----- Original Message -----
From: "Ookla The Mok" <ooklathemok@mac.com>
To: <ffml@anifics.com>
Sent: Saturday, December 29, 2001 1:48 AM
Subject: [FFML] Re: [Ranma] Let the Curtain Fall, Chapter Five: Shibuya
Lights, Shinjuku Nights

As you say, this sort of explanation is completely unnatural...the

"talking

heads" approach is rarely the way to go. With something so ubiquitous in

Japan

like purikura, having one character explain it to another would usually be

very

unbelievable, unless the one being explained to were someone like Ranma

who

might be less familiar with such common social practices. The best way is
usually to make it obvious in context. Even then, novels involving other
cultures, real or imagined, sometimes have a glossary at the back.

Footnotes,

however, can be very distracting, so if you go this route you can just add

word

explanations at the end of the post without having any in-text footnote
indicators.

True...I do find that when authors put in lots of footnotes (usually
author's comments, not real notes) it breaks the flow of the story for me.
A "glossary" or something like that would probably be best...

In this case I don't see the use of introducing the term "print clubs"

since it

is not colloquial in English. Using either "purikura" or "photo stickers"

is

probably the way to go.

Prior to my first seeing a purikura and having my Japanese friend tell me
what it is, I would have no idea what a "photo sticker."  I think this is a
matter of something ubiquitous to Japanese culture, but rarely seen in the
US...thus any translation has something lacking.  Consider it a vote for
"purikura" with a word about it in a "glossary" of sometype at the end.

J


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