Golden Time:Volume1 Translator's Notes

Translator's Notes

"wa" - "re"

↑ わ (wa) and れ (re) look similar in Japanese.

Yanagisawa Mitsuo

↑Banri and Mitsuo are explaining which Japanese characters make up their names. This was translated as reciting a phrase that describes the meaning behind their full names. Tada Banri is 多 = Ta (many), 田 = Ta (rice field, the t changes to d in this combination), 万 = Man (Ten thousand or myriads), 里 = Ri (either an old unit of area, or village). Yanagisawa Mitsuo is 柳 = Yanagi (Willow Tree), 澤 = Sawa (Marsh), 光 = Hikari (Light), 央 = Hiroshi (Center). The last two symbols, taken together, wind up being pronounced Mitsuo.

Escalator

↑ Refers to the "escalator"/"elevator" system, in which graduates from a high school attached to a university can enter it without admission exam.

Don Doko Don

↑Banri's mind is going ballistic here, and suddenly he's thinking in terms of a video game, Don Doko Don. The first phrase is actually a sound effect, referencing the name of the video game. The second refers to a kind of high jump.

Ham Man

↑ハムの人 (Ham Man) is a catch phrase coined by Tetsuya Bessho, the actor in a CM for Marudai Shokuhin, a company mainly selling ham and sausages. The CM featured Tetsuya holding a huge box of ham, thus the resemblance to Yanagisawa with the huge bouquet of roses.

Hayashida

↑The kanji '林' (forest) in '林田' (forest rice paddy) can be read two ways: Hayashi (Kun reading), and Rin (On reading), so her name can be read both as Hayashida and Rinda (Linda), what is to the Japanese a foreign name.

Satou-san

↑ Sato Foods Co. is a company specializing on cooked rice. One of their products, called Satou's meal (サトウのごはん) has gained popularity mainly among people living alone or without any children, because it can be prepared easily and fast.

Crabs

↑The type of crab was named: Floral Egg Crab. The species is very poisonous, and there is no known antidote.

Ruu Ooshiba

↑ Ruu Ooshiba (ルー大柴) is a Japanese actor and comedian, famous for mixing many, many many manyyy English words into his speech.

Omaken

↑ Omaken (おまけん) is an abbreviation from お祭り文化研究会 (Omatsuri Bunka Kenkyuukai), or "Festival Research Club".

Naki Sumo

↑ Every year in the Sensouji Temple, in Tokyo, there is a baby-crying festival held. Babies are brought there by their parents to be scared into crying by amateur sumo wrestlers, two at a time with a judge watching and scoring. The baby who cries longest and loudest wins. The parents believe this strengthens the babies and wards off evil spirits.

'Re'

↑ The "syllable" repeatedly refered to here is a single Japanese character, 'れ', which is a syllable-like sound 're' or 'le', because of how the 'r' letter in Japanese is a sort of mix between the English 'r' and 'l' characters. In any case, the author is playing here, and the 're' words used are: レンコン (renkon: lotus root), レモン (remon: lemon), レンタル (rentaru: rental), 連獅子 (renjishi: a kubuki dance) and レンジ (renji: range/microwave). I took some liberties in the translation here in order to (sort of) preserve the word play.

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