It feels like it takes much longer to write when a chapter’s 80% dialogue.

Not to mention three or four versions of scrapped dialogue.

By the way, I did some cursory research on cicadas before putting it in the chapter, and was surprised to find out how long they live. Apparently, some types of cicadas can live up to seventeen years. It’s really crazy — they live underground for 17 years, surface, live for a couple of weeks, mate, lay eggs, and die. And they all come up by the thousands at nearly the same time (within a week of so of one another).

Anyway, back to the story. Read under the cut (especially if you were confused by what I referred to near the end of the chapter).

First of all, if you were confused by the Pocky commercial reference… all I got to say is,

Pocky is srs bsns.

There are many more variations thereof, most of which are quite hilarious. You can find them on YouTube if interested. Just type “Pocky” into the search bar. And in case you’re wondering, the jingle they’re repeating is 貴方も私もポッキー！ (anata mo watashi mo pokkii). What is implied is “o tabemasu” after the jingle. It can be loosely translated into “You and I both eat Pocky” (implying more of a “will” or “should” than present tense, I believe), which is not nearly half as catchy.

Next up: Hisa addressing Mihoko as “Fukuji-san”.

As much as I want Hisa to call Mihoko all sorts of embarrassing nicknames so Mihoko can blush ten different shades of red, I can’t. What supports this most strongly is Hisa referring to Yumi (from Tsuruga) as “Kajiki-san” (in ep 25). Although Yumi isn’t Tsuruga’s club president per se, Hisa’s relationship with her is more or less comparable to Hisa’s relationship with Mihoko (as of now).

And let’s see… gambling is illegal in Japan, with a few exceptions. Most of them are government-operated (such as the lottery or racing). Pachinko parlours are not government-operated, but they are allowed legally. What I’m getting at is, mahjong cannot (officially) be played as a form of gambling, even in mahjong parlours.

There are cases where people do gamble with mahjong, of course, and can be typically divided into two types — one, gambling on a small scale that is 99% safe according to Japan’s vague gaming laws, and two, gambling with huge sums of money in a yakuza-ish or underground-ish, clearly-illegal-ish, police-will-bust-you-ish, kind of way. There is a considerable grey area in-between too, I’m sure.*

But with the one Hisa was working in, we can probably assume it wasn’t operated by yakuza and we can probably assume it doesn’t have weird ties to dubious entities or organisations. So Hisa working at a mahjong parlour like that isn’t bad in that sense, but those parlours are aimed toward older people (mostly males) as a place where they can smoke and drink cheap beer while they play. The legal age for smoking is twenty. And I do believe there’s some law that would make a fifteen-year-old Hisa’s presence in a mahjong parlour a bit iffy, but there’s a bit of leeway when it comes to that stuff. Probably because a whole lot of people in Japan smoke.

Also, Japanese schools have some rules that non-Japanese people may find rather weird. School rules and regulations extend beyond school hours or school grounds, and students are expected to conduct themselves in a certain way as they reflect the school they attend. (And it’s pretty obvious which school they attend, given they’re wearing their uniforms.) For example, I believe it’s a pretty common rule that students shouldn’t take seats on trains in general to leave them for others. Or students are prohibited from working part-time, etc. (The reasoning behind this is the belief that students should focus on their studies. Parents are expected to provide for their children through college.) And some schools have a list of movies that students are allowed to watch. And if the movie isn’t on the list, students have to be accompanied by their parents. Or they’re not allowed to go to arcades or karaoke bars, etc. (Rules are broken, of course.)

Oh, and Hisa is definitely 17 at least up till episode four. Which would’ve put her at 15 at the beginning of her school year when she was a first-year.

The Authorised Personnel Only Beyond This Point sign can be seen at 1:10:38.

If you don’t remember the mahjong parlour in question, you can see it at 3:21:21. If the times don’t match on whatever source you’re looking at, then just go to somewhere near the end of the episode. It occurs after Saki and Nodoka do their yuri pinky promise. By the way, 3:21:59 – 22:03 exemplifies why I love Itou Shizuka. (Yes, you get to hear me fangirl again.)

This doesn’t hurt either:

(I grabbed the screenshot over from Byakuya, by the way.)

And Mihoko may come off as… hm, I wonder how I should put it. I try to keep the content of what everyone says in a Japanese context, so sometimes I’m half-translating standard, set Japanese phrases to English. I try to find a balance between natural-sounding English dialogue and Japanese influence, but Mihoko especially may come across like she’s hemming and hawing by politely refusing things at first (but, as you probably know, it’s rather Japanese to do that, and rather reflects bad manners if you accept things right away). If you find Mihoko coming off that way a little too much, I would really appreciate it if you let me know so I can tweak a few things. I’m not too worried about Hisa as she’s a lot more easygoing. But if you notice weird characterisation from Hisa, please let me know as well.

Oh, and I vaguely remember seeing a kettle on a stove in the clubroom in Saki at one point (EDIT: Nuu… there really is one at 02:19:57…), but I think it’s going a bit overboard to imply the clubroom has running water AND a functional stove. I mean, a spacious Western-style building with stained glass windows (and a veranda) built on top of an old building that for some really odd reason hasn’t been torn down in over three years… well, you get the point. It makes serious writing rather difficult.

And given the gazillion flavours of Pocky, I must say it’s rather fortuitous that both Hisa and Mihoko like strawberry Pocky. What’s that you say? I made them like it ’cause I’m the author? Oh, pfft.

You must live under a rock if you don’t know what Pocky is, but here goes:

A few of the many flavours of Pocky:

And okay, you might not know Tohato Caramel Corn.

Picture yoinked from a snack blog called The Japanese Snack Food Review.  (Isn’t the bag adorable? )

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P.S. Hisa is a total yuri pimp.  (See section III.)

P.P.S. Itou Shizuka~ <3

きゅう～ん。

From left to right: Shiraishi Ryouko (Mako from Saki; Hayate from Hayate no Gotoku!) , Itou Shizuka (self-explanatory awesomeness, but she voices Hinagiku in Hayate no Gotoku!), Yahagi Sayuri (Izumi from Hayate no Gotoku!).

Am I the only one who finds it amusing that Shiraishi, the one with the most boyish roles, is striking the most feminine pose?  It’s sort of like the thing with Kaida Yuko.

And I realise that at some point this post derailed completely from “Ch.4 Commentary”.  But that’s how it rolls.

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*The blurb on Japanese gaming laws courtesy of とある人の優しさ。