Author Archives: Lurkette

Setsubun

So, after my successful frantic attempts to translate all of Maro’s blog before she graduates ( 🙁 ), I will resume my frantic attempts to catch back up on radio translations, hooray! At the point of this broadcast, Setsubun, the traditional Japanese first day of spring (which is well before the actual first day of spring and well before it actually stops being cold outside), is coming up. One tradition within Setsubun is the eating of Ehou Maki, or “lucky rolls,” a rolled sushi comprised of various ingredients that are supposed to bring about good fortune. Rinapuu opens this show by asking if Kananan likes this tradition.

Kananan: Ummmmmmmmmmmmmmm
Rinapuu: Stop it.
Kananan: mmmmmmmmmmmmmmmm
Rinapuu: Hurry up and answer.
Kananan: Yeah.

Kananan says that she always ate them back home in Kansai, but since moving to Tokyo and Kanto, she’s noticed that they aren’t as common in this area and it’s been difficult to find them. This is sad for her, because she has fond memories of eating them with her friends and family. To maximize one’s luck with the Ehou Maki, it must be eaten facing the luckiest direction for that year (Rinapuu: “Which way is that?” Kananan: “I have no idea!”) and in silence. The silence part is what Kananan has always had most trouble with, because being around people and not being able to talk just makes her laugh. Then, as she looks around at other people’s faces, she inevitably mutters, “Somebody say something,” then immediately recoils in horror because she realizes that she just broke the silence. It’s a fun holiday for her.

Weirdos.

New Single PR

Because ANGERME’s first single is set to come out soon, Rinapuu encourages Kananan to talk about the songs so that everyone can learn more about them. Taiki Bansei is, of course, a Takui song that he wrote for his own album, but according to Kananan, some staff members approached him and asked if they could use the song for Ange’s purposes. He complied and rearranged it for them. Kananan tells everyone to watch MUSIC+ on YouTube to see some footage of the instrumental recording as well as footage of the members recording the chorus and other background vocals. The lyrics are also important, because they push the listener, especially those among us who are late bloomers, to keep doing their best because we only have the present. This also encourages Kananan, as it is particularly relevant to her and the reborn group.

Continue reading →

Hi, hello. My name is Lurkette (sort of) and I promise I’m not intentionally abandoning anyone. I’m just really busy. That said, I do enjoy translating and especially translating anything related to S/mileage/Ange (no I will not say their full name unless I have to, thank you), so I am going to try my best to keep up with this better. I am also a crazy completionist and I like having everything translated, but if you, the readers, would prefer I give up trying to fill in the gap between now and when I last translated, I will focus on the more recent shows instead. That goes for We Are Juice=Juice, as well. Let me know, and I’m sorry for the delay!

It’s getting hot in here

…so go buy more clothes. As the weather warms up a little, Kananan asks Rinapuu what’s heating up for her, and the answer is sales. This is the time of year in Japan when everything goes on sale so that stores have room to add the new year’s collections, and Rinapuu is taking full advantage by buying lots of shoes and clothes, as now all the sales have gone from 30-50% off, as they started with at the beginning of the year, to 70% off. Kananan hopes that she’ll take her with next time she goes. As for Kananan, the hot new thing is lazing around at home. She used to spend all of her off days going out with friends, but lately she has taken more time to relax by herself.

Kananan: I’ll just hang out on the floor, sometimes I find some cardboard and make a fort out of it and stay in that.
Rinapuu: …are you a cat?

In her defense, she has also taken up running and runs around her neighborhood for an hour every day, so by the time she gets back she falls asleep on the floor. End of story.

… are you a cat?

Continue reading →

International Travel Dreams

The opening discussion question is, “What country do you want to visit?” Kananan’s first choice is Saipan. Rinapuu does not know what that is. Instead of explaining what that is, since she probably doesn’t really know, Kananan details her plan for Saipan, in which all of the 2nd gen members go on vacation for a week in Saipan in 10 years’ time. Rinapuu wonders how old they’ll be then; Kananan says 30, but then she realizes her math is all wrong. Then, she changes when she wants to go from 10 years to 7 to 5 to 6. Basically, a year or so after they graduate from ANGERME, she wants them all to go on a trip overseas together. Rinapuu doesn’t know about Saipan or this timeline, but she agrees with wanting everyone to go on a trip or at least getting together again once they leave the group, however long that will be. Right now, even though they’d like to travel together, they never have that long of a break, and when they do have days off they spend them with their families and they aren’t all necessarily in charge of their own finances yet, so it just makes sense from a practical and an economic perspective to wait until they’re done with the group. Whether it’s 4 members or 6 or 9, they both want to have a fun trip with the group.

She just wants to see the Saipanda, because who wouldn’t?

As for Rinapuu, she wants to go to Hawaii. She notices that a lot of entertainers choose Hawaii as their destination of choice for vacations and end-of-year activities, and she reads a lot of blogs by people who go to Hawaii this time of year since it’s so cold in Japan. She gets really jealous over this, because she hates winter and wishes she could spend the whole season or even just live in a country with a more tropical climate where winter doesn’t really exist. She also loves the ocean so some place like Hawaii or Australia would be perfect for her. Kananan disagrees because she would get worried if her mother ever got sick so she’s going to stay in Japan. Continue reading →

Adults

This is the time of year for newly 20-year-olds and not quite 20-year-olds to dress up in their finest kimono and wander out into the cold to get a certificate confirming that they are now adults. It’s the Coming of Age Ceremony, hooray! Unfortunately, none of 2nd gen are getting to participate, and even though 1st gen should be, they aren’t, because their managers are buttheads. In any case, Kananan and Rinapuu talk about what an adult woman is to them.

Rinapuu: In any case, an adult woman is very calm…
Kananan: Ah, like me.
Rinapuu: …when she’s walking…
Kananan: Yes, yes, like me.
Rinapuu: …and she seems very distant…
Kananan: Mhmm, just like me.

Rinapuu notes that she has this image of an adult now, but she recalls back when she was younger that anyone older than her seemed like an adult, so she thinks that even when she reaches 20 and technically becomes an adult herself, she will have a completely different idea of what it means to be grown up. Still, for right now, the primary characteristic she sees in an adult woman is her composure. Kananan is clearly already an adult woman so she doesn’t have any impressions as to what one would be.

New Year’s Celebrations

It’s the first show to be recorded in the new year, and so they go over what they did to bring in 2015. Rinapuu wrote about her big event in her blog, but she went to see the Kpop group Supernova in concert. She’s been a huge fan of theirs for a long time and really, really wanted to go see their end-of-the-year concert. However, the end of the year is a notoriously busy time for the H!P members, between the Countdown live and rehearsals for Hello!Con and everything in-between, but the concert just so happened to occur on the one day this month that she has off. She got to buy a penlight and a t-shirt and had a great time.

Why are Rinapuu’s blog pictures so tiny?

As for Kananan, she spent her day off back home in Kansai, since they were prepping for the Countdown in Kobe and Osaka. This meant a lot to her since most of the time she’s in Tokyo, even on her days off, and she could go do New Year’s festivities with her friends from back home. She actually slept through the change between 2014 and 2015, which shocked her, but once she woke up she went to go hang out with her friends. They went to Nara together to do the first shrine visit of the year, they played with the deer, and they got to write down their wishes together. Kananan notes that this year is supposed to be an unlucky one for her, so while she didn’t get a chance to go see a Buddhist monk to perform a ritual to ease some of her future misfortune, she feels she got off to a good start. She’ll just need to be extra careful in February.

Continue reading →