Daily Thread: simple questions, comments that don’t need their own posts, and first time posters go here (August 10, 2022)

6 comments

1. I recently came across some works from 金子みすゞ, and I’ve really enjoyed the ones I can read (of note, there’s something incredibly charming to me about 私と小鳥と鈴と).
   I’m curious if anybody has some suggestions for poets or poetry they’ve enjoyed, either for the material itself or for its instructive merit.

2. I was wondering about this:

   > まだまだこれから発展していく、未来に希望のある村だ。

   > …とはいえ、そんなに大きくない、のであって、狭いわけじゃない。

   For context, it’s describing a small village in a book, but this is a new chapter so I don’t have a ton of context.

   I think this means something like, “The town isn’t that developed yet, perhaps [it can grow] as a wish for the future. However, it’s not that big, ????, it’s not small.”

   I was wondering what のであって means. I can’t quite figure it out. My guess is maybe it means “so it is” or something, because ので can mean “so” and あって might be ある.

3. Not sure where else to ask this, but there’s something I noticed. On Japanese gravestones, the writing usually has 「之」instead of 「の」. For example, 「山田家之墓」instead of「山田家の墓」. What’s the reasoning behind using 「之」 rather than 「の」? Formality? Superstition?

4. 数日すりやあいつら出て行くのにさ

   This gets translated to “give it a few days and they’ll leave” What does すりや mean? I couldn’t find it in the dictionary.

   [Context](https://imgur.com/a/hnbP3A6)

5. Back when I was learning vocabulary, I didn’t learn the readings so any words past N5, I don’t know how to read them out loud. I want to learn how to listen too so should I focus on my listening comprehension, learning the words orally, and just read by looking at the meanings, or should I go and make an anki deck to learn all the readings before listening?

6. In Attack on Titan, I noticed that titan numbers are often (always?) referred to with the counting word hiki 匹 , which as far as I know is for small animals. Which titans obviously are basically the exact opposite. I would think they would use tou 頭 , so why is hiki used?