First, I'd _really_ like to thnk you, Bert.. this
helped a lot, and some of the points you brought up I'm
going to have to address in the second draft.
At 05:35 PM 10/8/1999 -0400, Miller, Bert wrote:
Another chapter. Still interesting, but somewhat less so than the
previous ones. You may want to accelerate your pace a little;
this section had no new consequences to Gos's bath.
So it was no surprise that she was clutching a postcard that had
just arrived in the mail, smiling proudly as she read it. "Takuji!
Takuji! Our son is returning home!"
You missed an opportunity for a good joke here: the postcard has a
panda on the front, and the rest of the scene echos the very first
panels of the manga.
Huh? There wasn't a panda on THIS card.. altho come to think
of it, I suppose I could do a romantic hero joke with it.
Lilac smiled as the jet arrived in Tokyo International airport.
"Tokyo/Narita"
Yeah.. perhaps "..in Tokyo's Narita International Airport."?
While they often decried the outsiders who
chose to beat nature into submission (rather than living in harmony
with it), as a healer, she had a much less romantic view of
'Mother Nature'.
People who've lived their whole lives close to nature seldom
have a romantic view of it at all.
Still, I've run into quite a few back to nature types
who still manage to have a romantic view of it, despite living
with it. And worse, the puritan types who believe that the
suffering imposed by living close to nature is 'good for the
soul'. I'm trying to show Lilac as _slightly_ hedonistic here.
Any suggestions?
She laughed to herself as the young Japanese stewardesses
helped the passengers off the plane. It was strange to see the
respectful way they treated her as just another elderly (albeit
a gaijin) passenger. She still remembered the bloody days of the
1930's.. the Rape of Nanking hideously clear in her mind.
I read David Johnston's comment on this, and your response. I am
of two minds on the subject. By rights, anyone living in the
Bayankala range in Qinghai shouldn't think of themselves as being
Chinese, and shouldn't particularly hate the Japanese. However,
canon Cologne appears to view herself as Chinese rather than Tibetan
(no Tibetan would speak of "3000 years of ... history"), and she,
Shampoo, and Mousse appear to speak Mandarin as their
native tongue. One might suppose that the Nujiezu emigrated to
their present home from further east fairly recently. Anyway,
you are, in my view, more consistent with Takahashi (whose artistic
liberties with Qinghai are considerable, as Qinghai is not home
to the limestone crags she likes to draw).
That's what I was shooting for. I suppose I didn't quite
make myself clear. It's always seemed to me that the Amazons
reguard themselves as Chinese.. they do speak Mandarin.
Not that the People's Republic of China was much better. The
Nationalists had stolen everything that wasn't nailed to the ground
or protected by armed guards. But the Communists had tried to steal
the _souls_ of the people. To an Amazon, no crime could be worse.
Things could be replaced. A member of the tribe, lost to the lies of
Communism, could not.
I'm not sure this really rings true to me. Given that she thinks
of herself as Chinese (on which you seem to backtrack a bit in this
paragraph, BTW), she should bemoan the physical catastrophes of
Communist rule (the famines of the Great Leap Forward; the senseless
destruction of the Cultural Revolution) as much as the others.
OTOH, for a real Chinese, raised on a pragmatic mixture
of Confucianism, Buddhism, and Taoism, to think of Communism as
"stealing souls" is a bit much. A Tibetan, fine.
Well, here I was shooting for the tendency for the Party
to try and make the Party into Father, Mother, and God. There
were some points where loyalty (honest or faked) to the Party
demanded that children even turn in their parents for perceived
disloyalty, as proof that the children themselves held allegence
to the Party over that of family.
A grin crossed her wrinkled face as she remembered an old joke,
told to her by the American who'd taught her English so long ago. It
didn't work in Chinese, but in English, she felt it was a perfect
slap at the so-called "People's Government".
"The People's Republic of China.. the PRC. Nothing but a bunch
of PRiCks," she chuckled. "Hehehehe."
She'd learned her first English from a downed American flyer, a
member of the famed mercenary group, the Flying Tigers.
Unless this flyer stayed well past the end of the war, he would
never have heard the term "PRC". So he couldn't have known the joke
himself, and I find it difficult to believe Lilac learned enough
English to make up this joke herself.
Most people don't know it, but there was a substantial
population of American sailors, soldiers, and Marines in China,
people who had retired from the military and chose to take their
retirement there. They'd married Chinese women, and used the buying
power of the American dollar to set themselves up in various small
villages as 'rich' people. Rich compared to the average Chinese, that
is.
When the Japanese pushed deeper into China, most of them
rather stubbornly refused to leave, chosing instead to retreat
to Nationalist controlled areas of China, thinking they could return
to their lives once the war was over.
Many of them refused to leave, even AFTER the Nationalists
lost. In fact, a few trickled out across the Tibet border as late
as 1950, if I recall correctly.
This was a reference to that.
All Cologne could see was a chance to USE an American. To her, he was
just another asset to be used to protect the village.
This, about the Cologne who has now lived outside the village
herself for the last year...
The stuffy old battleaxe just couldn't accept losing.
Granted this is Lilac's opinion, but it certainly differs from mine.
We are talking about the person who freely gave the Phoenix Pill
to Ranma for giving her a good fight.
I was trying to show things from Lilac's point of view. She
is just as opinionated as Cologne, merely in a different direction.
<"We've got a mission to complete, Sash! Your addiction can
WAIT!"> Dowel reprimanded her.
<"But they've got copies of the latest 'Pokemon' music video,
Dowel! I gotta have it! I JUST GOTTA! Go on without me! PLEASE!">
Heh. This bit was funny.
Thanks. I tried.
Yankee
Carpetbagger School of Martial Arts," snorted the old sensei. "And
a more disreputable school there never was. You could have ended up
as bad as that young reprobate, Genma Saotome."
Norton South straightened up and stood proudly. "I'm WORSE than
Genma!"
Seamus looked at him biliously. "And you take pride in that."
"Well, I haven't sold my son yet," admitted the rebellious
student.
This wasn't funny to me, though it was obviously supposed to be.
Setting it in the U.S. was a bit of an implausibility, I thought,
for people who've supposedly heard of Genma. There is potential
in the idea of someone trying to be worse than Genma, but I don't
think your version quite works. Why does Norton want to be worse
than Genma?
They know about Genma because Seamus met him. As for Norton,
who's heard stories from his Master about Genma, he regards Genma
as the pinnacle of the Con-man's art. Norton is all of the worst
of Genma, Nabiki, and Happosai rolled into one teenager.
This is something that's going to come out more in Chapter
4 & 5.
A few moments later, the customers finishing their lunch heard
a rising voice from the direction of the kitchen snarl "LILAC?!"
(blink) Was this supposed to be Cologne? Raising her voice? Well,
we _are_ departing from canon, aren't we.
Hmm.. again, I was trying for Lilac to be the ONE person
who can get under Cologne's skin. We all have weaknesses, and I
want Lilac to be Cologne's.
I won't tell them, he thought. It's not like I have Ranma's
problem.. how hard can it be to avoid cold water when you _AREN'T_
a martial artist? They don't need to know, and they won't find out.
No problem.
* * *
Needless to say, THIS is a textbook example of the sort of
irrational, almost insane, overconfidence that's endemic among most
Neriman martial artists, American super-heroes, and Harlequin
Romance Novel studs.
Thank the gods it's not infectious. Let's hope it stays that
way.
Trying to write like Kenko here, I see. You're close. IMO, you've
overwritten. (You might try writing him direct, and asking him how
he'd write this section.) I would recommend cutting this to
something like:
They don't need to know, and they won't find out. No problem.
Right. Let's not disillusion him, shall we?
or:
Irrationalis Nerimanmartialartistus. Thank god it's not
infectious.
I wasn't consciously trying to write like Kenjiko here, but
you're right, it does come off sounding like a cheap rip off. I'm
not quite sure what to do.
<clip Norton and Seamus section>
I hope these guys are important to the story, because, at this
point, they're boring. Why should I care about them?
They will be, soon. Chapters 4 & 5. Heh.
Maiku walked back to Kiki's Copy Service (the name was
disgustingly cute, but they DID do a good job. And they did all their
own deliveries.)
Heh. A little overwritten, perhaps, for a throwaway joke. Think
about taking out "the name was... a good job."
*grin* Well, I was trying to write in this spot the way
Maiku thinks. He IS (or at least WANTS to be) a detective in the
film noire tradition.
her. In the kitchen, however, Cologne jerked her head around as she
sensed a presence that she hadn't felt since she'd left the village
to help Shampoo.
Another joke opportunity you missed. Cologne should have said, aloud,
"I sense something. A presence I haven't felt since..." and abruptly
darted away.
*grin* THIS, I like. A good writer, you are.. A skillful
joke this is. ^_^ With your permission, I'll try to use that in the
re-write.
<"Hey, _you're_ the one who's so gung ho on tradition,
Cologne,"> smiled Lilac. <"Gung ho.. heh. I love the way the
Americans manage to steal from every language on the globe. Even
ours. But I digress.
It _is_ a digression, and one which lacks plausibility. How can
this even be said, in Mandarin?
Cologne's eyebrows went up in surprise. <"Mace? Interested
in a man? That says it all, Lilac. This behavior isn't natural.">
<"What was your first clue?"> snorted the Healer.
<"You don't need to be snotty about it, Lilac. What I'm getting
at is that if it's not natural, it's probably magic. That much goes
without saying, I know. But have you considered the fact that it's
magic that we don't know anything about, and don't control?">
That brought Lilac up short. <"Oh, shit. I let that slip right
by me. I _must_ be getting old and senile.">
This discussion didn't make a lot of sense to me. Lilac knew it
was magic, but assumed that she _did_ know about it and control it?
No, she was being careless. She had literally dismissed it
as being of any importance.
Gos wanted to scream. This was impossible! How could something
as _simple_ as hot water be so hard to _find_?
Heh. Of course.
Meanwhile, in a mountain retreat somwhere in Tibet, a young man
felt a cold shudder run down his spine...
The Master sat there for long minutes, looking deeply with his
mystic abilities. Then he stood, placed a calming hand on the younger
man's shoulders and said...
"Oh, lord, it's those idiots in Nerima again."
Then he told his student to pack. They were going to take a
vacation. The Falkland Islands were nice this time of year.
This read like an irrelevant digression. Do these Tibetans sense
everything that happens in Nerima? And they're already thousands
of miles away; why go to the Falklands?
Actually, the Tibetans will come into the story later on.
At the moment, I'm just having fun with them.
Gos let out a small cheer when the Nekohanten came into view.
FINALLY, some hot water! He could go home and rest. Without a second
thought, he dashed up to the door and rushed inside.
<clip>
<"Come now, Lilac, do you REALLY expect the boy to show up here
in Nerima?
Heh. This was good. Very Takahashi, but you built it up slowly
enough to seem inevitable when it happened.
It wasn't as if it were life threatening. If this particular
seal blew out, a fire hydrant would spray water over a small side
street and perhaps the front yard of one home. It wouldn't do any
serious damage. At worst, a few people might get wet.
Don't you just love it when Fate takes a hand?
Another Kenkoism. This time, IMO, you got it just right.
Odd, I didn't realize that I was comitting Kenko-isms. I
wasn't really shooting for them, I was writing the way I tend to
talk. (Obviously, I'm a smart-ass in person. Ask Ethan 'Doshu'
Tsai.. I met him and his girlfriend last month in Denver)
I also realize that I tend to waver between the anime
and the manga.. I suppose it's because I like some parts of
each, and tend to mix and match when I think no one is looking.
^_^
Well, I hope to hear from you soon, and as always, I welcome
any and all C&C, in the hopes of imporving this chapter.
Take care, and see you around the list!
Edward Becerra
"Dreamers may die, but the Dream is eternal..."
----------------------------------------------------
Reach me by ICQ. My ICQ# is 13361581 or,
* Page me online through my Personal Communication Center:
http://wwp.mirabilis.com/13361581 (go there and try it!) or,
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13361581@pager.mirabilis.com
Edward Becerra eabecerr@henge.com
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