Buying a book.

[elfs]

"Bae Yong Jun ga totemo kawaii desu ne?"

The woman operating the cash register paused in her habitual repetition of the credit card dance. The thoughts turning in her head were visible in that pause: who is this guy? His Japanese is serviceable enough for commercial transactions, probably a second-year student, but what he had sought out was obscure. Westerners browsing the Japanese novels section was rare but not unheard. Westerners who watched Winter Sonata, on the other hand, were simply not to be found. For one thing, the show isn't even in Japanese; it's made in Korea, and available in Japan only in subtitled editions.

The pause enters its second phase as she took in the picture. Groomed and business casual, wedding ring, iPod, PG-rated shoujo-ai kanji novel, Korean soap opera, "the male lead is very cute, no?" It was simply not adding up.

Instinct took over and she finished the ritual with a pallid flourish of the receipt. I took the book and opened it to page one: "Gokigenyo."

I love messing with folks' heads sometimes.

Comments

[elfs.livejournal.com]

Well, the Japanese is mostly translated: The first bit is "Bae Yong Jun is very cute, don't you agree?" The second is "Good day to you," said in a feminine flourish, and is the opening line of the book "Maria-Sama looks over us, Ep. 20: In the Library."

I should probably add that her co-worker had just put up a small poster behind me advertising that Winter Sonata was going to "be available soon" in the states, with a picture of he and his co-star on it.