hard, and merciless. - Can Invert axis. - Action adventure gameplay. - Cutscenes are a mix of Anime sequences, and character interactions which can all be skipped or fast-forwarded. - Multiple choice interactions. - Stellar soundtrack. - Familiar controls for the series. - Save when you want but also choose to save to the cloud or console. - Possible to transfer saves between the PlayStation 4 and the PlayStation 5 versions of the game. - Saving also saves a bit of your past so you can back in time a short bit. - Going to sleep advances the game forward one day. - The closest are used to access DLC items. - Fast loading times. - Online functionality can be turned on and off. - A full 3D world with 360-degree camera control. - You can zoom in and out of your character. - There are a lot of open areas you are free to explore. - The mini-map shows objective markers and any points of interest. - Beautiful locations. - A great memorable cast of characters. - The town map lets you jump from location to location and finding new areas puts them on the map. - Social stats are academics, charm, and courage. You can level these up by doing challenges, doing well in school and other hidden things. - Over time you will unlock shortcuts that act as fast travel points. - Turn-based combat. - You learn all about what a Persona is and how you have one. - The dictionary menu will keep track of keywords and meanings so you can use it to recap knowledge. - A really good story that also boasts just as engrossing side stories. - Eventually, you have to plan your days as activities, jobs, and friends. - Build up your friendship levels. - Typical dungeon-style layouts. - The game destroys time with its addictive nature. Persona 3 Reload Review Cons: - Transferring saves is fine but you don't get the trophies earned automatically unlock, and any do X action X amount of times reset to zero. - Cannot remap controls. - Slow starter. - Had a few hard crashes. - It is a very daunting game as you do get bombarded with many mechanics and systems but this depends on how many of the other games you have played. - If you have played many Persona games before then you will get a lot of content you have seen before. Related Post: RC Revolution Review (Steam) Persona 3 Reload: Official website. Developer: ATLUS Publisher: SEGA Store Links - PlayStation Read the full article

[maxwell-grant]

Excuse Me what is pulp and why is it importan?

Good question! And probably one I should have answered sooner. Time to put on the historian hat for this one.

"Pulp" is a term used mainly to describe forms of storytelling that sprang out or were dominant in 20th century cheap all-fiction American magazines from the 1900s to the 1950s. The pulp magazine began in 1896, when Frank Munsey's Argosy magazine, in order to cut costs, dropped the non-fiction articles and photographs and switched from glossy paper to the much less expensive wood pulp paper, hence the name. The pulp magazines would mainly take off as a distinct market and format in 1904, when Street & Smith learned that Popular Magazine, despite being marketed towards boys, was being consumed by men of all ages, so they increased page count and started putting popular authors on the issues.

It was specifically the 1905 reprint of H.Rider Haggard's Ayesha that not only put Street & Smith on the map as rivals to Argosy, but also inspired other companies to start publishing in the pulp format. Pulps encompassed literally everything that the authors felt like publishing. Westerns, romance, horror, sci-fi, railroad stories, war stories, war aviation stories. Zeppelins had a short-lived subgenre. Celebrities got their own magazines, it was really any genre or format they could pull off, anything they could get away with.

Nowadays, although they came quite late in it's history, the American pulps are most famous for it's "hero pulps", characters like The Shadow and Doc Savage that are viewed as a formative influence on comic book superheroes. The pulp magazines in America lasted until the 1950s, when cumulative factors such as paper shortages, diminishing audience returns and the closing of it's biggest publishers led to it dying off, although in the decades since there's always been publishers calling their magazines pulp. That's the American pulp history.

But pulps are a phenomenon that spans the entire world and has a much bigger history to it, because pulps have become synonymous with cheap fiction magazines and those have a much bigger history. In America, before the pulps, you had the dime novels, the direct predecessors of the pulps, as well as the novelettes. England had it's penny dreadfuls and story papers, and continued publishing pulp-format magazines past the American 1950s, and that's how we got Elric of Melniboné. France and Russia arguably got to it first with it's 1800s coulporters, chapbooks and particularly the feuilletons which lasted all the way to the 20th century and created characters such as Arsene Lupin, Fantomas and The Phantom of the Opera. The Germans published pulp under the name hefteromane. Japan also published pulp magazines both original as well as imported, and the current "light-novel" phenomenon started off as an equivalent of pulp magazines (it's even on the Wikipedia page). China has wuxia, Brazil has cordel, Italy has gialli. There were Indian, Persian, Ethiopian, Canadian, Australian pulps and much more. Look anywhere in the world and you'll find examples of "pulp" happening again and again, under different circumstances and time periods.

Even if we stick to American fiction, it's impossible to state that all pulp heroes must come from the 1900s-1950s pulp magazines, because that forces us to exclude some of the most popular pulp heroes like Indiana Jones, Green Hornet, Rocketeer and The Phantom. Pulp may have once been a term meant to refer to pulp magazines exclusively, but it's morphed and lost structure and it's become the closest thing we have to a general umbrella term that allows us to try and consolidate these under a shared history. It's a lot, as you can see, and it's why several pulp historians that broaden their scope outside of 1930s American fiction have adopted Roland Barthes's definition of pulp as "A Metaphor With No Brakes In It", which is still the closest thing to a true working definition we have.

Why is it important? You tell me. I don't like to stake claims about stuff being "important", everyone's got their own priorities in life. Surely a lot of people would scoff at the idea of old populist fiction published in what was functionally equivalent to toilet paper having any sort of "importance". On the other hand, some people definitely want to talk big about the pulps as a cultural bedrock of fiction, something that's baked into the lifeblood of all fiction as we currently know it. Which it is, mind you, but I don't like to talk about pulp fiction's value being derived mainly from merely the things it inspired.

There is definitely a historical importance to be had in cataloguing them. According to the US's foremost pulp researcher Jess Nevins, 38% of all American pulps no longer exist, and 14% of all American pulps survive in less than five copies. Many libraries have very scant, if any, records on them, many collectors are hard to locate and are uncooperative when it comes to sharing information and letting outsiders view their collections. A lot of them are bound up in legal complications that prevents them from taking off in the public domain, and a lot of them ARE public domain but are completely inacessible as research material. And that's the American pulps, foreign pulps have fared far worse in posterity, with records inaccessible to people unfamiliar with the language or locations, many existing merely in mentions on decades-old records, and hundreds if not thousands of them being completely gone beyond recovery or recall.

Gone, dead, wasted, destroyed. They can't be found in barbershops or warehouse or bookstores, not even in antique stores. Hundreds, thousands of characters, stories and creators, gone. Time and posterity have crushed them to dust, forgotten and ignored by their successors. Unfettered by pretenses of respectability that repressed their glossier counterparts, in packages meant to be destroyed after reading, proudly announcing itself as trash. Things that should have never even lasted as long as they did have died many times now. It's heroes peripherical shapeshifters, nearly all of whom seem dead, quite dead, as dead as fictional characters can possibly be.

But they do not die forever. Many of them have, maybe most of them have, but many of them linger on.

"The strange red flickering of 1930’s fiction seems distant now.  You hold in your hand the product of a time too remote to recall, and feel a slow stir of wonder.  The smell of pulp pages, an illustration, an advertisement, these fragile things mark the slow hammering of time and display what it has done.  About you are today’s machines, today’s shadows.

Outside the window, leaves hang against the sky, as did leaves during the 1930’s.  The sound of voices are no different then than now.  You hold the magazine and feel something quite delicate slipping past. These solid forms surrounding you are all insubstantial. Time’s hammer will also pass across them, leaving little enough behind." - Spider, by Robert Sampson

Many of the things people call dead are just things that have been sleeping for a while or haven't had the chance to be born. Pulp fiction is dead on the page, inert, unless your imagination breathes live to it, and every now and then, one way or another, these characters dig themselves out of dustbins. Maybe it's a brief revival, maybe it's a successful reboot. Maybe they find publishers, or maybe the public domain allows them to find new life. Maybe new creators do interesting things with them, and maybe, just maybe, they live again because some won't shut up about them online. Some curious impulse led you to me, did it not? 

We all have our Frankensteins to obsess over, and these are some of mine. As someone who's lived a life perpetually restless over pursuit of knowledge, pulp has lured me like a moth to flame, because I literally never run out of things to discover within it, I never run out of possibilities. As the years pass and the public domain starts being more and more open to the public, more and more narrative real state is brought forth for writers and artists and creators to play around.

Pulp is the dark matter of fiction, the uncatalogued depths of the ocean, the darkest recesses of space. It's the box of your grandfather's belongings, the treasure you find in an attic, a body part sticking out from an old playground. It's the things that don't work, don't succeed, the things that don't fit, that are out of place. That shouldn't live and succeed, and did so anyway. The things that slither in the cracks, the shadows behind the curtain.

Aren't you interested in peering on what's behind the curtain?

The exquisite workmanship of the head, of a pre-pyramidal age, and the hieroglyphics, symbols of a language that was forgotten when Rome was young–these, Kane sensed, were additions as modern to the antiquity of the staff itself as would be English words carved on the stone monoliths of Stonehenge.

As for the cat-head–looking at it sometimes Kane had a peculiar feeling of alteration; a faint sensing that once the pommel of the staff was carved with a different design. The dust-ancient Egyptian who had carved the head of Bast had merely altered the original figure, and what that figure had been, Kane had never tried to guess.

A close scrutiny of the staff always aroused a disquieting and almost dizzy suggestion of abysses of eons, unprovocative to further speculation. - The Footfalls Within, by Robert E Howard, quoted by Stuart Hopen’s The Mythic American Culture

[chronomaza]

The eternal message

It is the year 15092, humanity has developed a tenfold of what it is now, spreading itself out across the stars like a steadily growing puddle of water moves along a smooth floor, developing technology which the modern man cannot possibly fathom in even their wildest dreams. Though the distances between stars separate humanity into smaller and smaller fractions, the tides of time shaping them into different forms, a complex web of information and memories connects them. A network where everything is eternal, and archive after archive, stores thousands of years of information across several star systems. A network haunted by the ghosts of thousands of generations past, and media lurking in the darkest corners of it's existence, waiting to be uncovered.

Of course, memories get foggy with time, and such a vast archive, consisting of many eras of disaster and reworks will quickly become as complex and deep as the soil of the earth itself. This led to the creation of a new job, a digital archaeologist. Such archaeologists, rather than digging through the soil, would dig through the depths of this network, hoping to find relics of humanity's earlier years. Most of these teams would focus on finding news outlets, wiki articles, and other informal pieces of media- but these would often be damaged or heavily influenced by the time they were made.

So, some teams, like Carl's, chose to focus instead on the pop culture of the time, and what it commonly depicted. Today, him and his team were focusing on the chaotic early years of the internet, which lasted from roughly the 1990s to 2040s, based on rough estimates and loose data. In this time, there had been major changes made to the internet that ultimately decided what it'd become for the rest of it's existence. What exactly these changes were, remained unknown. Really, the entire era remained shrouded in mystery aside from a few pieces of information that had somehow survived what was commonly known as "the 3367 rewrite", an event that had made a majority of early internet archives frustratingly hard to document and preserve with the standard LXX format.

Carl and his team were close to making a breakthrough it'd seem; after countless nights staying up into ungodly hours of the morning, only kept awake by the glow of their holoscreens and the atrocious amount of caffeine in their system, they'd finally found a way into what seemed to be an ancient archive of sorts. It was, of course, all written in information age english, something which was barely legible compared to the standard universal trades and associations (UTA for short) language that everyone was mandated to learn, but it was the best and most intact archive they'd ever found.

It was going to be a long night of combing through webpages and backing up data for the translation and restoration team over on Gliese 625, so Carl got himself another beverage and got to work.

However, about fifty or so pages in, he stumbled across something unlike anything he'd ever seen before. It was a standard looking webpage for some sort of online video related service- nothing he hadn't seen before, the early internet was littered with them. Among the endless sea of broken links, empty spots where ads should've been, missing page elements, and a whole slew of other bizzare issues caused by time- was a video, seemingly caught in a loading loop. He wasn't sure what format it was in, or what it was supposed to display, but it seemed to be loading something. He was about to ignore it, when it suddenly stopped, and it instead of showing a broken video, it showed a play button over an extremely compressed image. It was incredibly bizarre to find something functioning that was this old, but Carl soon noticed something even stranger.

It was a site for some form of cable TV channel, and from the little information age English he knew, there was a box at the top telling him it was indeed, still broadcasting live.

No. That couldn't of been right. There was no way in hell something like this could've still been running, right? It must've been some sort of weird glitch, he knew there was no way the box at the top of the page that said "LIVE" was right. The only way something like this could still even possibly run was if it was being hosted on a server somewhere back on earth. Carl felt an odd sense of awe and wonder as he imagined a server, perhaps deep in the basement of some long forgotten building, covered in cobwebs and quietly transmitting a message nobody had bothered to listen to in well over a thousand years. What would such a broadcast even be? How could something so mundane, so average, so forgotten, possibly survive that long?

He stared at the static video, which was still offering him the option to play whatever the broadcast had in store for him. Of course, it was his job to document these things, but he still couldn't help but feel nervous. This was a multi-millennia old transmission, god only knows what he could find, it could've very well been the holy grail of early internet history.

Carl looked over his shoulder, at his surroundings, then back at his screen. He cracked his knuckles, stretched his shoulders, and then moved his emulated cursor over the play button. He took a deep breath, and pressed it.

The video changed back to it's loading state, and for a moment, Carl was scared he'd lost his one chance to document whatever he'd just found. However, after a moment, a video feed came through. At first, it was impossible to even remotely understand what it was showing, but after a moment, something came through as clear as day.

A single sentence, uttered by what sounded like a young woman.

"Honey, isn't that the dog's towel?"

[enneamage]

do you think there’s a reason tubbo seems to be so ignorant beyond his privileged upbringing? like does his personality factor into his lack of knowledge/research about certain topics? it’s fairly hard to grow up as a teenager in this day and age and be completely unknowledgeable about certain world issues yet he is. is he just stubborn? does he just not care enough to look into it/does he not know of the right resources to look into things? is it some other reason entirely?

So, there’s layers to this one.

I'm actually not familiar with what “world issues” he seems to struggle with, other than the things that lead to the Tory allegations. Since I'm not a regular viewer I won't be able to give specific examples, but it looks like he falls into a broader pattern so I'll have a guess at that.

The question of how he hasn’t passively gained information because of his time on the internet might have something to do with his dyslexia. While there are more social video and audio platforms than there used to be, the majority of the internet is still written text, and when I think back on how I learned about “World Issues” and the general attitudes people had about them, it was 99% scrolling and reading.

Now I’m not saying he can’t read, but reading things is going to be more of a struggle for him than a simple, passive scroll on whatever the website he’s on, so he’s going to be more selective with what he pays attention to. In general, he may be someone who's learning style / way he needs to be taught is different from the post format of the kinds of websites that talk about these things. This leaves him at the mercy of his social circle and the people who make regular contact with him, making it easier to get caught in a bubble. This assumes that he’s even following the kind of people who post about “world issues” to begin with, the social justice movement is big online but it isn’t as hard to find a niche that doesn’t hold those beliefs / talk about them as one might think from the inside. From there, he doesn’t know what he doesn’t know, so he can’t be proactive about it.

If the question is 'why is he so abrasive/indelicate when he doesn’t understand something and it makes him uncomfortable', that we can blame on the heavy Eight wing and being raised an English boy. It may be possible for him to take a ‘can’t be bothered’ stance on certain issues because of his nature. He wants to be a nice, caring person, but from his perspective he may not see the point in emotionally / intellectually investing in things that don’t involve him if they cause him grief.

Tubbo seems to lean towards interrogating ideas when he encounters them. While this might come off as rejecting or combative, it might not necessarily be the case. From what I’ve seen of him, he likes to take ideas apart and stress-test them to see if they make sense before he accepts them into his existing worldview; he's exploring. While this probably has a nails-on-a-chalkboard effect for people who are more aware of how sensitive handing topics like that in public is, it’s an effort to give the concept a fair shake. From there he can sometimes get stuck on a detail and struggle with being re-directed, but chat-on-streamer conversations lack nuance by their nature, so that just digs the hole deeper.

I know people say ‘go google it,’ but honestly it’s not that easy to google things and find the best in-depth resources. Goggle can give you the facts, but it won’t always give you the broader social context or the attitudes or a good idea of how many people think one way or the other. Usually being around to witness the bigger social media conversation is a part of how people get this passive knowledge that it feels like ‘everyone knows’, because everyone in your circle is talking about it. If he’s got that removal from the cultural stew, a Wikipedia article isn’t going to be able to properly catch him up.

[flyingcookierambles]

sadness over a3! eng i guess

oof just on my 700th day.....

kinda sad because of the announcement about A3! ENG server shutting down soon due to financial difficulties at LIBER/CYBIRD in the past two years (covid-19 related, etc.). according to a rather in depth reddit comment that had links to LIBER's publicly available financial reports + some financial reports from LIBER's parent company, Aeria, in english, covid-19 really hit LIBER hard since they had to cancel many money making events, from pop-up shops for the typical anime merch trinkets (keychains, plushes, pins, etc.) to the huge in-person events (voice actor meetups, the stage plays of MANKAI LIVE, etc.). due to shrinking player base on the ENG server + major loss of profits on both JPN and ENG servers, LIBER had to choose one or the other and they chose the JPN one, which i totally understand since it's way bigger there and the JPN fanbase will continue to give the franchise money more often. also, another person found a financial report/estimate from the google play store or something, and A3! ENG only made ~$20K to ~$10K in the past few months, which i guess is not enough to keep a server and localization company afloat. 

i got pretty attached to the characters and it was a great game to help get by during college. and honestly, while i am very sad about this, again, i understand why LIBER did this, looking at their financial report from 2020. I would LIBER save the entire franchise rather than shut all the servers down, making us all unable to see our favorite actors ever again, even if it means that we ENG fans will have to go thru the extra steps of finding/reading fan translations, wikis, etc., to read any further stories from where A3! ENG left off. still, A3! ENG's localization was something special. i'm saying this as a TKRB JPN player who read the wiki for all the character voice lines and then had to see the official TKRB ENG localization make Yamabushi Kunihiro a rapper for some reason? lol. it was....weird.... meanwhile, all the memes and slang in A3! ENG didn't seem out of place and all fit their personalities because 3/4 of the troupes were all high school to college age and 3 of them were ~Gamers~. Out of all the gachas i've played, i feel like the only other F2P gacha game that had this incredibly smooth, all cultural jokes/puns translated in a way that still makes sense/fits the character/doesn't require a galaxy brain and some TL note to understand, is probably dragalia lost and that's only because it has frickin Nintendo localizing/publishing it globally for CyGames. Nintendo. i'll eventually read the fan translations of A3!'s Act 3 on the wiki, but it won't be the same without Kazunari's super high-energy influencer slang of "'whoa fam! that's totes 'blammable, gotta take a pic!" or Itaru's gremlin Gamer speak of "lol get rekt noobs" or Tsuzuru's tired dying breath of "that ain't it chief." the appropriate slang and relatable meme speak of the localization really helped humanize these characters as people of their respective ages, rather than just a typical formal speak or some directly translated JPN slang -> ENG that turns out super awkward that can be found in bad localizations.

going back to the reddit comment too, the death of A3! ENG servers could have bad repercussions in the future for other joseimuke games. josei, if you for some reason have been in the anime fandom but still don't know this term, is basically the genre of stories/video games/media/etc aimed at women. it's the mature adult counterpart to seinen, media aimed at adult men. basically shoujo/shonen = elementary/middle school/high school aimed while josei/seinen = high school/college/adult aimed if that helps. Joseimuke is a part of josei that is not specifically romance. while some josei/joseimuke can overlap with otome, aka female aimed dating sims/romance media, they have many things about them that make these all separate genres. one of the official A3! ENG translators and a known fan translator of another joseimuke gacha, Mahou Yaku/Wizard’s Promise, minami, goes more in depth with this in a twitter thread. 

A3! was an actor raising game, and a big part of it was found family and relationships that were platonic. yet it got advertised as an otome, which has more connotations with dating sims and brings to mind other shoujo/otome games and anime where the cast is all high schoolers and the setting is most often in a high school. but, other than some characters making flirty jokes or implied to have crushes on Izumi/player character, many character relationships with Izumi are platonic and not romantic at all. Spring Troupe in the game also jokingly calls themself a family. the entire Mankai Company is basically found family. plus, since the game actually has time passing in story and the characters age with each year, half of the characters aren’t even in high school anymore. a large majority of them are in college or are graduated by now, with only a few still in high school. i’m not surprised if a reason that some people left the game was due to feeling bored with the slice of life/not romantic story, feeling that they were lied to about it being an otome, which was falsely advertised since it is a game meant for the older teens/adults demographic of josei/joseimuke.

i’m worried that other japanese companies will look at this shut down as a “josei/joseimuke doesn’t work well in the west” and never localize other josei/joseimuke gacha games like Mahou Yaku, EnStars, Twisted Wonderland, Helios, etc.

while i like otome and shoujo, i, as a 23/soon to be 24 year old college graduate and now tax paying adult, want more stories that have more mature themes and characters that are more my age so i don’t have to feel awkward when i’m playing some dating sim and i, a literal 23 year old adult, and trying to woo a 16 year old. it’s...a little awkward to say the least. i would gladly welcome more mature media that is categorized as josei/joseimuke.

sorry if this is all over the place, but overall im just sad that A3! ENG is shutting down. i don’t know if i’ll join the JPN server yet. i’m def going to read the Act 3 story via fan translators on the wiki, but A3! gameplay was...boring lmao. as much as i love A3!, im sure that the constant event grind/burnout and boring rng gameplay turned people off too and i dont blame them. i felt the burnout bad since i participated in basically every event since day 1. it. is. rough. i’m not joining the hellish thunderdome that is the JPN server and im not ranking anymore as a F2P player lmao. literally had to play almost every waking free moment to get into the 30%-20% bracket as a F2P person and i never got to top 20%-10%, much less top 1% lmao. i’m don’t whale enough lol. 

i feel like i should probably just. crack open my genki 2 textbook and uhhh totally legal pdf copy of tobira. so i can just. get the JPN version of games in the first place so i don’t have to worry about getting shafted since overseas fans are often considered expendable. 

i wish that, when any games that are online end, gacha or mmo or anything, anything online, companies will let fans archive things. or like. release a book that is just the story text or something. like. CYBIRD is letting us still technically play the game and have the story and all, but what if they eventually later shut everything down? why not just release a pdf/ebook that’s just the text of the eng localization for some money? i’d buy it. for nostalgia and rereads and all and also archiving purposes. i think i’ll try to help with any english localization archive projects if i can so that the hilarious and incredible localization that was a work of love from the translation team doesn’t just disappear forever.

well.

that’s it for now. as i said, guess i’ll head to the app for one of the last times to read the last unread stories and mini stories i have left, then the wiki for Act 3, and then i guess i’ll crack open genki 2 and bunpo.....

some fun random links for you to think about!

random ffxi article that came to mind (if ffxiv ever shuts down in the next 20 years or whatever i’d be cool to get a statue of my character at the end)

and death of a game playlist by NerdSlayer Studios on Youtube that has me thinking a lot about game preservation and losing MMOs and games

the lost media wiki  and blameitonjorge’s lost media iceberg

other gacha games i’ve played that have shut down that i think about sometimes because the loss of A3! ENG isn’t my first rodeo:

terra battle & terra battle 2 (1)

AFTERL!FE

(related kitsu post link for archive reasons)

[museenkuss]

Hi, I wanted to ask, I’m a poc thinking of moving to Germany. Is there a lot of racism there? Like dangerously I mean? For reference I’m racially ambiguous enough to pass as Mediterranean, but not racially ambiguous enough to pass as white basically anywhere else. Sorry if this is offensive, I know there’s racism everywhere but it’s hard to figure out how much of a problem it is in places I don’t know anyone from.

Hey! :) Firstly - It’s absolutely not offensive to ask at all, and I’ll do my best to answer as best as I can! Since I’m white myself, I can only repeat the experiences of others and state facts concerning the general developments, and I’ll do my best to do so. I’m also very sorry that this got so long, but I felt like I had to give a little context on what’s happening here to give an impression on the climate. (Also I don’t talk about politics in English often, so I hope this isn’t too rocky and I explained things well enough to be understandable!)

It’s a fact that we have a right-wing party called AfD (”Alternative for Germany”). When they started out, their main goal was to leave the EU, but by now, their focus has shifted more towards things like “protecting the traditional family” and “managing immigration”. All other parties in parliament refuse to work with it, but it’s there, and it gets enough votes to have a say, and that alone is a sign that ignorance and hateful ideas are something that can be expressed out in the open, again.

In 2014, a group named Pegida (short for “Patriotic Europeans against the islamisation of the Occident) was founded. Those people marched the streets of Dresden every Monday, chanting “We are the People”, recalling the famous “Montagsdemonstrationen” in Eastern Germany, where people peacefully demonstrated for the opening of the borders. It’s truly sickening how those words that used to hold a completely different meaning are now used to spew hate. (I tried to find out whether those demonstrations are still happening, but sadly came out empty handed – I haven’t heard from them in a while, but this was going on for quite some time)

Those are general developments that we see. And I can say that those developments are criticised and politicians stand against the AfD and against Pegida. There have also always been counter-demonstrations. But those people exist and they have a voice. (The reasons for those developments could be found in the inequalities between East and West Germany that still exist today or the handling of the arrival of refugees in 2015/16 - but those are topics that would have to be explained in-depth and wouldn’t bring you closer to your answer, which is why I’m just mentioning them here)

There are also cases of Right-Wing Terrorism. Maybe you’ve heard of the shooting in Hanau last year. Walter Lübcke, a politician, was killed in his garden last year as well, after being threatened online for quite some time for his stance on immigration and right of asylum (this man was not a POC, this was a politically motivated crime). And in 2011, a group called NSU (“National Socialist Underground”) was practically discovered “by accident”, after operating undiscovered since 2000.

I want to say that thankfully, these cases don’t happen often, but if we look at how the police ignored the NSU for YEARS and instead investigated the families of the victims (blaming them for the deaths of their loved ones), it really makes one think about how many cases we simply don’t know about.

There’s a saying, that someone is “blind on the right/brown eye”, which is, in my opinion, one of the biggest problems with the police here.

---

I tried to find articles on the experience of POC in Germany that will give a more accurate insight on the matter. These sources combine personal experiences from people with facts and I found them both eye-opening and terrifying, to be entirely honest with you. Also - the articles are all either from 2019 or 2020.

What's life really like for black people in Germany? (dw- short for “Deutsche Welle”, German Wave)

‘I Will Never Be German’: Immigrants and Mixed-Race Families in Germany on the Struggle to Belong (The New York Times)

Racism in Germany 'an issue for society as a whole' (dw)

How structural racism works in Germany. "The Concept of Race Is Taboo" (Der Spiegel)

Racism in Germany: A Beginner’s Guide (ExBerliner)

Racism in Germany. Being Black in Berlin (Handelsblatt)

Germany is a racist country (ExBerliner)

---

In the end, I as a white person can’t truly answer your question, and I’m very sorry about that. Still, I hope this was helpful!

[toplivesite4970-blog]

What exactly is DroidCam and the facts for?

When you invest in a laptop computer, it is quite exceptional that it does not include a webcam for leisure or job communication, but using a desktop Laptop or computer is one of the peripherals we overlook to increase the cost. But don't be concerned, you can use your mobile phone being a Personal computer webcam together with the DroidCam app, therefore you won't must acquire one when you want to work with it sporadically.

Its use is very simple, we need to set up an application on our Personal computer, and the other on our Android phone, make your design so we may have it able to use with Skype, Zoom or any other useful programs for teleworking. Software put in through the Home windows Shop will not be compatible with DroidCam, so we would need to download it from the application's internet site.

We will describe step by step how to get it done in a few easy steps.

Mount DroidCam Client on your hard drive in depth

To work with Droidcam is essential to setup the application about the smartphone as well as on the PC, firstly we need to set up around the Microsoft windows Personal computer the application that will permit us to speak the digital camera on our mobile phone using the PC to use it as a a webcam in other apps, this application is called DroidCam Buyer and that we reveal to you step by step how to get it done.

Before downloading the DroidCam customer for Windows and to make certain that the application form will work appropriately, we have to shut all the Videoconference programs we now have wide open, Skype, Focus, and so forth.

Now we download the DroidCam Client software from its web site and set it up following the methods.

Available the applying by simply clicking on Begin, DroidCam Consumer.

Now we leave the application form open and check out the mobile.

Putting in DroidCam step-by-step on Android Smartphones

When we finally have put in the link DroidCam Client on the Laptop or computer, it is actually now a chance to mount the DroidCam application on our Android mobile to convey your camera with all the PC. This app is free and offered at Google's Perform Store. We should adhere to the following actions:

We search for the DroidCam software within the Enjoy Retail store, in case your mobile can be a Huawei without Google professional services, right here we explain to you the best way to install them.

Simply click mount the applying and wait around for it in order to complete.

We available the application form, and click on on following and after that on go it, we accept the permissions gain access to the camera and audio so the app could work appropriately.

We keep the applying open to begin to see the info we require.

DroidCam design around the mobile phone

Well before simply clicking on Begin to start off the recording transmitting from your mobile phone for the personal computer, we can easily develop adjustments inside the DroidCam mobile application. Clicking on the three dots on top proper, we now have initial the support that is in The english language.

Next we can easily click on Adjustments to http://edition.cnn.com/search/?text=webcam gain access to the options food selection for your digital camera, we can easily reduce the FPS to conserve electric battery, or choose the standard mic.

Inside the digicam settings we have the choice not to rest the device, necessary to achieve the wifi link energetic in most cellular phones, once we select Digital camera we can choose the front side or back digital camera we wish to work with, addititionally there is a choice of automatic dimming from the display and the range of ports we wish to use for that digital camera.

If we want to take advantage of the application for an Ip address web video camera, we can easily fill in an individual and password data along with when it makes use of HTTPS and also the harbour we wish to use.

As soon as the link begins, it will allow us some configuration options on the photo, when we click on the 3 points on the top remaining we have the chance to put the white colored harmony that is certainly in Auto automatically, but we have now alternatives for incandescent, luminescent, comfortable luminescent, cloudy day, etc.

We also have the possibility to transform on or away from the publicity prevent. This really is to leave the coverage ideals resolved in the course of activation until we deactivate them, so it does not consider if you will find variations in gentle or colours to adapt the graphic to these new alterations.

Eventually, we have the option to deactivate the camera until we activate it again from the House windows DroidCam Consumer.

The applying DroidCamX Pro, allows us to take advantage of the program with a few improvements with all the disadvantage of the need to pay out 4.89 euros for it, some further choices

720p Movie in HD method

As much as twice the FPS on some supported devices

Zoom

Constant autofocus

Rotate, mirror and turn

Choices to adjust video illumination, comparison and postpone

Preserving JPG on the PC

Extra articles that, probably if you are intending to make use of it assiduously, would be advisable to have.

How to link up your smartphone digicam in your Personal computer via WiFi with DroidCam

Given that we certainly have the application around the portable and so on the Personal computer, we need to configure every little thing to make it operate.

In order to connect our mobile phone using the computer we can get it done in 2 various ways, if there exists a wifi link inside our PC and mobile phone, we can easily connect through wireless, in this instance we have now to make certain that both items are in the exact same network, usually it does not job.

Whenever we have the cell phone attached by Wifi, we have to find the Wi-fi key (it is strongly recommended and easier).

In System IP we need to publish, if this hasn't been filled in instantly, the Ip that shows up within the portable program in Wifi IP.

In DroidCam Slot, we also fill in the harbour mentioned by the mobile phone program in DroidCam Slot.

Pick whether you would like Video and Sound by looking at the corresponding pack.

All we will need to do is click Commence and that we will be able to see a review of the digital camera from the DroidCam Consumer for Home windows program.

After the setup is carried out either by Wi-fi or Usb 2 . 0 cable, we simply have to wide open our favorite software for online video phone calls and initiate making use of it. We have analyzed it with Skype plus it is very rewarding.

How you can link your mobile phone video camera to your Computer via Usb 2 . 0 with DroidCam

When we are away from home or do not have a Wireless relationship for some reason, we are able to likewise use the Universal serial bus cord of our cellular phone for connecting for the Computer and make use of the DroidCam program.

In order to connect using the mobile data cable television, adopt these measures

Be sure that the symbol of interconnection by USB is designated and try to link up the cellular towards the Computer, if this has recognized it and we possess the individuals put in we could attempt to push Begin and view whether it performs, if it does not work go to point 2.

We must disconnect the mobile phone from the personal computer, and look for the car owners in our brand and product, we can take advantage of this web site to see them, or we can lookup in Google "ADB Car owners for..." and our brand name and type of portable.

On the phone we need to enable the Usb 2 . 0 debugging alternative that may be normally in the adjustments and also in the designer possibilities food selection. To enable the designer menus, just go to the About telephone section and hit 7 occasions inside the Construct variety area.

After the Usb 2 . 0 debugging choice is empowered, we link the device towards the Personal computer of course, if a message presents itself on screen allowing debugging by USB, we need to take it. Now available DroidCam Consumer again and press Learn to start it.

When you get any mistake, you can test to seal the support adb.exe inside the process director, affect the port inside the cellular app and then in the DroidCam client by way of example with the ports 4848, 5050 or 5151 or turn off and re-enable the debugging setting by USB.

The best way to change the smartphone digicam in a Droidcam IP camera

We can also have our mobile phone for an Ip address video camera using the DroidCam program, in this instance it is not necessarily needed to mount any software about the PC, it is rather easy to use and can allow us to make use of the cell phone like a video clip security program by way of example.

Ensure you are associated with a Wireless community and open the DroidCam software on your own mobile phone, we are going to take some info that it can have us.

Glance at the IP address it will give you towards the bottom, where it states Internet browser Ip address Cam Accessibility and write it down from the internet browser you typically use.

When you haven't configured a account information from the application's configuration options, we'll directly see the recording inside the browser. This way you can focus, start up the display, autofocus, enlarge or lessen the appearance, limit the FPS and conserve a push in JPG.

[rigelmejo]

Review of Lingq and Reader Language Apps

My tentative review of lingq: Literally seems to serve the same function for me as the Pleco Reader. The positive benefit of using lingq - it highlights words you don’t know in blue, words you’ve started learning in yellow, and words you already know are left unhighlighted. This is motivating because the progress you make is clear, and the words you already know you don’t try to over-study or re-memorize (because my perfectionist tendencies LOVE to get hung up studying things I already know before progressing). Lingq also counts the words you’ve marked as known. That is the primary reason I’m trying the app - I wanted to gauge how many chinese words I actually can read and am familiar with.

However, the core negatives to lingq: their dictionary/lookup function for words is clunky and inconvienient. It only shows the most common translation at a quick click pop up and that isn’t necessarily nuanced or correct. The pop up is hard to get rid of because you have to expand it then exit out of it, which is inconvenient and slows down reading (I wish I could just click the pop-up again or click the word again to remove the translation pop up). It has options to search more in-depth definitions on sites like baidu, but all the steps that takes makes doing so just as time consuming as opening the internet browser or baidu app and searching it that way. So the dictionary option I find is lacking and inconvienient, and that affects ease of reading/ease of use. The dictionary feature IS better than the Idiom reader app, but Idiom reader app also has the ability to look up more in-depth definitions which takes just as much time as lingq/a web browser. 

Basically - Pleco Reader is eons better than both of them. Pleco Reader’s only draw back in definitions, is it provides so many that the less familiar you are with chinese, the more its a puzzle of which definition applies (but usually the top ones are the most common, so it’s rarely an issue) - but a reader can’t be expected to know which meaning of 15 possible a writer may have intended, if that meaning’s one of the least common. So it’s just nice that pleco provides the less common ones so it’s easy to look up when those situations arise. In addition, Pleco Reader is very convenient to flip from dictionary explanations back to reader, not slowing the reading experience. Lingq ALSO has very few chinese materials in varying levels. It seems to rely on users uploading their own materials. So a lot of it seems to be ripped from a textbook, or web article, or native book. Pleco Reader in comparison has several graded readers available to purchase, which are great for picking materials at your actual reading level, with relatively high frequency words to learn, and with grammar that should be comprehensible. Also, pleco lets me import any of my own pdf, ebook, and txt documents, along with any website. So I can read webnovels on there, my own graded readers I’ve got from other places, etc. Pleco Reader is MUCH more convenient for reading virtually whatever you want, and it’s definitions are both easier to access (including most idioms you’re likely to encounter) and more likely to have most helpful definition. 

Probably the biggest difference - Lingq is 12.99 a MONTH. Pleco Reader has a one time cost of 10-20 dollars (depending on the package you buy). Then Pleco sends you a code so if you ever lose your app/get a new phone/something goes wrong, you can enter the code and get back all your purchases. A one time cost is eons more affordable, and really kind of them. I especially like that they put in the effort to give you the ability to recover your purchase if you have any issues. I bought the 20 dollar package I think - so I could get the expanded dictionary, with pretty much any word or idiom I’d ever see, natural speech audio, and the Reader. It has been well worth it. I’ve been using pleco for like 4 months, so the longer I use it the more that cost seems minimal (it’d be like the equivalent of 5$ a month before, free now. Or the equivalent of the cost of Lingq for less than 2 months).

Lingq’s cost PER month I’m not sure I could feel justified in spending. The ONLY added benefit I see of using Lingq over Pleco, is lingq has color coded the words you know/don’t know/are learning, and lingq counts how many words you know. Those two features are motivating. But they’re just motivational benefits. 

Other then that, Lingq has the following features: audio (Pleco Reader has this too), flashcards (using anki or memrise for free appear to be equally good or better than lingq’s feature, especially because you can simply export from lingq), cloze-like questions (again, memrise, anki, Quizlet, and even in some ways clozemaster are free alternatives). I personally hate flashcard type study, so I use memrise when necessary but generally would never use such features - so lingq’s flashcard features aren’t worthwhile for me. If they’re something you’re interested in - again, there seem to be free options available that are as good as or better than lingq. 

So, at least for my own personal learning preferences, lingq does not seem to be worth it. Everything it provides is available somewhere else for cheaper, for a one time cost, or free. Pleco Reader I think offers the most benefits and convenience out of every Language-Reader app I’ve tried. Compared to: Lingq, idiom, using Baidu itself on a webpage, etc - closest comparison is the free ZhongWen chrome extension on chinese sites, I think that’s nearly as convienient as Pleco Reader and obviously the alternative for when you’re on a computer. Idiom is actually a really nice app considering it’s free, and it does serve the basic purpose (Pleco Reader is a one time purchase cost) - idiom has sometimes incorrect translations/audio, but over all if you read enough content then that’s just a few words a paragraph or page that you won’t be able to study.  Those words can be looked up separately in a free dictionary app (like free Pleco’s dictionary, or google translate, or baidu) if they keep confusing you or keep seeming to be wrong. 

Lingq just... does not seem worth 12.99 a month, for only the added benefit of making it obvious which words you know/don’t know/are studying. Other than that single ability, there are comparable tools out there that already does what Lingq does or better, for cheaper or free. 

Overall, readers I would recommend:

Pleco Reader (10 dollars, or a bit more if you buy it in a package, single time purchase) - benefits include the only dictionary you’ll need, audio (per word or for entire text), flashcard making ability, option to import any ebook/txt/website, option to one-time purchase graded readers. Although paid, I appreciate that all purchases are one time only. On a phone, this is the app I overwhelmingly rely on - it has everything I need in one area. I personally like to open up mtlnovels.com and read the novels with dual chinese/english, so I can look at the english sentences afterward - and use Pleco Reader as I get through the chinese chunks to make sure I can look up words I don’t know. If I were going to start translating, I’d probably use this method so I could get a gist of the meaning in english, then go through each line and fix errors and improve the translation for idioms and less straightforward meanings. For reading for Ease, that method’s the best for me to get through the novels I want to read. For reading intensively, I just open up a novel I want to read in all chinese and chug through it using pleco to look up words I stumble on. 

Free alternative: Zhongwen chrome extension. Equally extensive dictionary, links to grammar points, audio (per word), can read anything online or opened in a chrome browser (so you could open your txt documents in it) - sometimes works on subtitles on videos too. Subtitles on viki, on netflix, seem to be readable by zhongwen. It may work on some pdfs opened in chrome. Only available on computers. It’s really fantastic. If you’re on a computer I’d just recommend using this one overall. 

Free Alternative: Idiom - app. dictionary is decent, but some errors or limitations mean occasionally looking up words in another free dictionary app (Google Translate, Baidu Translate, Pleco Dictionary). Machine audio (per word), also sometimes has errors. Can read anything on a website. There are some other readers that serve the same function as idiom, I’ve seen one for webnovels... but I think at idiom overall is as good as or better than the other options out there. Idiom does not auto-link you to novel websites, but if you can find them then you can put any url in. Idiom also works for MANY languages - so you can also use it for french/spanish/japanese/etc. Idiom is the app I use for french, since obviously Pleco Reader is just for chinese. For free readers, and readers in other languages, I think idiom’s the best bet. Lingq might have more appeal for language learners of other languages - since it IS a little better than idiom with providing the correct translations, but lingq’s translations are still off sometimes TOO. So, if you’re learning a language that isn’t chinese, I’d recommend trying Idiom for free and seeing if it’s useful to you before shelving out money for anything paid. 

Not a reader, but there are two netflix dual subtitle chrome extensions that work really well for reading with a dictionary too, I’ll list them later when I look them up. These are ALSO available to use in many languages, so that’s nice. for both of the free dual subtitle extensions, Zhongwen also seems to work for them (if you ever want to look up a secondary definition).

Dictionary Apps:

Google Translate - good for drawing the characters, at least for me it has the easiest time recognizing what I’m trying to look up (I’m left handed and draw characters with my right on my phone so). When I’m watching tv its easy to open google and draw an unknown character in the app when I don’t know the pinyin. It usually only offers the most frequent/common definition, so it has limitations - but for a quick lookup of one word its usually convenient. For a quick gist of bigger chunks of text, google translate is also a quick way to do it although at least some words and phrases WILL probably be incorrect. 

Pleco Dictionary - this part of the pleco app is free. The definitions are the most thorough I’ve seen, and the easiest to get a meaningful definition if google translate is inadequate. Pleco’s definitions hands down seem to be the best. You have to pay for one of the packages to access the ability to draw characters to look them up, to access idiom translations, natural voice pronunciations, and a much more massive dictionary. I just bought it - and now I rarely have to use google translate. Only negative - have to look up things word by word, or by idiom/phrase. Other then that, it’s the best one probably.

Baidu Translate - also free. Biggest benefit is the ability to put a url in and have it machine translate the entire page. Like google, it’s very useful to get a quick gist of bigger chunks of text, and a handful of those words or phrases may be translated wrong. It’s fun to use it to translate english pages to chinese (again, some errors will crop up). It’s sometimes better than Google translate for looking up individual words, and phrases - but also has its limitations. 

Overall I use Baidu and Google for chunks of translations, and then Pleco or Zhongwen for specific words or phrases. It’s why I like using dual chinese/english mtlnovels.com in Pleco Reader - because then the big-chunk machine translated english is already provided (and the only thing Pleco Reader can’t do), and so I can just use pleco to go by word and phrase to get specific pieces of translation that are more accurate. 

I use Google translate or Pleco Dictionary for looking up words by drawing characters - but this is only a free feature in Google translate (and honestly I think Google translate recognizes my handwriting better - so I usually use Google, then if the definition isn’t helpful I copy paste the text version of the word into pleco dictionary). 

[siddharthpaterson-blog]

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? IFlow Objects> 12% ? Security> 12 percent ? Clever Enterprise> 12% ? Cloud Native Application Development> 12 percent ? Operations and also Monitoring8% - 12% ? Intro to SAP Cloud Platform Integration< 8% ? Product Overview< 8% ? Standard building blocks< 8% SAP C_CPI_13 General Information SAP C_CPI_13 Exam Preparation IMPORTANT: All SAP adviser certificates Are now accessible as Cloud Certifications from the Certification Hub and can be booked together with product code CER006. With CER006 -- SAP Certification at the Cloud, you can simply take upto six examinations tries of one's choice in one season -- from wherever and if it suits you! Evaluation dates can be selected and booked individually.Those of you who want to get certified on-site at an SAP training facility alternatively can still do so. Official dates to the C_CPI_13 certification examinations are recorded on the proper. Each specific certification includes its own Collection of groundwork tactics. We define them as"Topic Areas" and so they can be seen on each individual exam description. You can find the range of concerns, the duration of this exam, what are as you'll be tested on, and also advocated class work and content you can reference. SAP C_CPI_13 Certification examinations might contain Un-scored things which have been tested for up coming releases of this exam. All these un-scored items are randomly distributed throughout the C_CPI_13 certification topics and aren't counted toward the final score. Even the whole number of products within a exam as promoted from the Training Shop is not exceeded when unscored things are applied. SAP C_CPI_13 Certification Details: ? Exam Code:- C_CPI_13 ? Exam Name:- SAP Certified Application Associate - SAP Cloud Platform Integration ? Shipping Methods:- Certification ? Amount:- Associate ? Exam:- 80 queries ? Sample Questions:- View longer ? Cut Score:- 68 percent ? Duration:- 180 mins ? Languages:- English Get More details on SAP C_CPI_13 Certification Exam: ? https://www.academia.edu/43633655/How_to_Prepare_for_C_CPI_13_exam_on_Cloud_Platform_Integration ? https://issuu.com/seema897/docs/sap_cloud_platform_integration__c_cpi_13__success_ ? https://c-cpi-13-success-story.tumblr.com/ Safeguarding the Value of SAP C_CPI_13 Certification SAP Education has worked hard together with The Certification & Enablement Influence Council to improve the price of C_CPI_13 certificate and enhance your tests. An Rising Number of customers And spouses are nowadays looking towards certificate as a reliable benchmark to Guard their investments. Alas, the increased requirement for Certification has brought with it a developing amount of men and women that to take to and Reach SAP C_CPI_13 certification through unfair ways. This ongoing issue has Prompted SAP Education to place a fresh focus on test security. Please choose a Look in our article to see that which you are able to do in order in order to simply help protect the Authenticity of your C_CPI_13 certification position. More details about C_CPI_13 exam guide you can check this useful web portal.

[marshmallowgoop]

Kill la Kill Books!

Got a small haul of Kill la Kill books the other day!

SUSHIO CLUB LOVE LOVE KLKL has been a glaring omission from my collection, so when I saw a listing of the book for 3,600 yen—which usually goes for 10,000+ these days—I bought it right away.

And I figured I might as well pick up a few more things while I was at it, right? To make the shipping more cost effective?

That’s definitely the only reason.

But anyway, my growing mass of Kill la Kill books and magazines has now reached 36 items.

And I’ve talked about some of this merch before; you can find my post about the Febri volume 21 issue here, my post about Fractal 10 here, my post about the Talking About Composite books, The Complete Script Book, and The Art of KLK Vol. 3 here (and I have a whole tag for the script book, #klk-script-book), and I yammer on about the nine Blu-ray key art collection and artboard books here. I also have several essays discussing the official manga adaptation: 

Kill la Kill Manga Chapter 7

Kill la Kill Manga Volume 3, Chapters 8-17: Thoughts and Impressions

Kill la Kill Manga Volume 3: Translation Notes, Anime Differences

Kill la Kill Manga Volume 3: Worth it?

Manga Differences

And now, I wanna briefly (lol) yap about the six new additions to my collection.

Because I have a lot of love in my heart for this ridiculous, ridiculous anime.

SUSHIO CLUB LOVE LOVE KLKL

So, I got this book for cheap because it was allegedly in poor shape and “not suitable for collection.”

(My reaction to “not suitable for collection” is always, “It’s suitable for my garbage collection! I’ll give your ‘ugly’ copies a loving home!”)

But, like? There are a couple of dents and folded corners, but the condition is really not bad at all. The art is completely intact and beautiful.

Sushio—who is the character designer for Kill la Kill—has shared much of this book on his Twitter, and I would definitely recommend fans of the series to scroll through his photos and have a look. There’s such a cute, sweet charm to Sushio’s work, and along with the polished, colored pages from LOVE LOVE that he shares online, he also shares sketches of his own fanart for the series, too.

(Okay, maybe this isn’t exactly the best demonstration of Sushio’s absolutely precious artwork, but. It’s one of my favorites from the book. Ryuko resorting to such wild extremes to be with Senketsu again is just. My heart. Kill la Kill is actually adorable.)

In any case, I don’t think any of the content in LOVE LOVE was new to me, but there’s just really something about having the book in my hands. I know there’s such a strong desire for digital media these days, but call me old-fashioned—there’s nothing quite like holding this art and really seeing every stroke and line in person.

Being able to physically flip through the pages also makes me notice things I didn’t before. For instance, I found myself charmed by the little detail of Barazo, Mako’s father, loving and adoring Sukuyo, Mako’s mother.

I mean, aw? It’s stuff like this that really makes me wish Kill la Kill were a kids’ show (as Sushio himself seemed to want!) Barazo is so much more likeable when there aren’t any signs of his less-than-pleasant behavior and he’s a loving, supportive husband and father.

Seriously!

Another thing I notice from having the book now is the order in which the pages are organized. Like, I couldn’t help but be amused about how Ryuko gets her own page here...

(Smiling for her Starketsu in the sky, right? Just like he asks her to in “Till I Die”?)

...and then the next pages have Satsuki beside Nonon and Mako (and Mataro) beside Ira...

...which strikes me as a bit funny because this isn’t exactly how Sushio organized his Tweets of these images. There, Satsuki was next to Ryuko, Nonon was next to no one, Mako and Mataro were next to Ira, and Uzu was next to Houka:

So, in LOVE LOVE, is Sushio deliberately trying to say something with the changed placement? Especially when it comes to the direction of the ladies’ eyes? 

Yeah???

I kid, I kid.

(But really, it looks much better to give Ryuko her own page and not have Nonon standing next to nobody.)

Also, one of the first things that popped out to me about LOVE LOVE is how Senketsu’s pages are right next to Ryuko’s pages. As they should be.

They belong together, okay?!

And speaking of Senketsu and Ryuko, I remember a comment years back that said you could probably find pics of your OTP with matching expressions in this book.

But, uh. Just compare Senketsu posing to Ryuko posing...

They’re kind of different types of people, lol.

But hey, they do both make cute sneezy faces.

As a final note about my copy of LOVE LOVE, I will say that my only disappointment is that I received the version with print errors. As such, this page of Nui...

...was accidentally printed twice, and I miss out on this page of Nui as a result:

There are also some minor goofs, like Mako’s arm getting cut off by the background here:

But considering I got this beautiful thing for only 3,600 yen, I really can’t complain!

Now I just need Sushiotan 2 to complete my Sushio Kill la Kill doujin collection....

Takepro

This charming little volume is a collection of animator fanart for the show (and other shows). The book includes a short profile for each featured artist, and their big Kill la Kill pieces are—like all titles in Kill la Kill—named after classic Japanese pop songs. You can read and see more about Takepro here.

It’s hard to pick favorites from this doujin because there is so much adorable and wonderful artwork, but I especially love Naoki Takeda’s “ここに幸あり,” or “Here is My Happiness,” named after the song by Yoshitsu Ootsu.

The picture features Ryuko, Mako, and Satsuki sitting together, all having a good time, and there’s just something so sweet about seeing happy Satsuki.

I also found an English translation of the song’s lyrics, courtesy of beast-senior 810:

The storm breaks and the rain falls Thorny as the women's path might be I would still keep on living with you And my happiness is here in the blue sky 

I could not tell anybody of my scars A bird of love that resided in my chest If only I wander about crying and evading A sorrowful night wind will blow through the streets 

I call out your name from the bottom of my heart Who will be awaiting me at the end of the echoes? Snuggle up to you and cheerfully look up to your face And my happiness is here in the white clouds 

Aw. This song is so Satsuki.

And speaking of Satsuki, I can’t get over how cute she and Ryuko look on the cover of this book. Like??

Aw! 

I also am quite fond of a small piece by Syuichi Iseki, which is in a super-deformed style and features Satsuki comforting Nonon after her uniform is destroyed during the Naturals Election. Nonon cries, and Satsuki pats her head. In the background, Ira looks distressed at the display, Houka seems to be deciphering it, and Mako smiles. It’s really, really cute.

Yoshie Endo’s “僕笑っちゃいま��,” or “I’m Laughing,” named for the song by Shingo Kazami, is also real cute. It depicts Mataro holding up Guts, who licks his face. It’s another one of those, “I-so-wish-Kill-la-Kill-were-a-kids’-show” kinda pieces....

Hiroyuki Imaishi’s Doujin

Admittedly, I don’t actually know the title of this one, but it’s a very small doujin by Kill la Kill director Hiroyuki Imaishi. There isn’t too much Kill la Kill content, but there are two pages of Ryuko and Satsuki in their respective Kamui, accompanied by some text.

I thought the text might be something about the show, but it seems like it’s actually about Imaishi’s experience working on the show. And... it’s rather sad? He talks about how he’s able to accomplish more now, but he also has to consider a lot more as well, and he doesn’t have the time and energy that he used to. It’s a lot about aging and growing old.

At least, I think that’s what’s being communicated. Here’s a transcription, though:

なんだろう。

初会社役員とか。

昔よりやれることは増えたが考えなきゃいけないことも増えて時間と体力は足りなくなっていく。

年相応とも言える。

だけどいつまでも大人気なく生きていきたいものだ。

One last interesting thing about this doujin is the material it’s made from; it’s different than any other book in my collection. I’m not an artist, so forgive me if I sound totally ignorant here, but the paper reminds me watercolor paper. It definitely took me by surprise!

SL Sketch 3

SL Sketch 3 is a small fan doujin by Buzin. You can find most of the art in this book on their Tumblr!

Sketch 3 is a really fun collection of sketches, and I especially love the cover. I’m so desperate for art where Senketsu is acknowledged as an actual person that I’m just all heart eyes over Ryuko smiling at him here.

March 2014 Newtype

Okay, so this one’s really a magazine, not a book, but wow. I was taken aback by what’s inside!

I’ll definitely have to look at this issue in more depth because there are a bunch of Kill la Kill goodies in here that I didn’t even expect. And I don’t think most of it has been translated at all!

I also realized that I’ve been mixing up my Newtypes and will have to fix my resources page. But on the bright side, there is so much to love about this issue.

Like, the Elite Four Light Novel got reprinted in the Kamui Bansho, but it’s way better here because it has pictures!

I also love how Nonon, out of all the Elite Four, is the only one who stands beside Satsuki in these illustrations.

And I don’t even know what this is (VR or something with Ami Koshimizu, Ryuko’s VA?), but it’s cute and got me smiling:

And Ryo Akizuki, the mangaka for the official Kill la Kill manga, made a small comic about his experience working on the project. I like the little title panel with Ryuko, Senketsu, and Mako a lot:

Plus, there’s a shiny ad for the manga’s second volume, too:

One of the things that most caught my interest, though, is an article about the second opening song for Kill la Kill, GARNiDELiA’s “ambiguous”:

I got so curious about this bit because I’ve heard varying, conflicting information regarding the meaning behind the song’s lyrics. On the one hand, I’ve heard that half of the song is from Ryuko to Senketsu, and the other half is from Satsuki to Ryuko. On the other hand, I’ve heard that the whole song is from Satsuki to Ryuko. But I’ve never found any concrete sources for either of these claims!

So, I was hoping the Newtype article would help, but it’ll take a lot more digging into. Still, briefly looking over the page, I did find this bit: 

そんな私の思いと歌詞が一致しました。 『キルラキル』でいう流子ちゃんと神衣・鮮血の関係に近いかもしれませんね。 

Roughly, it says, “As such, my thoughts about the song agreed with its lyrics. You might say it’s like the relationship between Ryuko and Kamui Senketsu in Kill la Kill.”

I’m not totally sure about the context here—and I admittedly don’t even know the author’s involvement in the making of "ambiguous”—but this article might explain where the Ryuko-and-Senketsu reading of the song came from. It’s definitely something I’d like to delve into more.

Because I really love the Ryuko-and-Senketsu reading of the song, okay, and I’d love some actually official backup for it!

Finally, another favorite part of the Newtype is simply all the art. Takafumi Hori’s spread is particularly great:

(You can find a cleaner image here.)

Just... dang. I wish I got a little poster of this instead of the ones actually included in the Newtype! The artwork is just stunning.

And one of the cutest things about the Newtype is all the fanart from its readers! I particularly love the little Valentine’s Day special; there’s an illustration of Ryuko giving Senketsu chocolate, and there’s also a Ryumako piece, too!

Kill la Kill Storyboard Ep. 01

Finally, one of my favorites from this haul is the Kill la Kill Storyboard Ep. 01. The book was included as a shop bonus for the original Japanese Blu-ray/DVD release, though I was able to win it by itself in an auction. I do think I overpaid a bit, but gosh, it’s a lovely addition to my collection. It’s just really neat to see the production process of an anime in action. I wish there were storyboard books for every episode in the show!

Hiroyuki Imaishi’s storyboards are also just super amusing. Here is a small sampling of some of my faves (because there is so much gold in here, my goodness):

And that’s all for now!

...I guess this really wasn’t so brief at all, huh?

Shocker.

[fourmodules]

Complete Guide To IELTS Academic Writing Task 2

Lastly, although scoring in any module or exam can be difficult, but not impossible. Every aim or goal can be accomplished if one puts all his or her efforts and hard work in it. By obeying some of these useful techniques, an applicant can enhance the writing skills flawlessly. Moreover, this will further assist a child to raise his or her IELTS scores by standing out in every section. IELTS (International English Language Testing System) is a very prevalent and most high-stakes English proficiency test, among all the non-speakers of English that owns it as a second language. All these students and workers need proof of their proficiency and this test accurately verifies it. After an expert evaluation, many skilled checkers provide you a band for each section and their average becomes your overall score or band. This test is aimed at supporting the aspirants who wish to pursue their higher education by participating in an English language University-level program or want to migrate to any other country on work or job basis, the IELTS test can help you approach your education, career or life goals. Briefly, it is a task-based test that covers four main skills of a language: Reading, Listening, Writing, and Speaking. The LRW test is held on the same day at a particular test center. The atmosphere of the test center is quite similar to an examination hall and is very strict. Under such conditions, many students feel very struggling to write an essay, where they have to think a lot to offer a great essay. However, this complete guide will discuss each and every aspect of the IELTS Academic Writing task 2 to ensure your good results in this question.

Firstly, we must highlight some basic information about the writing task 2. In this task, a candidate is made to compose an essay or article of 4-5 paragraphs, depending on the topic. Specifically, if we talk about the time allotment, each candidate gets a complete, 1-hour for the writing module. It depends on the fact that how you divide your time accordingly. It is considered that one should not spend more than 20 minutes on task 1 because task 2 is lengthier and quite hard. Consequently, you must save at least 40 minutes for this test. Moreover, if we look in-depth for the time-division, one of the best distributions is to spend 2-5 minutes on planning and brainstorming for the essay. Following it, on writing and presenting it, one must allocate a good half-an-hour and the left out 10 minutes should be devoted to editing and revising the passage. In this way, one should give his or her quality time to each and every part involved in writing to avoid any blunders & mistakes. Furthermore, the examiners evaluate your ability to express your opinions to an abstract question, reacting to social or environmental problems, analyzing the benefits or harms of a particular point, providing solutions to any problems, giving opinions & suggestions. Thus, one must take help from various Blogs and articles written by experts to widen the storehouse of your ideas.

The next important step is organizing & arranging the essay, which plays a vital role as one has to present his or her efficiently to score high. As we discussed the planning feature previously, it is very crucial to note that this complete test is an Academic and formal test. It allows and at the same time forces an aspirant to avoid any kind of informality and slang in his or her write-up. Apart from that, a thoughtful and neutral tone is highly appreciated by the examiners while evaluating the essays. Weighing to a particular side (either positive or negative), unless and until told so can adversely affect your scores. Another essential feature to organize the thesis well is putting all the similar ideas in a single paragraph to avoid confusion. This separation makes it easy for the evaluator to check your essays effortlessly that also leads to upliftment of your bands. Several experts are sitting on the online platform to serve you for the same purpose also. One can register yourself and with the help of an Improvement planner, anyone can enhance his or her performance by learning various tips and techniques.

Subsequently, to comprehend the scoring pattern of a particular task also proves very beneficial. Initially, a candidate has to answer an open and abstract question, thus the judgment is done on your content and thoughts as there is no clear or "correct" answer for it. The examiners basically check your point of perception, your portrayal of the text, and various skills that act as the base of your scores. These are:

Task Achievement ( 25% ): How well you accomplished the given question.

Coherence & Cohesion ( 25% ): How well you stick to the topic and the examiner concedes your message.

Lexical Resource ( 25% ): Ability to use an extensive series of vocabulary precisely.

Grammatical Range & Accuracy ( 25% ): Ability to implement the grammar rules & tenses in your speech accurately.

It is very important to give the examiner what he or she wants in order to score high. Moreover, this task particularly contributes two-thirds of its portion to your overall scores, which means complete 67% of the writing band comes from task 2.

Along with all the basic and formal necessities, there are certain additional tips that should be followed appropriately to stand out. It covers some understandable vocabulary words, relatable examples to reflect your practical side, linkers & connectors which act as a bridge between two lines, and a combination of various simple, complex, and compound sentences. These insertions will uplift your essay to an upper level and would draw the attention of the examiner toward your piece of work. Along with that, there are numerous habits that a student mistakenly incorporates while writing.

Some of them are bullet points or numbered list that makes your representation informal. Also, paraphrasing is very imperative for an essay because sometimes many students imitate the question sentences in their write-up in the same form as they are. On the contrary, taking and including large chunks directly from the topic will lower down the score. One must polish the vocabulary skills first and try to use synonyms & varied sentence structures to avoid duplication. Notably, this technique does not only help to avoid the question imitation, but it has also made its place in preventing redundancy in an essay. A broad and extensive vocabulary and using a cluster of simple, complex, and complicated sentences support one to add variation into his or her text.

Furthermore, when starting the preparation, it is also very valuable to solve the IELTS Practice Test first to know the current band where you stand. After interpreting this, one can easily plan the whole preparation path accordingly. These help an aspirant to understand the format of the test and the types of questions asked. Later with the feature of Instant Score Feedback, which you may find on fourmodules.com, you will be able to get your responses to evaluate efficiently by the experts. With the help of this verification, a candidate will comprehend where he or she stands. Moreover, this will help him or her to work upon the weaknesses to omit out all the flaws from their writings. 

[jennaowen-blog]

SAP C_CP_I_12 Details

The SAP Cloud Platform Integration C_CP_I_12 certification exam validates how the candidate possesses the fundamental and core knowledge required with the SAP Cloud Platform Integration profile. This CPI C_CP_I_12 certification proves that this candidate posseses an overall understanding and in?depth technical skills to participate in like a part of an undertaking team within a mentored role. This certificate builds on the fundamental knowledge gained by way of a related SAP Cloud Platform Integration training. Notes To achieve success, SAP recommends combining education courses and hands-on experience to organize for your CPI certification exam as questions will try your capability to use the knowledge you've got gained in training. You're not in a position to use any reference materials in the C_CP_I_12 certification test (no access to the online documentation as well as to any SAP system). Topic Areas to cover CPI C_CP_I_12 exam by SAP Please visit beneath the listing of topics which might be covered in this particular Cloud Platform Integration certification as well as the courses that go over them. Its accuracy doesn't constitute a real claim; SAP reserves the authority to update test content (topics, items, weighting) at any time. iFlow Objects >12% Operations and Monitoring 8% - 12% Infrastructure and Database Service in PaaS 8% - 12% Security 8% - 12% Basic building blocks < 8% Product Overview < 8% Introduction to SAP Cloud Platform Integration < 8% SAP HANA Enterprise Cloud (HEC) < 8% Software as a Service (SaaS) < 8% Application Development Services in PaaS < 8% SAP Cloud Overview < 8%

General Information Exam Preparation Each specific SAP C_CP_I_12 certification comes with a unique group of preparation tactics. We define them as "Topic Areas" plus they is available on every exam description. You will discover the amount of questions, the time period of quality, what areas you will end up tested on, and recommended course work and content you'll be able to reference. SAP C_CP_I_12 Certification exams might contain unscored things that are being tested for upcoming releases with the exam. These unscored items are randomly distributed over the SAP CPI certification topics and aren't counted towards final score. The complete number of pieces of an exam as advertised within the Training Shop is not exceeded when unscored backpacks are used. SAP Cloud Platform Integration C_CP_I_12 Exam Details Exam Code:- C_CP_I_12 Exam Name:- SAP Certified Application Associate - SAP Cloud Platform Integration Delivery Methods:- Certification Level:- Associate Exam:- 80 questions Sample Questions:- https://www.erpprep.com/article/sap-cloud-platform-integration-certification-sample-questions-and-answers Cut Score:- 69% Duration:- 180 mins Languages:- English Find out on C_CP_I_12 syllabus:- https://www.erpprep.com/sap-cloud-platform-integration-certification-exam-syllabus Safeguarding value of SAP C_CP_I_12 Certification Get complete details on how to prepare for C_CP_I_12 exam: https://sapexamguide.wixsite.com/sapexamguide/blogs/introduction-to-cloud-platform-integration-exam SAP Education spent some time working hard with the Certification & Enablement Influence Council to improve the need for C_CP_I_12 certification and help the exams. Progressively more customers and partners are actually considering certification as a reliable benchmark to defend their investments. Unfortunately, the improved need for C_CP_I_12 certification has gotten from it a growing number of those who attempt to attain SAP C_CP_I_12 certification through unfair means. This ongoing issue has prompted SAP Education to place a new concentrate on test security. Please take a take a look at our post to understand that you can do to aid protect the credibility of the certification status. More information about c_cp_i_12 sample questions web portal: look at more info.

[samuelasche]

First Artifact - IFE Research Proposal

Research Question: What is the relationship between demographic factors such as race and income/economic status when it comes to access to healthcare in the United States?

Working Title: Access to Quality Healthcare: Low Income and Minority Communities

Project Summary: In my project, the topic that I want to research is access to healthcare in the United States. Specifically, I want to learn more about the challenges of being a minority or growing up in poverty and how that can make access to healthcare even more challenging. While people are usually quick to come up with what they think is a solution, I know that the healthcare system is much more complicated, which is why I want to learn more details about the challenges first. Some specifics that I would like to research are which demographics specifically lack access to quality healthcare, and why those specific demographics cannot escape a cycle of struggle. Playing off that last detail, I also want to research proposals for solutions to the healthcare system in the United States that would benefit everyone and provide a fair chance to all people regardless of their race or economic status. Some key terms that come up frequently from my research are life expectancy, mortality, economic status, poverty, financial instability, out-of-pocket costs, Medicare, and Medicaid.

Some questions that I am going to use to guide my research are:

What demographic(s) in the United States would benefit the most from universal healthcare or more accessible healthcare?

What is the relationship between race and access to healthcare?

How does income affect access to healthcare?

Why is healthcare so expensive in the United States?

How could the government do more to help those that struggle with being able to afford quality healthcare?

How does the quality of healthcare in the United States compare to that of other countries?

What specific problems make it difficult to obtain proper healthcare?

4. Reason for choosing topic: For most of my childhood, my mom was a single mother, and she did not receive much financial help from my dad even though he was legally obligated to help. My mom worked tirelessly to give us a good life, but medical expenses for my sister and I were challenging to pay even with the plan provided to my mom by her employer. As healthcare costs were something that my family struggled with growing up, I have always been interested in learning about ways to solve the healthcare crisis and become more knowledgeable about the topic.

My aunt, who I was always close with growing up, worked in the healthcare industry, and she made good money but was not particularly wealthy. Even being someone who worked in the industry, she still struggled to pay off her bills when it came to medical expenses. Growing up, I have watched so many kind and hard-working families fall into thousands of dollars of credit card debt simply because of insurmountable costs.

5. One of the biggest challenges that I have faced so far in my research is understanding the different government healthcare programs that already exist in the United States such as Medicare and Medicaid. I know the basics of each system, but many of the online articles I have read go into detail about the programs, and I get lost in the sea of medical and financial terms. Although, I believe that with more research this will not be an issue.

Another worry that I have about my project is that the topic is too broad. I think that to find more valuable information when I am researching, I need to narrow down the questions to find articles that specifically answer questions about specific information. My research-guiding questions have helped me a lot, but I think that I underestimated the degree of specificity that is required for such a popular topic like healthcare.

My comments: In my previous English classes, I had completed assignments that are somewhat similar to this, but I had never created a proposal that is so in-depth. This proposal helped me properly prepare for the essay and visualize all of my ideas in an organized manner.