And screeched to a halt at the sight of the bare
blade of Nodoka's katana hovering, steady, inches from
his furry throat.
Not sure where this comes from. In canon, Nodoka needs
a VERY good reason to do this. And, actually, isn't really
good enough with a katana to hold it steady 'inches' from
someone's throat. I suspect alterverse changes to be
explored later.
Well, lets see, this panda just whacked someone that looks
like her child, what would YOU do?
Well, Nodoka _might_ chop the panda in half, but holding
the panda at bay? If she really thinks the panda a dumb
beast, why does she think this would accomplish anything?
Saotome Nodoka, born of Saotome Kenji and Saotome
Fujiko. No other children. Suzuki Genma, adopted the
day before their marriage eighteen endless years ago,
known thereafter as Saotome Genma. Saotome Ranma,
Right. Like this. Genma is trading up, so he adopts
Nodoka's family name. Post-WWII, you can do this w/o
the adoption, just by naming Nodoka clan head on the
family register, but this is still regarded as 'unmanly'.
The workaround is to fall back to the previous system,
using the adoption to give Genma the desired family name,
and then Genma heads the new family register with his (new)
family name. This is what the Japanese did back when
the law said that the man's family name HAD to be the
new family's name.
*Sigh* My most fav. topic...
Japan's leagal System
While Japan DOES have a Law system that is very western in
its mores and codes,
Japanese courts tend to toss out WRITTEN Law for Unwritten
laws based on the tradional ways.
PLUS Nodoka is a VERY Tradional woman, do you THINK she would
WANT the job of Clan head?!
No; clearly the adoption path was used for Genma and Nodoka,
assuming (as David does) that 'Saotome' is Nodoka's family
name. (BTW, I agree with David that it's hard to interpret
the volume 36 story any other way. Other stories, however,
suggest that the name might be Genma's. Personally, I think
RT changed her mind, or hadn't consciously thought about
it until volume 36.)
Does the emphasis with which you wrote the question above mean
that you think I disagreed with you? (just curious)
Also, Female clan heads GET a lot of abuse. (if you're female
in Japan, def. a second class citzen in a lot of ways.)
(IF, and in this one, likey. Ranma takes the Tendo name {If
equal rank, who brings more to the wedding? AND how many
children in both familes...} He would be adopted, FIRST.
{Soun, Nodoka, Kasumi, Genma {and to a lesser
degree. Ranma} are all tradional in this. NAbiki would ALSO
push for it, due to the "dislike" of female clan heads.)
My own solution, as dealt with in "Much Ado about Ranma" parts
1 and 2 (almost two years ago now, [sigh; where does the time go?]),
was to have Ranma adopted as a Tendo prior to the wedding.
Given that Ranma is also an only child, I had Genma, but not
Nodoka, insisting that the Saotome name be kept (meaning, of course,
that I assumed the Saotome name had been Genma's). Consequently,
I had the adoption occur almost a year prior to the wedding,
against Genma's will, through Nabiki's machinations.