flemmings | (no subject)

I've been happily DLing and watching the 100 Demons files that qwerty's so kindly made available. And then carried away by the joy of watching Chinese fansubs on my very own computer, I went and reviewed those Woxinchangdan files that

paleaswater put up a while ago. (This because

worldserpent linked to another drama on precisely the same subject but clearly from quite a (cough) different perspective. I think I'll stick with Woxinchangdan, which is more useful as fodder for the body language of dragon kings.) (But seriously- *white ostrich feathers*?? Were those a common feature of Warring States court dress?)

In acquiring languages, any exposure is good exposure, but it would make me very happy if deciphering Chinese subtitles from the Japanese dialogue actually helped me to learn to read Chinese. This so that when a series is in Chinese only, I have half a chance of figuring out what they're saying. But truly, watching this stuff on the computer where I'm 15 inches away from the screen is incredibly better than watching on the TV. I suppose I need to learn to DL torrents, if Win98 will handle them at all.

As for 100 Demons: qwerty's absolutely right, it's the barest of bones with all the complication of the stories gone. 'There was a demon and I didn't catch it and it killed your father and took over your cousin's body.' Nothing about the woods behind the house and Ritsu's uncle going in and bringing something back; nothing about Kagyuu trying to save his son and instead killing his son-in-law; certainly none of that weepy scene between Ritsu and Aoarashi (who's no kind of protection in the drama at all: manga Aoarashi is at least efficient) nor the equally melancholy encounter between Ritsu and his grandfather. This is very sad. And of course the grandmother is all wrong, and Kinu isn't right, and the house is *not* in the middle of the countryside, it's obviously in Setagaya or somewhere like that, and I can't make out what dragon!Aoarashi is saying and even Akama- however beautiful he may be in RL- doesn't look quite right. Still-- nice to see the thing live and in colour, and I find Ritsu growing on me, oddly enough.

But yes, it needs to be an anime. All that stuff would have been kept in in an anime.

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Hi there... would it be okay if I DL'ed a couple of these files too? These would be based on the manga right? At least the barest bones of a skeleton will be better than none at all! ^_^ Simplified further by my barest bones of the language itself. Hee!

I thought that too with the chinese subs. Our anime channel here airs them in dual sound English or Japanese with Chinese subs. Pre-language lessons I would watch them in English first then watch them in Japanese. Now I watch it the other way round to see how much I understood. It isn't ideal, but like you say any exposure is good exposure.

Oh, go ahead. I used a free file-sharing service - no effect on me if 10 or 100 people hop over and pick them up. XD Sendspace may be problemtic for people in sg though, so if it won't let you download, let me know and I'll toss the two eps on sendspace on mediafire too.

Thank you...I thought it would be nice to ask though! ^__^

will let you know how it goes

Oh. Ohhhhhhh. OH CHEN DAOMING HOW MAGNIFICENT ARE YOU.

But seriously- *white ostrich feathers*?? Were those a common feature of Warring States court dress?
Eh I don't think so, but then what do I know about the Spring Autumn period. (Woxin is Spring Autumn, I think, which is before Warring States, with the Qin Emperor and all that. I IS EDUCATED BY PEDANTS.) It's so pretty and dramatic though.

Damn. Now I have to go find the dvds.

In acquiring languages, any exposure is good exposure, but it would make me very happy if deciphering Chinese subtitles from the Japanese dialogue actually helped me to learn to read Chinese.
Ahaha I'm trying to do much the same thing in reverse. So far the only result is that I'm misspelling my hanzi.

*You* can understand the DVDs (hates.)

And they're probably not ostrich feathers- not hairy enough. But still. Feathers.

So far the only result is that I'm misspelling my hanzi.

Heresy though it may be, would it truly have been so unthinkable for the mainland gov't to simplify its hanzi the way the Japanese did their kanji? Half of simplified hanzi do look like the Japanese, but the other half look like Palmer Pitman shorthand. Like, we need three systems of character writing?

And come to that, what kind of hanzi does LRD use anyway?

Heresy though it may be, would it truly have been so unthinkable for the mainland gov't to simplify its hanzi the way the Japanese did their kanji?

Probably. Anti-Japanese sentiments persisting the way they did, long after the War.

LRD uses simplified; most places except Taiwan do. (HK used traditional until reunification.) I find that kanji resembles traditional characters more; you're right about simplified script being very much shorthand. My father hates it; he thinks traditional characters are easier to learn because a lot of links between words were lost or twisted in the process of simplification. I can read traditional characters if there's context, say a paragraph or at the very least a sentence. I'm trying to learn to write traditional characters, and when I sign my name in Chinese (cos hanzi just looks better, "x" really really doesn't make an approximately "s" sound argh NON-CHINESE SPEAKERS CAN'T PRONOUNCE MY NAME FROM THE PINYIN) I use traditional characters. Okay actually only the surname's any different (it's the same character as the "ra" in rasetsunyo) and I tend spell it the Japanese way rather than the Chinese. The -- silk, is it? radical is a little different.

Pinyin is a pet hate of mine, even more than simplified hanzi; but hell- Chinese sounds and English phonics just have no common ground. Well, Mandarin sounds, cause in my limited experience Cantonese doesn't have the same problem.

Thread radical in Japanese. The traditional version of the hanzi looks the same as the Japanese to me, but that might just be the uniformity of computer graphics. The simplified form is... 'where the hell'd you get *that* from?' to my eyes. I think your Dad has the right idea.

So you finally watched these. Including the feather dress as well. Hehe. I think Japan will probably pick up Woxinchangdan, given that they have picked up all of Chen Daoming's historical series before, so you might get it with Japanese subtitles eventually. ^__^

The series Worldserpent's talking about is made in Hongkong, so it's Spring & Autumn, kungfu style. It has it cheesy charms, of course, but not if you're looking for inspiration for dragon stories, I wouldn't think.

I look forward to the Japanese release, if and when, though god knows how I'll get my hands on it. But tell me: I can't find the first hanzi of Woxing at Mandarintools. What does it mean? In fact, what does the whole title mean literally, because I don't get Great Revolution out of any of it. (The hanzi dictionary L gave me is Johnsonianly here somewhere, or I'd go squint at that instead.)

卧薪尝胆

wo means to recline, to sleep. For example the bedroom is called woshi -- the reclining room. Xin means kindling, small branches. Chang is to taste, and dan is gall. So literally it meaning to sleep on kindling and taste gall, i.e., great bitterness. It refers to great determination and revival achieved only by suffering. Alternatively it's the Chinese version of revenge is best served very cold. The two ideas which may not seem related in the western mind, but there you go. A very Spring & Autumn kind of sentiment, though the phrase in its current form, associated with Goujian, didn't really come into circulation until Ming dynasty. The English title is actually The Great Revival, which I suppose kind of makes sense, but in the modern Hongkong style of translation where everything has to make sense in bland middle American English.

Ohhhkay. Now I see. Look up 卧 at Mandarintools and specify only simplified hanzi and they give you nothing for 臣 + 2. Look up wo and specify both traditional and simplified and you get 臥, with 卧 shown in the compounds. Argh.

I still don't see how you get 'revival' out of 'sleep on twigs and taste gall'. Sounds more HK Subtitle Factory school of translation, where things never make sense at all.