Psychedelic Mushroom
Posted: Mon Nov 27, 2006 6:31 pm
This discussion was moved from the chapter "Melancholy Of Asahina Mikuru"
Commonly known as magic mushrooms or laughing mushrooms, these mushrooms are known to cause whoever who eat them to fall into an insane fit of laughter. See here[[2]]
TRANSLATOR'S NOTE: In the original novel, Kyon mentioned something about Karakasa and laughing mushrooms, which I have no idea how to translate, so I opted for the closest meaning, the psychedelic mushroom. Can anyone shed some light on this matter? I would like to retain the translation as close to the original as possible. Thanks in advance. --HolyCow 19:32, 26 November 2006 (PST)
Well a Karakasa is just that, a Karakasa. It's a proper noun. An very specific type of entity out of Japanese folk lore. There is no other word for it, really. I'd leave it as Karakasa and link the text to wikipedia, unless you are attempting to hide the Japaneseness of the source material from prying Western eyes. In that case you might make due with 'mischievous spirit' or 'Goblin' which of course can't capture the specific implications of a Karakasa.
For the record many other fan translations and even some professional translations I've seen have left it as 'Karakasa' or otherwise substituted a silly description such as 'one footed umbrella monster' along with a translation note in either case.
As a further side note, I do know that sometimes rice, and I think onigiri, would be left as an offering to spirits. Whether or not one would do this for a Karakasa I don't know, but it might provide a useful lead for you in trying to figure out the meaning behind Kyon's description. Though my Japanese probably isn't good enough to help much by reading the actual source text, I can imagine a karakasa, which already has a rather silly looking face, would certainly be a sight to behold after downing one of those chili and magic mushroom laced onigiri, which it possibly took to be some sort of offering. (Assuming onigiri offerings are applicable to Karakasa.) --68.231.151.135 03:18, 27 November 2006 (PST)
REPLY: But I still don't get what a Karakasa has to do with laughing mushrooms. The original mentioned something about a kind of mushroom being used as an ingredient in one of Karakasa's dishes, or somehing along those lines. Since I have no idea what mushrooms they mean, I just took the most similar one - the Psychedelic mushrooms. --HolyCow 07:11, 27 November 2006 (PST)
REREPLY: From the sound of that, it might be a reference to a specific Japanese folk tale involving a karakasa eating such mushrooms. I wouldn't know what one that is off hand, I've actually tried to look for folk tales on karakasa in the past with little by way of results. Is it possible karakasa might also be a certain type of food or something involving mushrooms? The other thing I can think of, is the karakasa usually has a very silly facial expression, usually like it is laughing. --68.231.151.135 17:50, 27 November 2006 (PST)
