Maria-sama ga Miteru:Notes

Translator Notes

Volume 3

shichigosan

• Rite of passage ceremony for girls aged three and seven, and boys aged three and five. You wear a kimono to these festivals, often for the first, and for a lot of people nowadays, last time.

Volume 4

zabuton

• Zabuton are literally the square cushions that you place on tatami to sit on. But the cultural context of this usage is a type of quiz show. There's a decent variety of quiz shows and the likes that use zabuton as a means of keeping score (so the highest scoring people end up sitting on like a half-dozen zabuton), but the one most related is where the show's participants are all comedians, and as the host reads aloud a story or anecdote, the participants must 突っ込み, or interject in a humorous manner. And, of course, in this case, Tsutako-san fired off a good shot at Yumi. The culture of tsukkomi is a bit tough to explain, so I'll leave it to wikipedia, if you're interested, but hopefully you get the idea. [1]

kibidango

• Kibidango is literally a millet cake. The entire passage, however, is a reference to the folk tale of Momotarou. It's a tale of a child born from a peach that was found off of a river. And when he grew up, he became a downright heroic guy, and like all folk tale heroes, decided to combat the ogres that ransacked his home. Along his journey he befriends a dog, a monkey, and a pheasant, by giving them kibidango. Oh, and kibidango made Momotarou himself stronger. Precise details and further reading can be found at the wiki article. [2]

hachimaki

• A semi-bandana, semi-headband strip of cloth that you tie around your forehead. They're usually produced in red and white, because the most common cultural usage of them is during the athletic festivals for schools. They're sort of the symbol of concentration + perseverance -> victory, so you tend to see people put them on before they study (symbolically get yourself in the mood), among other similar activities that require hunkering down and grinding it out.

ohinasama

• Ohina-sama. As a quick summary, this is a reference to the "hinamatsuri," which is a sort of doll festival that takes place on the 3rd of March. It's usually not an especially extravagant sort of festival, being reserved and revolving around the hinaningyou (hina dolls), which are small ornamental dolls placed on a step-like display case. Each step is like a hierarchy of royalty, so the top two are the emperor and the empress... which in Japanese is the odairi-sama and ohina-sama. For far more information about the hinamatsuri, check out the wiki link. [3]

kakipi

• A mix of small, crescent-shaped soy-flavored rice crisps and peanuts.

gantan

• Gantan is the Japanese way of saying "New Year's Day." (元旦) On it, it's rather customary to have some sort of family celebration. Kouhaku Utagassen (紅白歌合戦) is the red and white-team singing match between popular celebrities, and it goes very deep into the night. "Otoso" (お屠蘇) is New Year's sake, and お重 is a multi-leveled meal box. Mochi (餅) is mochi rice cake, soba (蕎麦) is Japanese buckwheat noodles, ozouni (お雑煮) is "New Year's dish" in general, oshouyu (お醤油) is soy sauce, and nori (海苔) dried seaweed. You usually put grilled mochi into a sort of soup, and eat the mochi with soy sauce, nori, and in some households, dried salmon flakes. Shouchikubai　(松竹梅) is a rather odd combination of a pine, bamboo and ume blossom, which is sort of a celebration symbol in Japanese. Horigotatsu (掘り炬燵) is your usual kotatsu (炬燵), or heated table, except rather than being a mobile table, this one is more upper-class, in that it's a table that is placed over an actual indentation in the floor. It's built into the house, so to speak. Osechi (おせち) is just another way of saying New Year's dish.

kingashinnen

• Normally you say あけましておめでとう (akemashite omedetou) for Happy New Year's, but you could also say the obscure one, which is kingashinnen (謹賀新年). Means essentially the same thing, but it's ridiculously formal and almost never used.

hatsumoude

• By custom, people in Japan visit the temple at the beginning of the year to pray and then ring the bell. This is called hatsumoude (初詣).

babanuki

• Babanuki (ババ抜き) is every card in the deck, including ONE Joker, is split between every player (or team, in this case). In turn, each person takes one card from the person to their side, and if they have two of a kind, they throw that pair in the discard pile. The goal is to run out of cards first. And the loser is the one with the Joker. Almost exactly like Old Maid (Wikipedia lists it as a variation) except that the loser card is a Joker rather than a queen.

shichinarabe

• I assume you know of Doubt (it's like the English "Liar") so I'll jump straight to shichinarabe. Again, the idea is to use up your hand, except in this case, a full deck sans Jokers is used. The cards are distributed amongst the players, and all the 7s are played, in a column. Every player takes turns placing down a card that can be played consecutively. So, of course, at the start, only 8s and 6s can be played. And if you can't play anything, you pass. The idea is to use up all your cards first.

Volume 5

babashirt

• For starters, baba is a relatively vulgar term for middle-aged/old women. Usually rather insulting. Babashirt is thus a somewhat insulting way of talking about a certain set of clothing that is usually linked with middle-aged/old women. Nowadays they've become slightly more "fashionable" because of different colors and designs and all, but the name tends to remain. ババシャツ if you want to google image.

enka

• Enka, or modern Japanese ballad, which is generally really melodramatic. [4]

aisatsu

• Has it really been five volumes before this entered the story? In Japanese classes there is a generally universal tradition of giving "greetings" before and after each class. Sometimes it's led by the teacher, other times it's led by the class president, but the greeting goes: kiritsu (stand), rei (bow), chakuseki (sit). But since they're leaving, in this case the teacher only used kiritsu and rei.

gongitsune

• Known as "Gon the little fox" in english, it's a folk tale about a fox who loses his mother and struggles to survive by stealing food from the village. Except by stealing an eel, he indirectly causes the death of the mother of a guy named Hyoujuu. Realizing this, Gon tries to atone by giving Hyoujuu food, but then Hyoujuu is accused of stealing from other villagers. Then Gon tries to give Hyoujuu mushrooms and chestnuts, but upon discovering him, Hyoujuu shoots him out of revenge for his mother... before realizing that the fox was giving him food. [5]

ohyakudo

• Basically the act of going to a temple and praying for something. Specifically, the act of going from the entrance of the temple, to the praying ground, praying, and back to the entrance, and repeating that one hundred times (hyakudo).