Week 5 Listening

 

Anime: Kekkai Sensen | Blood Blockade Battlefront

I'm doing my listening this week on the anime Kekkai Sensen. It revolves around a young photographer named Leonardo Watch, who obtains 'the All Seeing Eyes of the Gods' at the cost of his sister's eyesight. After the incident, Leonardo moves to the city of Hellsalem's Lot, formerly New York City, to join an organization known as Libra to fight several monsters as well as terrorists. Libra consists of these superagents who have a blood art style with special abilities that help them fight these villlians. I really liked this anime. I had started this anime during the pandemic but forgot to get back to it. This anime is so awesome. The main protagonist isn't your typically strong and determined fighter. He's kind of weak and not that courageous at the beginning but uses the eyes he received to help Libra and eventually shows bravery in his own way. I really liked the different characters and their blood art fighting styles, very different than other anime powers and fighting styles. My favorite character is Klaus von Reinhertz. He's the leader of Libra and he's super strong, reliable, and kind. Not to mention, Libra, the organization, is also my zodiac sign! It’s officially Libra season y’all! 

I was actually able to understand a lot of words and phrases in this anime! The protagonist often writes letters to his little sister and he uses a lot of polite speech. I was able to note when he was referring to today, yesterday, and his use of particles in sentences. Also, the anime often cuts off screen to show the definition of a word in Japanese and that helped me learn new words and become familiar with Katakana more. 

KANA-BOON（谷口鮪）× ネクライトーキー（もっさ） - ないものねだり / THE FIRST TAKE

I was watching different Japanese songs from The First Take and chose to talk about my favorite one. This song includes Mossa from the band Necry Talkie and Maguro from KANA-BOON. KANA-BOON is one of my favorite J-Rock bands since they make a lot of anime intros. I really liked their duet together since their voices blend so well together and The First Take version sounds better than the recorded version (in my opinion). From the subtitles, it seems like they are simulating a couple going back and forth with each other and getting jealous and comparing that to their heart going round and round. When listening to the song again, I was able to understand some of the phrases in the song without even looking at the subtitles and even translate the title since it was all in hiragana. It translated to naimononedari, which means asking for the moon or asking for too much. Connecting that to the lyrics of the song and hearing the anguish and argument between the singers/couple, helped me connect with the song more and understand it more than when I heard it the first time.

じこしょうかい and Week 3 Listening!

 こにちわ！わたしは ウィトリーです。わたしは ノートルダムだいがくのがくせいです。わたしはにねんせです。そうしてわたしのせんこはじるいがくです。わたしはテネシー州 のナッシュビルから きました。どうぞよろしく おねがいします！

Anime: Beelzebub

This anime is about a delinquent named Oga who finds himself taking care of the devil's son, Beelzebub aka Baby Beel. He's navigating high school and daily life with a demon baby who electrocutes people around him, likes people's pain and mischief, and has other strange powers. Oga is trying to give him away to someone every chance he gets, but it only makes their bond stronger and shows him that he's the only one capable of taking care of Baby Beel. I have already watched this anime several times, and I love it every time! This anime is hilarious and action-packed while still having a plot, highly recommend it! I was surprised to see the different symbols that showed up in the intro song and actually understood the lyrics. To be fair, the lyrics are very simplified to symbolize baby talk, but I enjoyed being able to understand a little bit from anime now. 

Week 2 Post!

 

This weekend, I was feeling kind of down about being sick so I decided to watch my favorite comfort anime: My Love Story!! I first watched this anime back in middle school when I was going through a romance anime phase. This anime gave me everything I needed. It was pure, wholesome, comedic, deep, and random, all at the same time! Usually, I'm always watching shounen anime but this is the exception that I always go back to. The story is about this big high schooler named Takeo who has bad luck with girls because they all fall in love with his best friend Suna. One day, he saves this girl named Yamato on the train and she falls in love with him but he thinks she's in love with Suna. Suna tricks Yamato into confessing her feelings to Takeo and they end up together. The story then unfolds with unrequited love, family emergencies, rivals, misunderstandings, etc. Ughhh, chef's kiss!

As for how Hiragana and Chapter 2 is going, I can't lie and say that it is not hard. I'm still trying to memorize the symbols and learn how to decipher the audio materials. However, I know that with due practice and diligence, I will get the hang of it! My handwriting is getting better and I practice my diction a lot. As much as there is of things that I need to work on, there also things that I do well. I hope that anybody else struggling or needing any encouragement focus on the things they are doing well and reach out for help when needed. For me and everyone else: がんばれ！📣