There's a comic series here in Japan that's very popular with children ... and me. It's called ケロロ軍曹(Keroro Gunsou: Frog Sargeant) and actually only became popular as an animated television series. Both are hilarious, cute, and generally awesome. A perfect combination, I thought one day long ago, for learning Japanese.
Unfortunately the language used is more difficult than I expected, because the frog character (hereby referred to as Gunsou or Keroro) speaks in kinda old military-speak. But I've been making slow progress when I have time to be sitting for long periods of time with two dictionaries and a notebook. A quick web search reveals that since there is already substantial fan work being done on translating the animated series, no one seems to have bothered with the printed comic. I prefer the book and I need to learn to read, so why not?
Notes:
- I left the scans in Japanese format, which means you need to read right-to-left and up-to-down. The first two pictures in the gallery are "instructions" pictures. If you're not familiar with the Japanese reading style, make sure you check out those two pictures. They should help a lot. Above each picture you get a detailed description of what to do.
- I also left all Japanese sound-effects intact. I translated them literally and placed the translation next to them. Hence you get some strange effects like my thus-far personal favorite, "Bafusuu," which mysteriously represents the sound of bedsheets being ripped from a bed.
- Quick and dirty pronounciation tip for above-mentioned sounds: Consider that the vowel sounds in Japanese syllables are typically long. Thus the A in "Ka" sounds like the A in "Car" rather than "Cat." If you have any real questions about it (can't imagine you would) you can comment or mail me.
Here you are, the first six pages which just gets to introduce you to the main characters. Enjoy!
Comments
this is awesome... keep it up!!
your english is getting kinda fobby tho haha
Posted by: won | December 4, 2005 12:36 PM
Bafusuu could be a sneeze... maybe he's allergic to getting up in the morning.
Posted by: Nina | December 5, 2005 9:45 AM
Sadly, I'm limited by the space of the bubbles provided in the comic. Sometimes Japanese can say a lot of things in a little space, which results in a sometimes-fobby translation. Then sometimes they say very little in a huge amount of print.
If you're talking about my actual posts, well...hmm.
Posted by: Justin | December 5, 2005 3:48 PM
Um...fobby?
Posted by: IbaDaiRon | December 5, 2005 8:14 PM
Fobby...you know...like "Fresh Off the Boat"by.
In reviewing my post...it is not!!!
Posted by: Justin | December 5, 2005 10:13 PM
Very cute. Are you going to do more?
Posted by: teep | December 7, 2005 10:31 AM
Of course there will be more! I have pages and pages translated, all waiting to be digitized. I'm hoping to get a few pages out a week, so as to keep my readership anticipating the next release.
It's like a cliffhanger on a very short cliff.
Posted by: Justin | December 7, 2005 12:05 PM
I think it's popular not only with children and you, a lot of otaku and highschool kids who are into underground stuff(which is kinda otakish) like it too.
Posted by: annyomous | December 8, 2005 6:25 PM
will you continue to have the original japanese along with the translation?
ah... i see there's only the first few pages. i guess it looks like you will only include the translation. :(
maybe i can find the original comic (when i get to japan!) so i can learn along. i'm book marking this one, thanks.
Posted by: heather | December 10, 2005 12:42 AM
I actually had originally intended to include all of the original Japanese scans, however they are quite big and sadly my server space is running dangerously low. I figured if anyone really wanted the originals, I could make them available.
Mail me at shock_ez@shock-e.com.
Posted by: Justin | December 10, 2005 8:36 AM
That was cool. How long have you been working on this?
When did you actually translating?
Sorry, I don't know what you mean by fobby.
Posted by: Monster that lives a pathetic life | December 24, 2005 3:17 AM
It doesn't take too long to translate, but my Japanese isn't great so it takes longer than many people I'm sure.
I actually translated the first two chapters of the book a while ago, but I hadn't gotten around to doing the digital work until recently.
AS for "fobby," don't worry about it ;)
Posted by: Justin | December 24, 2005 10:07 AM