Forum - View topicEP. REVIEW: Haruchika – Haruta & Chika
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GeneStriker
Posts: 156 |
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Yeah, I suppose, but at the same time, it's not exactly something you expect to happen, you know? One of those "sure, that could happen, I guess, but it won't happen to me" kinds of things. I dunno, I'm probably just talking out of my rear here. |
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Alan45
 Village Elder Posts: 9840 Location: Virginia |
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@Gina Szanboti
The whole draft thing was an ungodly mess. There were all sorts of deferments, they were not mobilizing any of the reserves and they didn't take everyone that was eligible. Eventually they tightened up on the deferments and the reserves got full (including George W). Initially your chance of being drafted depended on the quota your draft board had compared to the available draftees. Eventually they had a big lottery where everyone eligible got a number. From that you got a good idea of your likelihood of being drafted. Student deferments got a lot of flack since they tended to protect the middle and upper classes (poor man's war). In the first few years of the war there was an exemption for married men. There was a lot of noise when that was cancelled as many had married to avoid the draft. I didn't pay a whole lot of attention to the draft since I was in Navy ROTC and committed to three years active duty on college graduation. Many of my friends were extremely aware of all provisions of the draft. Bottom line, the grandfather would have had to be completely clueless to get drafted by surprise. Also the process was not so sudden he couldn't have left the country before they came to get him. Also most of the "facts" that showed it was the Vietnam war are wrong and those that aren't wouldn't be common knowledge to a teacher who likely wasn't yet born. |
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sunflower
 Posts: 1080 |
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You have me interested. Can you explain further please? And thank you for the ready of your comment. I was a baby during the war and don't know as much as I should about it, just what was filtered through my family. |
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Alan45
Village Elder Posts: 9840 Location: Virginia |
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@sunflower
A couple of things stand out. Elephants are not commonly associated with Vietnam. I can't say for sure that there were none there. However, in all the photos and news footage I've seen over the years no elephants have been shown. Basically if you see a picture of an elephant in the jungle, it would be reasonable to think India, Burma or Thailand but Vietnam would not spring to mind. The second is the spraying of various agents. Since the intent was to defoliate square miles of forest, they would not have repeatedly sprayed the same area. They did not knowingly spray US troop concentrations. Spraying around bases was done on the ground. Only Agent Orange was used extensively. I'm not sure where they used the other agents but I think it was only experimental. I never saw spraying, however, the news footage (admittedly in black and white) shows the spray as white. The few stories I have read of people who were sprayed (or thought they were) speak of a clear mist. I should also point out that Agent Orange is not a poison as such. It is an herbicide, not really different from what people spray on their patio to kill dandelions. While a number of diseases have been associated with exposure to it, none of them involve amnesia or memory loss. Post traumatic stress disorder is generally manifest by an inability to forget. It has been over 40 years since the end of the Vietnam war. Not even the teacher was alive then. Even if what they say was true, it was not common knowledge during the war or since that time. How would two random Japanese citizens know such things? |
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vonPeterhof
Posts: 729 |
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@Alan45 The teacher did mention that he had read about it, but yeah, pretty much everything else about the story raised my suspicions. Turns out the Asian elephant's range does include a small part of southern Vietnam, but it was the bit with non-resident aliens getting drafted into the war that seemed the most suspect - that would have at the very least caused an international scandal. I searched in Japanese for information about Japanese non-residents drafted into Vietnam, and aside from blogposts and forum posts from people who "had heard" or "had read in a novel" about this, I found a Mainichi Shimbun article (English version here) with a similar story:
The rest of the article details his return to Japan, his battle to stay out of the war and the media storm that it caused back then. So, unless there were others that had attracted this much attention, I'm guessing that this is the story that inspired the author (and I've come across earlier articles about it, so it's not like it only resurfaced just now). |
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sunflower
Posts: 1080 |
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I too thought it odd that 2 Japanese people would know much about the war, considering how much I don't know, and I'm older than they are. But PTSD is widely associated with suppression of memory and unwillingness to remember. Been there, done that. However, the elephant seemed a trigger to him so I don't understand how he could keep paintings of it and suppress memories of that time. I'd think he'd avoid triggers. When they said PTSD though I was thinking that he was at the point of working through the problem and that can involve facing triggers. I don't know, there's not a lot there to go on. Thank you for all the information! 
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Shaterri
Posts: 173 |
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The best part by far of episode 6 for me (and I'm not going to wade into the fascinating mess that is episode 5) was that it actually showed Chika as a competent character in her own right. I don't mind (too much) having Haruta be the 'smart one', but the characters were frankly feeling a little too one-dimesnional in their interactions. As cliche as it might be to have this sort of 'we all have things we're the expert on' episode, that doesn't mean that it isn't welcome. And I agree with the reviewer that the prickliness was a nice touch; this show has been shaping up to be fun, sweet, but eminently forgettable, and - well, this doesn't really change that. But it adds a nice little touch of flavor along the way.
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Gina Szanboti
Posts: 11354 |
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Have those string and cup things ever worked, even when your hearing is great? I'm totally not buying the party line setup. She would've done better cutting the bottom off and holding it to her ear to simulate one of these. Or since she's got the music room right there, she could've gone this route!
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GeneStriker
Posts: 156 |
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They worked fine for me when I was little... I'm a little sketchy on the string-cup web, though. |
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Gina Szanboti
Posts: 11354 |
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If the string was long enough to bother with in the first place (ie, they weren't sitting right next to you, like they were in the episode), the problem was keeping tension on the string without pulling it through the cup. Everything just came through garbled.
Trying to keep tension in five directions at once would pretty much be impossible. Not to mention unnecessary for the two standing next to her left ear. |
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Hameyadea
 Posts: 3679 |
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It might be a bit more time-consuming, but what happened to non-verbal communication, like SMS and emails?
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D00dleB0Y
 Posts: 120 |
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Did we miss something here? Goto is apparently a member of the group now. I thought she was still a middle schooler? Did the next school year happen offscreen without a single mention or can middle schoolers join the club?
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Hameyadea
Posts: 3679 |
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Each episode takes place a few weeks/months after the previous one; during the 1st episode, the main group was just beginning their first high-school year. In episode #7, they are in their 2nd year. |
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D00dleB0Y
Posts: 120 |
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They should explain things like this. They are literally rushing the story. |
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TBY
Posts: 3 |
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The narration at the start of every episode does exactly that. Maybe you should pay more attention. |
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