#nihongo-lets-go

[nihongo-lets-go]

Lesson　１, Pt. 1　：仮名［かな］

『　Scroll to the bottom for a glossary and resource links！ 』

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A brief summation of Kana 仮名:

Almost every language in human history has a written form. Romance languages and Germanic languages have the Roman alphabet. Ukrainian, Belarusian, Kazakh, and Russian have the Cyrillic alphabet. Korean has 한글. Japanese is, of course, no exception to this.

仮名［かな］are the syllabaries used for the Japanese written language. Each kanji, hiragana, and katakana character represents a word or sound in Japanese. Although each 仮名 has a different purpose, when combined they make up the whole of written Japanese, and are a must-know for everyday life, especially if your goal is to live in , work in, or visit Japan.

From reading menus, to shopping, to navigating transportation, to reading housing and apartment contracts, it is essential to learn the written language in order to fully grasp Japanese as a whole. (Side note: 仮名 can refer to solely hiragana and katakana.)

As stated before, the whole of the Japanese writing system is a combination of two kinds of 仮名:

～ Kanji (lit. “Han characters”), derived from written Chinese

～Hiragana and Katakana (the syllabic kana)

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KANJI

漢字 ［かんじ］ ー The original 仮名, or 真仮名 [まがな］(lit. “true kana”).

汉字 [hànzì] (Chinese characters) that are used to phonetically transcribe Japanese. The most prominent is 万葉仮名［まにょうがな］, from which hiragana and katakana are derived. Although certain 漢字 retain their meaning in 汉字, many more are used in a purely phonetic context, and thus the original meaning does not always hold. (Although, you'll have a great head-start if you're learning to read Mandarin!)

There tens of thousands of 漢字 used today, but the minimum number that learners are encouraged to remember is 2000-2200 (I would actually recommend learning closer to 3000).

『　Six 漢字, and their meanings. Only 1994 more to go!　』

Because the amount to be learned is so extensive, it's often easier to become comfortable reading and writing in hiragana [平仮名] and katakana [���仮名] before moving onto tackling 漢字 en masse. Although, it never hurts to learn a few in the beginning, especially those written for commonly used words!

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HIRAGANA

平仮名［ひらがな］ー The writing system used for native Japanese. It is used to write 送り仮名［おくりがな］, which are kana suffixes following a kanji root (e.g. to inflect nouns and verbs); to write particles; written for emphasis, and for misc. native words with no kanji, or with kanji that is too obscure or formal for writing.

平仮名 is also used to write 振り仮名［ふりがな］, also known as 読み仮名［よみがな］, and rubi ［ルビ ］. 振り仮名 is written above 漢字 to indicate proper pronunciation. Books aimed at children often include 振り仮名 .

平仮名 can be broken up into three sub-categories:

~Chart 1 includes all of the base 平仮名, including the a, i , u, e, o vowels ［あ、い、う、え、お］and the n/ng［ん］consonant.

~Chart 2 includes the dakuten and handakuten characters. Dakuten [ ﾞ] and handakuten [ ﾟ ] are marks that modify the sound of the 平仮名 they are placed after. For example: a dakuten after the character ha [は], changes the sound to ba [ば]. Adding a handakuten after は changes the sound to pa [ぱ].

~Chart 3 is a combination chart that includes 平仮名 , dakuten, handakuten, and 促音 [そくおん] . Sokuon [促音], known more casually as chiisai tsu/chiisai kana [小さいつ | 小さいかな] or chiisana tsu [小さなつ] , are the small 平仮名 that aid in altering the character's sound. For example: take は, ば, and ぱ, and add a smaller version the character ya [や] after them. By doing this, や becomes the sokuon , [ゃ］, turning は, ば, and ぱ into hya［ひゃ］, bya [びゃ] , and pya [ぴゃ] .

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KATAKANA

片仮名［カタカナ］ ー　This writing system has many uses, primarily for foreign loan words ( 外来語［がいらいご］) and onomanopoeia. It is also used for technical and scientific terms; for the names of plants, animals, and minerals, and for Japanese companies.

As with 平仮名, 片仮名 is also used for word emphasis.

Other than the differences in appearances, 片仮名 are functionally identical to 平仮名. There are the base characters, the dakuten/handakuten characters, and the combination characters, all which produce the different sounds of Japanese.

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The Japanese writing system can seem overwhelming at first, especially if your native tongue is part of a completely different linguistic family. Just remember that learning anything new takes time. Practice makes for a practiced person!

To round out this lesson, included below is a glossary of all the words mentioned. If you have any questions, feel free to use that 'Ask Me Anything!' button.

Happy learning!

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LESSON 1 VOCABULARY LIST:

仮名 ー　Kana［かな] , the name for the Japanese writing system. Kana can also refer to only hiragana and katakana.

真仮名 ー Magana [まがな］literally translates into “true kana”. Another term for kanji.

漢字 ー Kanji［かんじ］, the character system based off of the Chinese written characters 汉字 [hànzì］. Kanji is also known as man'yōgana ( まにょうがな [万葉仮名 ] ), the magana writing system that hiragana and katakana descended from.

平仮名 ー Hiragana［ひらがな］, the writing system used for native Japanese.

送り仮名 ー Okurigana［おくりがな］, hiragana suffixes following the kanji stems of written Japanese.

振り仮名 ー Furigana［ふりがな］is small hiragana that is written above kanji to indicate proper pronunciation. Furigana also known as yomigana ( 読み仮名［よみがな］), and rubi ［ルビ ］ .

片仮名 ー Katakana［カタカナ] is the writing system used for foreign loan words, the names of Japanese companies, and much more.

外来語 ー Gairaigo［がいらいご] is the term for foreign names and loan words--essentially any non-native Japanese words.

Dakuten [ ﾞ] and handakuten [ ﾟ ] ー written marks that alter the sound of the hiragana or katakana they are placed after.

小さいつ 、 小さいかな 、小さなつ ―　chiisai tsu, chiisai kana, and chiisana tsu are all terms used for small hiragana that, like dakuten and handakuten, alter a kana character's sound.

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ADDITIONAL RESOURCES:

WIKIPEDIA:

Kana

Hiragana

Katakana

Furigana

Sokuon (chiisai tsu)

OTHER SITES:

Dakuten, Handakuten

Origins of Gairaigo

[uwublr]

Pine's Ridiculously Long List of Free Japanese Study Materials

First Month Edition

All my current study materials, because sharing found resources is caring. These are not JLPT-specific and are for pre-beginners to beginners like me. I can't believe I have been studying for a month. Comparison is truly the thief of joy. I am a slow learner, but that's okay. Find a community because it truly does make a difference. Shoutout to Seitokai's Nihongo Discord, and to @tokidokitokyo whose post let me know about it and is just overall a great person too.

Main study material: Marugoto Online A1 Self-Study Kastudoo and Rikai with downloaded PDF and Wordbook (my original post about it)

Supplemental references:

A Dictionary of Basic Japanese Grammar (The only NOT free resource in this list, sorry! The e-book sold on Amazon does not have good reviews as it's a scanned copy of the book, rather than a properly formatted e-book. A free alternative to this is JapBase which also contains Intermediate and Advanced content.)

Marugoto Plus which accompanies the Marugoto courses and includes videos, audio files, etc.

Apps: Anki, Renshuu

Anki decks:

Tatsumoto's Kana (Recognizing and Writing)

Tatsumoto's AnkiDrone Sentence Pack V7

Official KanjiDamage Deck (from the creator of KanjiDamage, crude language warning for both the deck and the site)

Marugoto A1 Rikai Katsudoo 2021

Dictionaries:

Rikaitan browser extension (installed JMDict English V4, JMExtra, 日本語文法辞典(全集), and Kanjium)

Takoboto app (with offline access)

Other resources:

Sukiruma for practice writing sheets

Reader Ttsu for reading Japanese materials on a browser (used in conjunction with Rikaitan, since I couldn't find an e-book reader that I can install a Japanese dictionary in)

Sousakuba for downloadable genkouyoushi without watermarks

Youtube:

Favorites marked with a ⭐️.

Comprehensible Input for what it says on the tin, in bite-size formats

Daily Japanese with Naoko for vlogs with Japanese subtitles

Dogen for the funny videos that you can learn from and/or relate to

Game Gengo because Japanese learning through games, and has JLPT geared content if you're looking for it

Gino Kei who has shorts teaching Japanese in a not so serious way

Hiro - Food in Japan for cooking videos, not in Japanese, but these make me crave for Japanese food anyway so that counts

⭐️ Japan Eat for Japanese food commentary in English and also makes me hungry. So, yeah, not in 日本語 but it's delicious so that also counts

Japanese Koro mostly for kana reading practice which actually helps you get short serotonin boosts for when you do actually get to read the words correctly

Japanese Quest which plays games in Japanese

⭐️ Japarrot! for fun, animated comprehensible input videos

Let's ask Shogo for culture content

⭐️⭐️⭐️ Matcha Samurai for delightfully unhinged culture content, debunking Japanese misconceptions one video at a time

Namba Tsuyoshi for no narration Japanese walk with me style vlogs, very chill and relaxing

⭐️ NihongoDekita with Sayaka for fun, short grammar content

ShekMatz Japan has videos/playlists where she teaches Japanese in Tagalog, so if you can't understand Tagalog, you'd better skip it

Sora The Troll because why not

⭐️ Takashii from Japan is honestly one of my favorites, even before I started learning Japanese. His interviews are just really good!

Taro's Sewing because my toxic trait is thinking I can sew the cool things they post. Also comes with short Japanese commentary on screen

Tokyo Lens counts as uh, immersion even if it's not in Japanese, but it's in Japan so that counts? Yeah, let's go with that

もしもしようすけ for Japan vlogs/walk with me with Japanese and English subtitles

Yomii Japan Piano if you like piano and the occasional trolling

Japanese Calligrapher Takumi because my other toxic trait is thinking I can write this beautifully

[ohagiyo]

What I use to learn 日本語! I'll be updating this as I go! So make sure to check in sometime! ദ്ദി(ᵔᗜᵔ)

Apps!

Renshuu - Adjustable plan, has flashcards, games, guides, and an interactive community! Overall really simple to use and so fun!

Busuu - Full of ads but has helpful information and an interactive community, no flashcards though.

Websites!

Wanna use Japanese! - It'll show you a few sources/links for the thing you want to practice, whether it be reading, speaking, writing or listening!

Dokusho club - Gives you reading sources!

Tadoku - Also another reading website, with furigana!

Nihongo e na - You choose what category you want to study in, and it'll give you resources! You can also add resources of your own!

Anime & Manga - Can't forget about all my anime/manga lovers!

Minato - For self-study students, they also have a few tutor courses!

Hikidasu - Hikidasu is a Japanese-drama series about Xuan our main character who found herself in Japan for work despite knowing little to none Japanese, embark on a journey of learning with her!

Youglish - Dictionary, plays a video and the timestamp where said word is being spoken so you can pronounce it like how a native speaker would!

Jisho - Another dictionary with examples!

Japanga - 3 in one! Dictionary, Kana and Kanji studies along with radicles!

Nihongoi - Flash cards, vocab, learning thru images, and kanji! All packed into one website covers N5 to N1!

Crunchy Nihongo - I honestly don't know how to describe it, just check it out brah.

Youtube!

Japarrot - Learning Japanese and listening practice in forms of skits!

Let's ask shogo! - Culture!

Kaname Naito - Japanese learning, particles, words, ect.

Comprehensible Japanese - It's in the name, The channel contains gaming content, cooking, unboxing, reading books, all in Japanese with gestures! I suggest watching the unpacking series!

Nihongo Dekita With Sayaka - Much like Kaname Naito, teaches you real Japanese!

Daily Japanese with Naoko - Food, listening practice, and conversation practice!

Nihongo learning - Bite sized comprehensible Japanese videos!

Japanese Ammo with Misa - Like Sayaka, although she uploads frequently(?)

Learn Japanese with Tanaka San - Short skits and listening practice!

Yuko-Sensei - One of THE best teachers there is tbh, explains grammar points, particles, Kanji radicles, and so on!

Leisurely Life Diary - Life vlogs from the country side of Japan! All in Japanese + Japanese Subtitles!

Akane Japanese Class - Vlogs and essential vocab for certain places, All in Japanese!

Anime!

Atashin'chi Official Channel - Slice of life anime in Japanese without subtitles! There are Eng subs though.

美味しんぼ 公式チャンネル【デジタルリマスター版】 - Cooking anime yum

Blogs!

Buchi to Pichi - They're on hiatus so don't expect new content! however their posts are so so helpful for beginners!

Hamusuke japanese learning - Posts 4 verbs or adjectives or some kanji at least everyday or so, they're also the creator Nihongoi!

Japan Words - Calligraphy and words. I mean, what did you expect?

Dokusho club - Did you know that they have a tumblr? yeah, me neither.

Nihongo no tabi - Just someone posting about their journey in japanese and sharing what they find.

Mocha youbi - tes, another study blog they also repost JP stuff.

Nihongo Enthusiast - I have no idea if this is an archived account or something but erm idk just have it.

@moss-sama-sideblog i thought id tag you in this since you looked interested

[echoweb2]

Help Siraj relocate and rebulid his Home

Hey everyone, my friend Siraj has asked me to bring awareness to his story again and give some new updates, here it is:

Siraj, his wife, and his three children, once lived in a beautiful home in the Gaza Strip. It took ten years, long hours of working, and a lot debt to bulid. But it was their home, and they loved it for the promising future it repersented, and the love it was made with in the present.

But their home was destroyed shortly after the beginning of the IOF's bombing campaign, senselessly set on fire and hit with random shelling. The family was displaced six different times and forced into increasingly unfit places to live. No where they went was truly safe. The places they looked for refuge in were also threatened by bombing, evacuation orders forcing them to move again, and danger day and night.

[Siraj's home after the bombing]

As of now, Siraj and his family live in a tent on a street. The tent is hot, cramped, lacks basic necessities, and is surrounded by other unfit displaced palestinan tents, which makes disease prone to spreading far and wide around the area.

[Tent where Siraj, his wife and his childern are staying]

This tent isn't fit place for any type of human life, much less childern. Siraj's children have been forced to forget about their once peaceful life of playing and learning, and now spend their days cleaning the tent, going long distances for water (if isreal hasn't decided to bomb the route for water, not letting palestinans hydrate or wash for the day), and many more tasks too adult for childern. Every child deserves to be a child, and shouldn't be forced to provide for there family and fight for their life like this.

Siraj and his wife's only goal is to rebulid their life and home that was mercilessly destroyed by the IOF bombing campaign, and recontinue their life for them and their childern's.

Siraj's has a short term goal of trying to relocate to a safer area (10k CAD) after the khan younis massacre took place uncomfortably close to his family, and rebulid his home (82k CAD), which you can see the details of on his gofundme page.

His gfm was verified by @/nabulsi (#219), so dont hesitate.

Please donate. As of now, Siraj is literally 2,216 CAD away from his goal of 10k, 1,609 USD, which means roughly 213 people can donate 5 USD and fufill his goal. @/sar-soor is trying to have people match their donation of 25 CAD

And there other ways you can donate to Siraj while getting something in return, like @/sheplaysbassdotmp3's digital art raffle, and @/magnus-rhymes-with-swagness' raffle for a collector's version of the Wrinkle in Time series (which also helps other palestinan families)

And if you can't donate, follow Siraj at both @siraj2024 and @siiraj2024 (which is his backup account if his main account is continuously reported by zionist and is taken down), share his posts and updates, share others posts about him, send him some love, and keep him in the eyes of others.

july 29th edit: @/thylacid is also opening up commission for siraj! even if you're not into their art, just reblog this post and spread it around!

edit edit: and @/sinnabum45 is too

(very sorry to bother, im just tagging for reach!

@animatedtext @maclediumzeyheri @mermaidsinwondaland @danplanb-blog @vogue @staff @xgames-blog @lunar-femme @mermaidbutch @z @zac-gorman @the-slap-updates @nihongo @guanbo

again, very very sorry)

[my-japanese-corner]

Japanese word of the day

いってらっしゃい (Hiragana)

行ってらっしゃい (Kanji)

pronunciation - itte-rashai

Meaning - have a good day or see you later.

Used with - family members leaving house, colleagues going for work trip, meetings etc.,

If you want to learn a bit more about the history of this word, please read more!

いっしょに日本語をべんきょうする！がんばってください！

Translation: let's study Japanese together! Let's work hard together!

Romanji: issho ni nihongo o benkyou suru! Gambatte kudasai!

I recently found out that this word which has come to mean have a good day, literally translates to "Go and come back!"

Basically the 行って (pronunciation: itte) means Go (or Journey, you will see this 行 Kanji in almost every sentence where something is leaving, going somewhere for example 行ってきます meaning "I'm going!') and (い) らしゃい (pronunciation: irashai) means come or welcome back

Basically,

行って + (い) らしゃい = Go + come back

Ko-San on Instagram explained it very well. The explanation goes like this -

In ancient Japan since there was no world order, anyone leaving on a work trip, or anything else from the village could die for various reasons. And Japanese people were firm believers of the power of words, this belief is called Kotodama. Therefore, by saying "Go and come back!" they are wishing their loved ones or colleagues a good journey.

[bungeo-ppangie]

17:03 // studying

ღ pairing. nonidol!student!riki x student!gn!reader

ღ contents. romance, fluff again, angst

ღ synopsis. in which you can't help but stress out when you don't understand an architectural theory for a test

﹒⪩⪨﹒scene below cut

you ran your fingers through your hair, letting your hand rest on top of your head for a moment. sighing in frustration, you slammed the textbook closed, walking out of your bedroom. you found riki sitting on the couch, playing games.

grabbing a bottle of water from the kitchen, you decided to return to studying- stalling wasn't going to make you understand the stupid architectural theory of post-structuralism. why the fuck did you choose to major in architecture again?

you ruffled your boyfriend's hair as you passed by him, still gaming on his phone. feeling the soft strands of his hair made you feel ever so slightly better, even though it also tempted you to want to just curl up in his lap and sleep. he looked up at you as he felt your touch, brow creasing in worry as he saw your irritated face.

"yn?" he said to your receding figure as you headed back to the room to study the louvre's design plan. you barely heard him over your turmoiling thoughts, wishing you could restart life and choose to not study architecture at seoul university. in the midst of your annoyed thought-monologue, you didn't even notice riki closing his phone in the middle of a ranking round, normally so important to him that he wouldn't so much as bat an eye if he was called during the game.

you plopped onto your seat again, opening the textbook and staring at the undecipherable gibberish of french architectural theories of building design in the late 17th century. after a good 10 minutes of translating the text back and forth, you had finally used up all of your remaining brain cells, and still had no idea what you were doing.

you felt hot tears threatening to slide down your cheeks, closing your eyes and tilting your head up in a desperate attempt to stop yourself from crying. all you wanted was to rest for a moment, to let yourself breathe instead of feeling your chest tight with tears, your mind clogged with bits and pieces of information you just couldn't piece together. you felt like you were falling apart from the inside, and found yourself wishing, yet again, that you were just having a lazy afternoon, cuddling with riki.

luckily for you, he was standing right in your doorway, watching you struggle for the past few minutes. all he wanted to do was kiss you and tell you that everything was alright, that you didn't need to push yourself so hard. but he knew that if he came at the wrong time, you would just close yourself off from him and make your situation even worse. however, watching you so near tears finally ruined his resolve. he hurried to your side, bending down to lift you out of your seat and into his lap as he sat onto the bed.

"shhh..." he murmured to you, whispering encouragement and comforting words into your ears as you cried into his shoulder, dampening his shirt. in his panic to make you feel better, he even switched to japanese, making you smile a bit at his effort.

"nihongo dekimasen, riki" you said, employing one of the phrases your boyfriend had painstakingly taught you. you were sure you butchered the pronunciation, but it was evidently understandable enough, because you earned a giggle from him.

"but yn-ie, are you okay? is architecture too much pressure? see i told you to do engineering, this isn't good for your health! digestive problems or some shit- i swear i can find it on naver if you give me a moment," he said, switching back to a serious tone. "you can ask me for help if you ever need it, you know."

you laughed, seeing riki so caring and worried for you when he usually teased you for bad grades. not that you didn't like this- you definitely loved him like this- but it was so out of the ordinary that you couldn't hold in a giggle.

"riki-ah, you're only passing your classes because the teacher obviously has a crush on you- she curved your grade up 25 points last test." you pointed out as revenge for being teased for your rare bad grades.

"hey, what has my rizziness got to do with this? i can do well if i really want to, you know." he replied, pouting because of your disbelief at his self-acclaimed amazing studying habits. that is, gaming until 30 minutes before the test, then kissing up to the teacher until the test for a higher curve.

you rolled your eyes at him, but ended up accepting his offer of help. surprisingly, he proved himself to actually be pretty decent at studying, getting the hang of the theory almost immediately and tried teaching it to you("so like fish bread, you have to savor the overall taste and notice the details at the same time- you know, the undertones of red bean, the ridges of the shaped bread...") key word: tried.

however, even though you almost didn't notice the gradual process, having riki around you as you studied released almost all of the stress and pressure from before. instead, you laughed along with him at his weird and completely unrelated comparisons, trying to explain everything you didn't fully understand to you.

what did i do in my past life to ever deserve him, you thought to yourself, smiling at the cheerful boy who would try anything to make you happy.

[82mitsu]

{18Trip} The 18 Questions Corner - Shiramitsu Toi

This is a translation for the 18 questions interview uploaded on the official Youtube channel. I suggest to read this translation alongside it!

Note: P stands for "Player", this series has a voiced male & female character for the player. The interviews are conducted by the male player in this case.

TL note:

Toi calls Ryui by 兄様, pronounced as “Ani-sama”. Now, I try my best to keep all honorifics and nicknames as is but I feel like “Big Bro-sama” did not look good, and I am intent on keeping the older brother aspect. “Ani-sama” I wouldn’t consider an option either due to it being the colloquial name for Animelo Summer Live, and overall can be confusing if your nihongo is not jouzu enough desu. (Neither do I think it looks good, either.) It has been translated to “beloved Big bro” instead.

P: 18 questions for the Tourism Ward Mayors! We look forward to your cooperation!

Toi: I-I’ll be in your care!

What’s your name?

I’m Shiramitsu Toi! 

How old are you?

I’m 21 years old!

Tell us about your occupation!

I’m the owner of Fortuner Teller Angel Eye.

What’s the first thing you do when waking up in the morning?

Saying good morning to my beloved Big bro!

Anything you’re particular about with lunch?

I chew my food thoroughly!

What pops up in your mind when it comes to “evening”?

The evening glow in the sky?

What’s your routine before bed?

Writing in my secret exchange diary. 

Where do you start with washing your body?

Um... my right upper arm!

What’s essential when leaving for a trip?

Um… a change of clothes… I think?  

What do you check before traveling somewhere?

What the local sweets are!

What’s your favorite method of transportation for traveling? 

Because I don’t usually go on these, I’d say the train!

What’s one item you’d bring to a deserted island?

Anything will do as long as I’m with my beloved Big bro!

Please give us some fanservice! 

Be glad mortal, for I shall provide you entertainment… Ehehe, just messing around. 

Who’s someone you’d lean on for support? 

Has to be my beloved Big bro, I’m sure. 

Who would you swap bodies with for a day?

Um…! Evening Squad’s Natsuyaki Chihiro… -san…

What would you want to do as them?

I wanna be like Chii-sama and try to shine like him while dancing…!! Waah I didn’t mean to say that! How embarrassing~!!

Pass on a message to your roommates!

My beloved Big bro, thank you for always being there. Netaro-san, let’s play a new game again sometime!

Tell us from the heart, what’s a “journey” to you? 

Something that broadens your horizons, I think. 

P: Thank you, those were all 18 questions!

Toi: Thank you very much!!

Toi: I'm Shiramitsu Toi and the HAMA’s 15th Ward Mayor together my beloved big bro. Please feel free to drop by Fortune Teller Angel Eye whenever you’d like! 

[sweet-roulette]

今。- Kotoko and Shinyu

(Now.)

Note: Imagine the dialogue being in Japanese, my nihongo isn’t jouzu right now 😦

TW: Slight mention/implication of suicidal thoughts, depression, anxiety, the pain that Shinyu is literally so in love with her but she’ll never feel the same way, this was kinda self indulgent cause I have been UNSTAAAABLE!!!

Kotoko sat on the edge of the roof, her legs dangling over the void, eyes locked on the skyline that seemed impossibly far away. The wind tugged at her hair, but she barely noticed. All she could hear was the overwhelming noise in her head—the familiar voices she thought she'd buried long ago. The past weeks had been relentless, every mission, every look, every damn reminder of her brother, pulling her deeper into a void she couldn’t escape.

Everything felt too heavy. It was like she was stuck in the dark again, fighting to breathe against the suffocating pressure. Her thoughts ran wild, spiraling into places she didn't want them to go. The cold stone of the roof pressed against her hands as she gripped it tightly, trying to ground herself.

But it wasn’t enough.

The door to the roof creaked open, and she stiffened, hearing familiar footsteps. She didn’t turn around, didn’t react. She already knew who it was.

Shinyu.

He had been teasing her all day, throwing snide comments her way like he always did. But today, she hadn’t responded—not even with her usual sharp tongue or sarcastic comebacks. She had just… let him be. She’d stayed silent, and that silence had clearly bothered him.

He sat down beside her without a word, close enough for her to feel his presence, but not close enough to crowd her. They sat in silence, his gaze wandering over the city while hers stayed fixed on some faraway point.

“You don’t have to talk to me,” Shinyu said eventually, his voice softer than she was used to. “But I’ll stay here. Just in case.”

She said nothing, just kept staring out at the horizon.

Shinyu didn’t push. He never did when she got like this. He just sat there, waiting, knowing that she needed time.

Minutes passed. Maybe an hour. Kotoko wasn’t sure. All she knew was that the weight pressing down on her wasn’t getting any lighter. She closed her eyes, feeling the sharp, cold sting of reality tighten its grip around her. It felt like she was drowning in it—dark, cold water pulling her under, dragging her deeper into an abyss that threatened to swallow her whole.

“I’m so tired, Shinyu…” she whispered suddenly, her voice so quiet it almost disappeared into the wind.

Shinyu’s head turned slightly, his eyes flicking to her in concern, but he said nothing, letting her speak at her own pace.

“I thought it was over,” Kotoko continued, her voice hollow. “Those voices… the darkness. I thought I buried them. But it’s like they came back all at once. I can’t breathe. It feels like I’m drowning… and no matter how hard I try to swim up, it just pulls me back down. I can’t… I can’t do this anymore.”

Her hands gripped the edge of the roof tighter, her knuckles turning white. She didn’t look at him, didn’t dare show just how broken she felt in that moment. But the weight of her words hung in the air between them, raw and painful.

Shinyu took a slow breath, and for a moment, he was silent. Then, he shifted slightly closer, his arm brushing hers. “You’re not alone in that ocean, Kotoko,” he said softly, his voice rough but gentle. “I’m right here. I’ll catch you if you fall. Hell, I’d do anything for you. Say the word, and I’d fucking fight GOD if that’s what it takes.”

Kotoko’s breath hitched, but she didn’t respond.

“I mean it,” Shinyu continued, his tone serious despite the absurdity of his words. “You feel like you’re drowning? Then I’ll dive in after you. Whatever it takes, Kotoko. You don’t have to fight this on your own. I promise this right now, it doesn’t matter what it is, I’ll help you. In this life or our next, I’ll find you and help you then too.”

His hand slowly reached out, gently resting on top of hers. She didn’t pull away, didn’t tell him to stop. It was the smallest thing—a touch, barely there—but it anchored her, kept her from slipping any further into the abyss she was staring into.

“I’ve seen you fight through hell,” Shinyu murmured. “I’ve seen you rise up every time they tried to push you down. You’re stronger than this darkness, Kotoko. And if you can’t see that right now, then I’ll see it for you.”

His words wrapped around her, pulling her out of the depths she was sinking into, even if just a little. She still felt the crushing weight of it all, the exhaustion that clawed at her insides, but there was something in his voice that kept her tethered. The way he said he’d fight God if he had to—so stupid, so him—but it made her want to believe, even if only for a moment.

A small, shaky breath escaped her lips, and her grip on the ledge loosened ever so slightly.

“I don’t know if I can keep doing this,” she whispered, her voice barely audible.

“You don’t have to,” Shinyu said, his voice steady. “Not alone. You’ve got me. And I’m not going anywhere. You could scream at me, call me every name under the sun, push me away, but I’d still be right here. Because you matter to me. More than you’ll ever know. You shouldn’t be here. You have.. a light, it’s still bright despite everything, but even after all that happened.. you still choose to try to dim it. The mafia isn’t a place for you.”

Kotoko closed her eyes, her heart aching at his words. There was a part of her that wanted to push him away, to retreat into that darkness where no one could reach her. But then there was another part—a smaller, quieter part—that didn’t want to be alone anymore, that wanted to believe him.

For the first time that night, she let herself lean into his presence, just a little. She didn’t have the energy to say anything else, but the weight of the ocean inside her felt just a little lighter with him by her side.

“I’m still here,” Shinyu whispered, his voice like a lifeline in the dark. “And I’ll keep being here, no matter how deep that ocean gets.”

Kotoko didn’t respond, but for the first time in a long while, she felt like maybe, just maybe, she didn’t have to face it all alone.

And that, for now, was enough.

@thetasteofbeautyandlove ITS DONE AUSUEBEBD

[dumbass-learns-japanese]

How are we doing this

So, I decided to learn Japanese again. How will I do that?

Well, one thing that needs to be noted is that I already used to learn Japanese, once a upon a time. I think I used to be N3 level, but it kind of all fell apart because:

a) My bachelor's and (first) master's degree used to be in Japanese studies, and when you are learning a language like that, you are rarely learning just the language. Chances are, you are also learning about the culture of the language, the society in which it is predominantly spoken, art, literature, history (boy, did we have a lot of history courses), geography (we actually had to remember each and every name of every region and prefecture AND we had to be able to draw a map of Japan and mark each region and prefecture). The point is, you have a lot of things to do that are NOT learning the language.

b) The pandemic and online classes. That is all I will say on this, You understand.

c) I was stressed with coursework and life to the point I could not sleep and it sucked.

I am not making excuses for myseld (well, maybe a bit), but the thing is, I needed a break. And that break lasted for about 2 and a half years. So yeah, your language skills kind of evaporate when you don't use the said language often. It helps when you have literally no one to practice it with too. Go figure.

SO, WHAT IS THE POINT OF THIS?

The point of this is to say that I already have experience with Japanese language, meaning, I do not need to relearn hiragana and katakana because muscle memory. I also do not need to learn some basic phrases, like "good morning" or "I'm hungry". I also realized that I have some knowledge hiding in the mental basement of my mind that I just need to take out, blow the dust off and reactivate it.

Thus, I decided on the following approach.

Assume I don't remember anything and start from the top. The thing is, I don't know what I don't know until I come face to face with a specific word, grammar, kanji, whatever. We are going through everything, no matter how insignificant or simple it may seem.

Do not rely on apps alone. Phone is too accessible so it is tempting to assume I will just use one of the many designated apps whenever I have the time. I mean, I will, when I feel like it. But relying on just the apps and my impulse control (I've been kiiinda obsessed with NYT games, to the point of unhealthy) is not good enough.

Textbook, textbook, textbook. We used to use Minna no Nihongo in classes, but I decided I am a bit bored of Santos and the spoon and other peopel (if you used Minna no Nihongo, you know what I'm talking about. If you saw the video, extra points to you.), so I decided to try Genki. So far, so good. The tempo is a bit different, but I enjoy it.

As for the apps, we shall use the following (I have an Android, mind you): Akebi (for dictionary, very colorful, able to add words and kanji directly to Anki), Anki (flashcards, though I have been lazy with this one), Clozemaster (I like this one, has grammar explanations, game-like, colloquial Japanese, very nice), Hello Talk (when I get brave enough).

Practice listening. I have to start watching YT videos for this because when I just listen to music I get distracted by the vibes so I don't even try to figure out what the song is about.

That's it for now I guess. Have to get brave enough to try speaking/texting in Japanese, and practice listening. Reading is so far good, writing too, I am pretty confident I could pass N5 test, but let's finish Genki textbooks first, just so I can say I actually know something, that I'm not just guessing and getting lucky.

Good luck to me.

[nihongo-lets-go]

Lesson 1, Pt. 2: 仮名 - Stroke Order

In part 1 of lesson 1, we were introduced to the Japanese writing system and its many different applications. In this part, we will delve more into 平仮名 and 片仮名 to cover the stroke order of the characters.

Like with any language that has a written system, writing in Japanese takes some practice. Below are charts that show the 平仮名 and 片仮名 stroke orders:

HIRAGANA

平仮名 is a bit more complicated than 片仮名, in the sense that there are more strokes to much of the characters. Hiragana is based on the brush strokes of 漢字, so many 平仮名 characters may already look familiar.

Here are a few words, written in 平仮名. Practice writing them, and remember the stroke order! 1. ひらがな [ hiragana ]

2. かんじ [ kanji ]

3. わたし [ watashi - "I" ]

4. せんせい [ sensei - "teacher" ]

5. こんにちは [ konnichiwa - "good afternoon" ]

6. ありがとう [ arigatou - "thank you" ]

７. おとうさん [ otousan - "father" ]

８. おかあさん [ okaasan - "mother" ]

９. ともだち [ tomodachi - "friend" ]

10. がくせい [ gakusei - "student" ]

KATAKANA

片仮名 has much in common with 平仮名, as its characters are drawn from the same root, 漢字. However, it's clear there are differences in appearance. While 平仮名 has curved lines and loops, 片仮名 has many sharp lines and hooks, and fewer strokes over all. It is arguably the easier of the writing systems to learn.

Like before, here are some words written 片仮名. Give them a go! １．ラメン [ ramen ]

２．トイレ [ toire - " toilet" ]

３．アメリカ [amerika - "America" ]

４．イギリス [ igirisu - "the UK" ]

５．コーヒー [ ko-hi - "coffee" ]

６．ドライバ [ doraiba - "driver" ]

７．デート [ de-to - "date" ]

８．コーラ [ ko-ra - "cola" ]

９．ボールペン [ boorupen - "ball point pen" ]

１０．パン　[ pan - "bread" ]

BONUS PRACTICE

Now that we've looked more closely at the 平仮名 and 片仮名 writing systems, and gotten in some brush stroke practice, let's try a reading comprehension exercise. Below are two crossword puzzles. Using the list of words that were provided above, see how many words you can spot. See if you recognise any bonus words as well!

That will do it for lesson 1, part 2! If you have any additional questions, feel free to click/tap that 'Ask Me Anything' button <3

Have fun practicing!

。

。

。

ADDITIONAL RESOURCES:

Japanese dictionary

jlptsensei katakana word list

FluentU katakana word list

[inanisomnia]

Hiiiii

Can you do some headcanon chishiya x reader where reader looks really arrogant but in reality is soft and shy?

Thank youuu!!!

lay me gently.

fem! reader x chishiya shuntaro

warning/s: mild profanities, slightly ooc! chishiya, mentions of ... (idk what's the term, someone tell me pls) forceful interactions... ??? WTF

ins.note: i'm currently reading tshoe (the seven husbands of evelyn hugo) that's why im not really active here in tumblr again... but no worries since i alr laid out the plot for entropy of chaos tot i'll upload it soon hehe

also if u enjoyed reading this, kindly let me know by liking or reblogging this post ^^ (only do it if its okay with u <3 ) ily all !!

- okay this is kinda tough but imma try

- we all know how deadly, and dangerous each game is in borderland and that's the beauty of this place – it brings out the human and true motives of each individuals ;

- and chishiya shuntaro, like the observant man he is, noticed you leaning on the beach's columns on the side, your left hand gripping your right elbow – away from all the jumping, drunk, wasted people on the dancefloor.

- you have a phlegmatic expression painted on your face, eyes lazily scanning each people up and down then switching to another individual then scoffing.

- someone randomly approached you, and he instantly recognized its someone that you're not close to since ever since you joined the beach, you never seem to approach anybody, seemingly annoyed at everyone's company.

- surprised, you looked at him up and down, eyebrows knitted together in ... is it confusion or irritation ? he can't seem to decipher what it is.

- you shook your head, and crossed your arms, and straightened your posture, away from him, signifying that you're not interested in whatever the man was saying to you.

- chishiya analyzed you closely ; you strike him as someone arrogant, and boastful – someone who's hyper independent, a woman who is a know-it-all when he first saw you at the beach.

- but are you, really ?

- the man paced a little closer to you, his drunken state visibly irking you as you step back the moment he got closer to you.

- you walked away from the man, eyebrows furrowed in annoyance, but you were grabbed by the wrist.

- chishiya didn't know what took over him, but he just suddenly picked up his pace towards you and wrapped his arms on your shoulder.

- "what seems to be the problem here, princess?" (but ofc in nihongo ++ with his hoarse, alluring voice, faints)

- you seem taken aback but you went along with it, "im sleepy. lets go?"

- wow

- just wow. chishiya was shocked by how your voice sounded so mellow, so soft, so tender - a complete contrast to his husky and gravelly voice.

- upon reaching a desolated hallway, he lets go of you. you thanked him and asked him how could you repay him, but he dismissed it by shaking his head.

- you smiled.

- and bid your goodbye.

- well damn. you were nothing what chishiya has thought.

- you have a tremendously soothing voice, the one that's not overly forced to sound like that, but naturally.

- ever since your encounter with each other, chishiya kept tabs on you every now and then, trying to make sure if you're okay and unhurt – from the games and the people here at the beach.

- sometimes he would go up to you to casually mention tips on how to win games in his own way. he would notice how surprised you would be when someone goes up to you unannounced, and how baffled and quiet you would be when someone tries to strike up a conversation with you.

- but with him, you seem to relax a little, and chishiya doesn't know why he's bothering to befriend you, he doesn't need anyone who'll weigh him down on his plan.

- but you're an exception, plus you're not a burden. you're intriguing and reliable, cunning, yet reserved.

- after a while, you seem to open up to chishiya, and god, he doesn't realize it yet, but he's falling for you, bit by bit. you were far from what he expected of you.

- he adores watching you analyze the world before you, he loves how tender your touch was on his skin, he adores your soft smile, the sound of your laugh.

- little did he know that he was abstractedly memorizing your features - the creases in your eyes whenever you laugh, smile, how your eyes sparkle -

- a part of him unconsciously swore that he'll protect you, and soothe you on all your anxiety-ridden days, hours, just as how you pacify all his inner demons that he himself couldn't understand.

- he just wished that he met you before waking up in this hell.

[seaemberthesecond]

Let me say how much I adore and am in awe of your writing! I find myself going back to your work again and again. With that, what are the chances of you ever returning to write more about Gojo and Megumi because wow did that fic just break my heart in so many good ways.

Thank you!

asdffhdhsjshlsfjdgs I'm SO flattered by this, you have no idea. You've inflated my ego to a dangerous size XD Thank you so much, I'm so incredibly pleased you like my writing <3

That being said, you sent this ask at the right time lmao. If you'd asked me even a week before, I'd have said that while I like jjk, its really not my primary fandom and I got what I needed to out of my system with Baby Mine. BUTTTTT, it's not a week ago and I have been in a jjk kind of mood lately and actually started writing a little bit of a fic even before you sent in this ask. Will it ever be finished? Who knows, but I sure hope so.

And because your incredibly kind words motivated me so much, here's 1k and change of a snippet. I hope you like it!

Warnings: Unbeta'ed and also Gojo's unhinged childhood

Gojo Satoru is a god.

On December 7th 1989, the heavens crack open and he rips his way out of his mother’s womb; his blessed, divine eyes open and blazing.

The world swings off its axis.

When he takes his first breath, the surge of cursed energy is so strong it kills the woman whose body he’s been pulled from and all her midwives. Her name is erased from clan records, her husband’s too – the man’s throat slit before he can lay an eye, much less a finger, on his baby. Before he can despoil that godly flesh with his mortal hands. 

Gods are not begotten. They have no mother and they have no father. He is Gojo Satoru of the Six Eyes and the Limitless. He is Exalted.

He sits alone at an elevated podium during mealtimes, the rest of the clan arrayed below him. They wait for him to begin, even the Clan Head. The servants prostrate themselves when they pass him in the hall, foreheads pressed to the tatami, lips moving in ecstatic prayer. When he is ten, the Clan Head’s children and their families present themselves before him and commit seppuku so he may ascend to his rightful place as heir. Their blood runs red and their cursed energy gutters and goes out, forgive us Rikugan-sama, for trespassing against you.

 He is raised by attendants and elders and tutors – the best of the best of the best. He can mould his cursed energy before he can talk, is taught theoretical mathematics before he loses his first tooth, learns Nihongo and Kugo and Putonghua and English till he can switch between them in his sleep.

But more than anything else, he is taught about jujutsu – about curses and cursed techniques; about the history of their world; about the great clans, of which they are the greatest, and the weaker ones that were exterminated for daring to cross them. Strength, his teachers croon, is the lifeblood of the universe Rikugan-sama. And he will be the strongest. It is destined, they tell him, it is ordained, written in the very stars. He is what they have been waiting for for so long – the first Six Eyes and Limitless user to be born in five hundred years. He will reclaim the glory of days past, remind the Zen’in and the Kamo what it is to quake beneath the might of the Gojo, take their clan to heights greater than any ever imagined.

He is Gojo Satoru, between the heavens and the earth, he alone is the Honoured One. He has no equal –

Except –

The Ten Shadows.

His teachers speak of it with pursed lips and tight voices. They assure him that the prized technique of the Zen’in holds no candle to his majesty in one breath, and in the same, drill him relentlessly on its capabilities. Something about the Ten Shadows worries them, though they try not to show it. Fools. There is no hiding from his eyes.

At night, when they think he is asleep, he sneaks from his room to the library – that grand collection that holds in its recesses all the secret and profane knowledge of the jujutsu world – and seeks what his caretakers don’t want him to know. The Ten Shadows is the anti-thesis of the Six Eyes, he learns – its counterbalance. Through time and space, history and myth, they are tied together. Where one appears, the other follows not long after. They find each other, always.

Where the Six Eyes is a supernova, the Ten Shadows is a black hole.

Where the Six Eyes is the blinding light of all the universe’s knowledge, the Ten Shadows is the dark seething underbelly of which nightmares are made.

Where the Six Eyes can manipulate the very atoms that make up the fabric of existence, the Ten Shadows deals with the absence of matter entirely.

Yin and Yang. Matter and Dark Matter. Equal and opposite forces, that together, balance the world.

He becomes obsessed. He plumbs the depths of the Gojo’s extensive collection for anything even tangentially related to the Ten Shadows – he pores through tomes of history and genealogy, researches the shikigami and their abilities like a boy possessed and comes up with strategy on strategy on how to defeat each one, memorizes the names and biographies of each user of the technique ever recorded, turns them over in his head till he feels like he knows them. And maybe he did. In another life. When he dreams, he dreams of wolves the size of horses with teeth like swords, of snakes large enough to swallow the sun, of the creak of an eight-handled wheel turning turning turning. He wakes, shivering with anticipation, a smile burned across his face.

 Somewhere out there exists his match, the only person who can truly challenge him. Someone the universe has crafted for him specifically. The thought settles the gnawing hunger in his chest that eats at him whenever the wind carries the laughter of the other clan children to the cold and quiet training salles where he spends his days. It soothes the splintering fractals of pain that race along his nerves when it all becomes toomuchtoomuchtoomuch and even candlelight blinds him till he’s throwing up and his head feels like its collapsing in on itself. Soon¸ he reminds himself, soon we’ll find each other. It is destined.

But years go by. There is no news of the Ten Shadows. Not even the wind brings any secrets to their walls.

At first, the elders gather in their dark rooms and hiss in worried whispers about Zen’in plots – they must be hiding him, they argue, raising him in secret to become the ultimate weapon against Gojo supremacy; plans must be hatched, contingincies must be made. No threats to Rikugan-sama’s safety will be borne, they insist in furtive murmurs as they hire spies and assassins and saboteurs. They all return empty-handed.

More seasons pass. Paranoia recedes like the ebbing of the tide. The elders no longer talk in hushed whispers. They no longer feel the need to. Naobito doesn’t have the prescience to pull off a long con, they agree smugly over cups of tea and rice wine, still in their dark rooms. The Gojo have triumphed once again. It is to be expected, of course, victory is their birthright. But still, it is good to be proven right so definitively. The cycle of reincarnation must have broken when the last Rikugan-sama killed their Ten Shadows, one speculates. The Zen’in have been punished by the heavens, another crows. Whatever the reason, one thing is clear: there will be no Ten Shadows to challenge Gojo Satoru. Outside, with his ear pressed to the wall, he listens as they laugh and congratulate themselves. His all-powerful eyes burn and he rubs at them as he slinks back to his room.

He feels scraped clean – hollowed out. There is something that feels strangely like betrayal sitting heavily in his gut, like a cherished promise has been reneged upon. How could you? he thinks, turning over on his side, tears wetting his pillow, blanket clutched tightly to his chest. How could you? I was waiting for you.

He is Gojo Satoru. He alone is the Honoured One. He is unequalled, inimitable, peerless. He is a god.

He grows stronger than his teachers, bats aside curses that kill men thrice his age, masters techniques faster than any of the Six Eyes and Limitless users who came before him. Even measured against them, he is something else – the shining star of the Jujutsu world. A world that will be forever out of balance, tipped too far out of equilibrium by the weight of his power.

Mere weeks after his thirteenth birthday, he wakes with a jolt, gasping. It is the darkest, coldest hour of the night. Something pulls tight at his chest. His attendant shuffles in from the antechamber, asks if he needs anything. He shakes his head and falls back into uneasy slumber.

It is December 22nd 2002.

Gojo Satoru doesn’t know it at the time, but the world just swung back onto its axis.  

[waitmyturtles]

Turtles Catches Up With Old GMMTV: The Bad Buddy Rewatch Edition, Part 0.5 -- The BBS Meta Series Preamble

[What’s going on here? After joining Tumblr and discovering Thai BLs through KinnPorsche in 2022, I began watching GMMTV’s new offerings -- and realized that I had a lot of history to catch up on, to appreciate the more recent works that I was delving into. From tropes to BL frameworks, what we’re watching now hails from somewhere, and I’m learning about Thai BL's history through what I’m calling the Old GMMTV Challenge (OGMMTVC). Starting with recommendations from @absolutebl on their post regarding how GMMTV is correcting for its mistakes with its shows today, I’ve made an expansive list to get me through a condensed history of essential/classic/significant Thai BLs produced by GMMTV and many other BL studios. My watchlist, pasted below, lists what I’ve watched and what’s upcoming, along with the reviews I’ve written so far. Today, I'm preambling a series of posts that I'll be publishing throughout November and December about my OGMMTVC rewatch of Bad Buddy and Our Skyy 2 x Bad Buddy x A Tale of Thousand Stars.]

After nearly a month of rewatching Bad Buddy and Our Skyy 2 x Bad Buddy x A Tale of Thousand Stars -- TWICE, holy shit! -- I'm finally putting pen to paper on a four-part series of BBS meta that I've been looking forward to writing nearly all year.

Before I start the series, I'd like to offer a not-so-quick preamble of how I got here. Before the birth of this Old GMMTV Challenge project, I was flitting and floating, enjoying a dalliance with Thai BLs here and there, while still mostly watching Japanese BLs, my entrée into overall Asian BL content. I started with KinnPorsche in the late summer of 2022, picked up The Eclipse after that on the recommendation of a dear mutual (@the-nihongo-adventure, I hope you're well!), and then picked up A Tale of Thousand Stars in order to prepare for my first live GMMTV fandom experience on Tumblr in early January with Moonlight Chicken.

That was the exact order by which I came to Bad Buddy, which I watched for the first time in January and February of this year, after MLC ended. I was so blown away. I thought I was a drama girlie before Bad Buddy, but it was like Bad Buddy had made me see facets of drama-making that I had never known or appreciated before. The act structure of episode 10 alone just sat me the hell down, let alone the brilliance of the overall story arc vis à vis Pat, Pran, the themes and motifs of intergenerational trauma and filial piety that I related to, down to my bones and bloodstream, and the millions of layers on this show that we could spend a lifetime parsing.

My first piece about Bad Buddy, published in February, is the post on Tumblr that I am the most proud of writing, my first post (as a relatively new Tumblr-ite) that I took days and drafts to work on. In that post, I worked out what I saw as the major theme of intergenerational trauma dominating the story landscape of Bad Buddy, framed in what I interpreted as a reflection of David Hegel's thesis-antithesis-synthesis modality of change in philosophy and art, as most poignantly reflected in Herman Hesse's Siddhartha.

In other words, y'all: I became a BBS girlie, lol.

And, partly in conversation with @miscellar, and partly by way of the just TREMENDOUS, TREMENDOUS amount of meta on Bad Buddy on Tumblr (whew, the MASTERS, @telomeke, @grapejuicegay, @dribs-and-drabbles, @airenyah, @dudeyuri, @dimplesandfierceeyes, oh my gosh, so many many more, I can't list them all!), I came to learn that Bad Buddy was a home to so many other themes, motifs, and references that honestly, my mind was blown.

For me, personally, it was ABL Sensei's original post on the newer landscape of GMMTV BLs answering to Thailand's seminal BLs, as well as @miscellar's post on BL tropes referenced and reshaped in Bad Buddy, that served as the original inspiration for the creation of the Old GMMTV Challenge project.

I needed to watch older Thai BLs to understand the landscape of how this genre was born and how it's changed and developed over time, to truly and deeply understand the impact that Bad Buddy had on me personally and artistically, and how it stands in the echelon of the Thai BL genre today, particularly by way of the influence of BBS's director, the brilliant Aof Noppharnach. I needed to know about the food that fed Bad Buddy to make Bad Buddy what it was as its own seminal drama.

So, after 32 shows and movies watched on the OGMMTVC list, I get to this moment -- my turn, my time, to pound out some BBS meta, knowing what I know now about the history of the Thai BL genre up to 2021-2022.

My four-part series of BBS meta will focus on the following:

Part 1: A look at how previous GMMTV BLs spoke to Bad Buddy in their own development, and to Bad Buddy itself. I'll take a look at the BL tropes that Bad Buddy references and reshapes. I'll touch upon Theory of Love, A Tale of Thousand Stars, Still 2gether, and many more older shows. I'll also take a look at themes in BBS that I didn't touch upon in my first BBS thesis from February 2023.

Part 2: In conjunction with my Big Meta series on themes of pain in Asian dramas, I want to take a look at the themes of pain, trust, and separation (sometimes voluntary, sometimes forced) in some Asian dramas, including Bad Buddy, Still 2gether, A Tale of Thousand Stars, Until We Meet Again, and I Promised You The Moon.

Part 3: I have had the extremely GREAT luck to engage in lengthy discussion about Bad Buddy with a number of Asian Tumblr bloggers, to discuss how we related to BBS as Asians, and what themes we could analyze from our culturally attuned and lived-in perspectives. In this meta, I'll take a look at Asian cultural touchpoints including inherited and intergenerational trauma; competition amongst one's peers; the nature of secret-keeping and what's "acceptable" to explicitly talk about in Asian family systems; and much more. (I may need to split this post into two, we'll see!)

Part 4: I'll offer some thoughts, based off of the Pain, Trust, and Separation Big Meta and the BBS Asian Cultural Touchpoints meta, on Pran leaving for Singapore, and how Thai vs. international audiences may interpret his decision to leave Thailand for two years.

I'm late to the BBS meta game, but there's no time like the present to catch the hell up. I'm happy to celebrate Bad Buddy's two-year anniversary this way, and I'm really excited that the OGMMTVC allows me to do so.

Part 1 drops later this week. Meet me at Wai's bar for a chit-chat -- and thank you for reading along!

(Tagging @dribs-and-drabbles by request! If you'd like to be tagged, please let me know! <3 )

[Here's the complete OGMMTVC watchlist as it stands today. For a more accurate look at what I've watched, please mosey over to this link!

1) The Love of Siam (2007) (movie) (review here) 2) My Bromance (2014) (movie) (review here) 3) Love Sick and Love Sick 2 (2014 and 2015) (review here) 4) Gay OK Bangkok Season 1 (2016) (a non-BL queer series directed by Jojo Tichakorn and written by Aof Noppharnach) (review here) 5) Make It Right (2016) (review here) 6) SOTUS (2016-2017) (review here) 7) Gay OK Bangkok Season 2 (2017) (a non-BL queer series directed by Jojo Tichakorn and written by Aof Noppharnach) (review here) 8) Make It Right 2 (2017) (review here) 9) Together With Me (2017) (review here) 10) SOTUS S/Our Skyy x SOTUS (2017-2018) (review here) 11) Love By Chance (2018) (review here) 12) Kiss Me Again: PeteKao cuts (2018) (no review) 13) He’s Coming To Me (2019) (review here) 14) Dark Blue Kiss (2019) and Our Skyy x Kiss Me Again (2018) (review here) 15) TharnType (2019-2020) (review here) 16) Senior Secret Love: Puppy Honey (OffGun BL cuts) (2016 and 2017) (no review) 17) Theory of Love (2019) (review here) 18) 3 Will Be Free (2019) (a non-BL and an important harbinger of things to come in 2019 and beyond re: Jojo Tichakorn pushing queer content in non-BLs) (review here) 19) Dew the Movie (2019) (review here) 20) Until We Meet Again (2019-2020) (review here) (and notes on my UWMA rewatch here) 21) 2gether (2020) and Still 2gether (2020) (review here) 22) I Told Sunset About You (2020) (review here) 23) YYY (2020, out of chronological order) (review here) 24) Manner of Death (2020-2021) (not a true BL, but a MaxTul queer/gay romance set within a genre-based show that likely influenced Not Me and KinnPorsche) (review here) 25) A Tale of Thousand Stars (2021) (review here) 26) A Tale of Thousand Stars (2021) OGMMTVC Fastest Rewatch Known To Humankind For The Sake Of Rewatching Our Skyy 2 x BBS x ATOTS (re-review here) 27) Lovely Writer (2021) (review here) 28) Last Twilight in Phuket (2021) (the mini-special before IPYTM) (review here) 29) I Promised You the Moon (2021) (review here) 30) Not Me (2021-2022) (review here)

31) Bad Buddy (2021-2022) (thesis here) 32) 55:15 Never Too Late (2021-2022) (not a BL, but a GMMTV drama that features a macro BL storyline about shipper culture and the BL industry) (review here) 33) Bad Buddy (2021-2022) and Our Skyy 2 x BBS x ATOTS (2023) OGMMTVC Rewatch (watching) 34) Secret Crush On You (2022) [watching for Cheewin’s trajectory of studying queer joy from Make It Right (high school), to SCOY (college), to Bed Friend (working adults)] 35) KinnPorsche (2022) (tag here) 36) KinnPorsche (2022) OGMMTVC Fastest Rewatch Known To Humankind For the Sake of Re-Analyzing the KP Cultural Zeitgeist 37) The Eclipse (2022) (tag here) 38) The Eclipse OGMMTVC Rewatch For the Sake of Re-Analyzing an Politics-Focused Show After Not Me 39) GAP (2022-2023) (Thailand’s first GL) 40) My School President (2022-2023) and Our Skyy 2 x My School President (2023) 41) Moonlight Chicken (2023) (tag here) 42) Bed Friend (2023) (tag here) (Cheewin’s latest show, depicting a queer joy journey among working adults) 43) Be My Favorite (2023) (tag here) (I’m including this for BMF’s sophisticated commentary on Krist’s career past as a BL icon) 44) Wedding Plan (2023) (Recommended as an important trajectory in the course of MAME’s work and influence from TharnType) 45) Only Friends (2023) (tag here)]

[ikuzeminna]

Hi! How did you learn to read Japanese? If I'm not wrong that you do, is the Japanese depiction of the GW characters' personalities different from their Western depictions?

Hey! Learning how to read Japanese is definitely an adventure in and of itself. For me, I had learned how to read and write hiragana and katakana from the Yoshida Institute’s site long before smartphones existed, along with a few kanji. I would use hiragana for my cheat sheets at school. (Yes, I learned a whole different alphabet just to cheat at history and geography instead of simply studying for my exams like a sensible person, even though I realized it was way more effort. I'm not exactly smart.) I started learning kanji properly years later with the kanji learning app Japanese Kanji Study, which I can't recommend enough, then took a brief language course and then accidentally ended up studying Japanese in college for 1.5 years, which is where I learned all my beginner's grammar (みんなの日本語 anyone?) and, as is totally apt for a beginner, hentaigana.

It’s funny when you can't string five sentences together without issue, but can make out Nobunaga's scribbling, something many natives are incapable of. Great, balanced education you thought up there, folks.

At least I got a laugh out of one Ranma ½ episode where Ranma found Kuno’s journal entry and couldn’t read it because of course that doofus would write it in the most archaic manner possible. 

Anyway, as far as reading aids go, I’m just gonna plug everything I’ve used over the years for anyone interested. The Firefox extension 10ten reader has been a lifesaver, as has been Jisho. When it comes to comprehension, Google translate is dog crap. I’d recommend Papago, which must have been trained specifically on East Asian languages as the results are much better. Not perfect, but better in my experience. Google translate has long incorporated OCR (image to text) so it may be less useful, but I’m very fond of the no-install Capture2Text which can convert manga speech bubbles to text, provided the scans are clean enough to read the kanji.

For grammar, I stuck to Minna No Nihongo. Bought all the books and slowly work through the lessons now.

The most valuable asset though is having a fluent or native speaker you can ask. Nuance is impossible to grasp if no one explains it to you. Even with vocab, you’ll run into plenty of words with the same meaning. Dictionaries often don’t distinguish in those cases. Having someone you can ask makes learning a lot easier.

Now for the Gundam Wing part of your question.

I’m not exactly sure what you mean by Japanese and Western depictions, or rather who you mean. If we’re talking official sub vs. dub then yes, there are a few differences. Heero isn’t perpetually constipated in the original (he actually has a sense of humor!) and Duo is a lot less flirty than his dub version. But it’s nothing grave. Certainly not Seto Kaiba levels of the dub rewriting his character to make him rant about not believing in destiny every time he opens his mouth.

Or Saber Rider being the leader of the Star Sheriffs. wtf I grew up with a lie D:<

Now, if you’re referring to fandom spaces, I am, without a doubt, the wrongest person to ask as I have never seen what the Japanese Wing fandom is up to and have never really been in touch with what the West is doing either. Have I seen fanfics and do I know 1x2 is the most popular ship? Yes. Have I spent 10 minutes looking at a manga panel, trying to figure out what is going on, only to hit the back button as fast as I could once I did? To the detriment of my poor eyes, yes. But when it comes to fandom differences, I think @muwi-translates could give you a proper answer. I can’t really say much as I’m not involved in the fandom in a way that lets me know such things.

I just sit here in my bubble, talking to myself most of the time.

[corvid-language-library]

2024 Goals Monthly Check-In

I actually didn't do this last month because I was ill all of February and didn't make much/any progress with anything so I felt it was kinda pointless 😅 Let's see where I'm at now!

Japanese

1) Reach ~N3 level - I've not really been focusing on this so much. I've started using HelloTalk again and occasionally trying to learn a little new N3 grammar/kanji/vocab, but I should probably study in a more focused way.

2) Learn 10 songs by heart to a level where I could sing them at karaoke - Oh yeah I haven't worked on this at all, I kinda forgot it was a thing lmao

3) Finish reading another book of short stories - No progress made whoops. I try to read articles on Todai/NHK Easy a bit more but I've not touched my short story book.

4) Finish both Minna No Nihongo books - I'm about halfway through unit 11, so I'm a little behind but not too much. Hoping to finish unit 11 tonight and unit 12 at some point this week, but we'll see what happens!

Norwegian

1) Read at least 2 books in Norwegian - Not started yet

2) Maintain an overall B2/C1 level - I think I'm maintaining, but I need to immerse more for sure

3) Finish Enjoy Norwegian textbook - I've completed unit 2 so I'm a little behind where I wanted to be, but I should be able to catch up relatively easily.

Life in Japan Goals

As with last time, I'm just gonna focus on the goals where I've made progress rather than listing all 11. So:

1) Get my hair cut - Did it! And it wasn't as scary as I thought it would be :D

4) Have a 10-minute conversation with a native speaker in Japanese that’s not an italki lesson - I managed to chat with the hairdresser, so I can definitely say I did this!

6) Go to the dentist - I've booked an appointment and I'll be going next Monday. Absolutely terrified :D

7) Go to a prefecture I haven’t been to before - I went to Tochigi last weekend!

11) Be able to point to every prefecture on a map and name their capital cities - I can still more or less do this, but I sometimes mix up some prefectures or can't quite remember a capital

Non-language

1) Read 36 books - I've read 11/36 books, which means I'm 3 books ahead of schedule.

2) Complete a first draft of a novel manuscript - no progress made lol

3) Comfortable two-block oversplit with back bend - my oversplits are there but they feel very tight and not comfortable, so I need to work more on them.

4) Consistently hold a handstand for 5 seconds - I can barely balance on my hands at all atm lmao but I'll keep trying

5) Noticeably improve my demi pointe - I'm using the strength in my feet a lot more than I used to but I'm not getting much higher. I'll keep at it!

Health/diet goals under the cut:

Diet & health goals

1) Tackle my diet soda and sugar addictions - I've come a long way with the binge eating! I bought a multipack of chocolate marshmallow biscuits and managed to just take one with me to work every day instead of sitting and binging the whole lot. And right now I have a family-sized bag of mini eggs in my cupboard and I'm managing to eat a controlled set portion each day. I still mess up my diet sometimes, but I'm very happy with how I'm doing!

Diet soda is still a huge problem though lol

2) Slim down enough that none of my clothes are tight anymore - I look and feel SO much better about myself! For ages I've not wanted to dress up nicely because I felt like I looked frumpy or chubby or shapeless in my nice outfits. But when I was packing for Utsunomiya, I tried on all my cute outfits and I thought they looked good! I still want to lose a bit more so that I can see my abs, but I'm really happy with my progress here.

[kikikokonihongo]

🌲🏕️🌳ᕕ( ᐛ )ᕗ🌳🐅🌲 It's always good to know exactly where you're going. And, these particles will help you get where you're going on your Japanese language learning journey! -📚 ー 📝𝐉𝐚𝐩𝐚𝐧𝐞𝐬𝐞 𝐏𝐚𝐫𝐭𝐢𝐜𝐥𝐞𝐬 に+へ(𝚒𝚗𝚝𝚛𝚘)

-💬ー (๑⁠・ω・๑⁠)[・▿・](๑⁠・ω・๑⁠) Particles に and へ may seem too similar to differentiate at first, but with some explanation and examples, you'll be on your way to Japanese sentence creating success!