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The weirdest thing: after a couple of volumes of Hikaru no Go in French, I started thinking in French. Manga kickstarts the third language centres. Howcum?

I'm so used to the idea that I learn languages ~~badly~~ through the eye, by reading and not by speaking, that I never realized before that French is the one exception to that otherwise universal rule. Never mind my four years of high school French, all from a textbook with no labs at all. I remembered as little of that as of my HS chemistry. (Well OK, a bit more than chem, because all the sciences were a bust for me.) My own party line was that French didn't come together for me until I took a night course in '79, and *that* was what did it, with its instant refresher of the HS groundwork. That the course was followed by a trip to France where I actually had to use the language escaped my notice. And that my French always degenerated when at home, in spite of books and tapes, and revived once I was back speaking French in France.

This finally explains why I can't learn French vocab from reading novels- or indeed, why I find reading French novels incredibly difficult- and equally, why listening to French radio doesn't start the language processes going either. I'm not a French reader, or even a universal French listener. My orientation is to everyday conversation, because that's what I learned French with. Manga gives me everyday conversation, and lots of it, and there we are: French comes back to me after, ohh, only about 15 years away.

Hikaru no Go is such an odd thing to be reading in tandem with 100 Ghosts. True to its name, Hikaru is all sunshine and light. Yang-er than this we don't get. I like it-- though I fancy, as with most Jump manga, that I like it better in French than in Japanese. There's something inherently unsympathetic about shounen manga outside Enix's game-based genres; all the Jump series I know give me the same vague oppression of the spirit that Readers' Digest does. Don't ask me why; they just do. Whereas 100 Ghosts is so yin at times I want to open a window or switch on a bright spotlight. OK, OK-- misty moonlight, vague things out the corner of the eye, vaguer dialogue and motivation, passivity, negativity, inertia. I got you. Could I have a little clarity here?

No, I could not. I shall keep on rereading the tanks and extracting a little more certainty and a clearer take each time, and eventually Tonkam will get around to giving me the French version of what's happening. Which may not be accurate but will at least be something to hold on to. Yes. So dépêche-toi, Tonkam- on t'attend.

(And apropos of my icon- damn, I wish I could read whatever Seimei story it was that Ima illustrated. Gramps and his shikigami and Kai and *his* shikigami are such antsy areas in the manga, it'd be nice to see someone with shikigami who knows what he's doing. This doesn't change my vague notion that the story was shikigami x Seimei: since it's impossible to do shikigami seme with 100 Ghosts shikigami, most of whom are bald with horns, I'd like to see it done somewhere. Yes yes, I know Aoarashi seme can be *done*, but probably not IC and doubtless not well.) (Aside from the fact that gluttony can work as a metaphor for lust-- No. No. Shut up and go away. I will *not* think about Aoarashi x Ritsu. Or red-haired youkai x Kagyuu. Even if red-haired youkai x Ritsu is practically canon.)

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It's true, that series is shikigami X Seimei. But it's all teasing and fan service, Seimei keeps on falling in love with the most unsuitable ghost ladies and the shikigami has to extract him from all these situations. You really don't want to read them. The pictures say so much more.

Rats. Seimei... should not be falling in love with ghost ladies. I want to say, with anyone, but at times I do want a change from the so-above-it-all Yumemakura/ Okano version.

Hnn, I can read it fine (no writing tho), but the rudimentary listening and speaking pretty much flushed the moment I stepped off that plane. Now, attempts at the Japanese larnin' comingle with it in incomprehensible ways. Bother.

I will *not* think about Aoarashi x Ritsu. Or red-haired youkai x Kagyuu. Even if red-haired youkai x Ritsu is practically canon.

Reeeeally? Oo. I'd gotten the other volumes up to 13 (auction, quite yay-some), but I'm putting off looking at them until some day when I have much much patience 'cause zomg so hard. T_T

attempts at the Japanese larnin' comingle with it in incomprehensible ways

I still wince at the memory of going to the French embassy well over ten years ago to inquire about EC citizenship, certain that my French was up to a simple request like that, and finding my brain chock-a-block with Japanese words and nothing else. Floundering fish time. 'Wakari-- eunh, ahh, d'accord.' Also- the reason I had to give up on Cantonese was that my learning-Japanese brain insisted that all Asian languages /had/ to have particles and that the verb /had/ to go at the end. I'd say 'he' and then hesitate, searching for the particle that must-of-course come after a Chinese he, and not at all prepared to say the 'is' that in fact was what came next.

Hard, hard, so hard, yes. Tonkam get a move on. Though you can picture read Mr. Red Gate and figure he's a decidedly bad lot just from his expression.

HnG is kind-of otaku ghost really. So one is driven to death by cheating rival? Does one plot gory revenge on said rival? Nooo. Instead, one goes about haunting a Go board, waiting for chances to semi-possess life weiqi otakus just so one could go on playing the game. Always wondered how he ever got enough time away from Go board to actually drown himself.

Chinese has no grammar. Subject is optional in a sentence. La, sometimes even the predicate is ^^;;;

Chinese has no grammar.

LOL! I think so too!

But 'not so!' claims a book I have on Chinese grammar by some English-speaking teacher of Chinese... Too bad for me, the book tries to teach by showing me how, which I already know, not explaining why, which is what I want to know.

HnG is a lot of fun and very lovely, and not so SJ as many other SJ titles. But still, it's SJ so there is no there there. At least in Chinese, unless you can make hay with politeness, which probably doesn't work in Japanese 'cause it's every day politeness and not polite politeness. I'm glad there is more there there in French.

I was thinking of whistling it all away and hoping something would come along to reveal what this mysterious SJ is - so I could pretend I knew all along. But. I am too curious. So, what does it stand for?

book I have on Chinese grammar by some English-speaking teacher of Chinese <---- Want to read! It's so discomfiting to know that grammar *does* exist for Hokkien/Cantonese/whatever, since one has been yammering in one or another for years to (equally) illiterate relatives and friends.

Oh, I'm sorry! Shounen Jump.

I'll look up the book and let you know the name. I think it addresses Mandarin, though, which may not be useful. You know your grammar instinctively, as do all native speakers of any language. Instinct is hard to teach to non-native speakers, is why I am looking for grammar books.

SJ: incurable manga leecher more familiar with names of scanlation group than magazines ^^;;;

I don't know them really, ergo want to see book. Bad example: Have trouble telling 'come' and 'go' apart the same as when conversing/thinking/writing in English.

But still, it's SJ so there is no there there

Mhh. There's certainly enough there in French, and I'd assumed from what scanlations readers had said that it was there in English as well. The obsession Akira has with Hikaru which becomes stronger from volume to volume, as well as Hikaru's growing mastery of the game, gives the series a nice sense of continuity, emotional action and forward flow. I'm sure it will eventually hit the SJ doldrums because that's what SJ does with its mangaka, but so far no complaints.

Except that I'd need to see the yaoi djs with my own eye to believe yaoi can be done with it. As ever, the gap between the canon shounen series and the fans' erotic imaginings about it seems unbridgeable. (Except I could see it happening no problem with Death Note, but that's a much darker series with protagonists who are much older emotionally.) But in general, I'd expect HnG yaoi to be the kind of parallel universe AU that YYH yaoi was. Looks like the characters, doesn't act like them at all.

gives the series a nice sense of continuity, emotional action and forward flow

Oh yes. THAT's all there. It's the leap to djs that isn't there, to my eye ...

Oh, you mean *that* there isn't there. No, it isn't; but one really doesn't expect it to be. SJ doesn't do Enix-type fanservice. SJ yaoi is generally all about the female imagination wresting the male text to its own use in spite of the male text's utter lack of cooperation. Go the female imagination, I suppose. 'All connection can be sexualized' works fine in theory, but when I like the unsexualized canon it seems uncalled for.

The first time I tried to learn Japanese, I found my three years of high-school German kept resurfacing. "Arbeitest du heute lange im Buro? No, no, dammit!"

Aujourd'hui travailles-tu tard au bureau?

That just came out. Not sure if it's even correct but I'd have to stop and think how you'd say it in Japanese