Ki-84 Pilot's Manual - Translation Help Needed

[nrshida]

Yes I apologise I was in a hurry. I know it is upside down, I can read some of the Kanji.

I'll try again with a bigger resolution.

Just give me a few hours. 

[nrshida]

How's this?:-

[Midway]

I see this thread now, thanks to nrshida's PM. I'll try to help with things if I have some time - a commodity I have a limited supply of right now.  

The second page is upside down but we can invert it after saving it. Not a big thing.

We can also Ctrl + to zoom in, but some of the characters get fuzzy doing that. As our good friend Scherf says, the old kanji is different and seeing the strokes of a kanji is important. (Trivia time: You look up Kanji in dictionaries by counting the number of strokes comprising the kanji, plus some other things like radicals, but the stroke count is important.)

I'm sure Mitsu san will help us with any mistakes. Onegaishimasu...

Interesting.  So Kanji is in part based on numbers/counting.   An alphabet that incorporates math.... interesting indeed.  

[nrshida]

Kanji is basically pictograms Midway, which is much easier if you're like me and you have syDplexpia.

[Midway]

Kanji is basically pictograms Midway, which is much easier if you're like me and you have syDplexpia.

  According to wiki: A pictogram is an ideogram that conveys its meaning through its pictorial resemblance to a physical object. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pictogram

Odd, because Kanji pictograms do not seem to resemble any physical object I can see... looks like just a bunch of lines, dots, and curves.

[nrshida]

They are abstractions. Look at this Kanji, which can mean tree:- 木

Now look at this one which can mean woods or forest:- 森

[Midway]

They are abstractions. Look at this Kanji, which can mean tree:- 木

Now look at this one which can mean woods or forest:- 森

Very interesting.

[Karnak]

The Japanese have three writing systems, Kanji, Hiragana and Katagana.  Two of them are pictographic where each character represents a full word and the third is syllabetic where each character represents a syllable.  The simple looking characters are part of the syllabetic system.  Keep in mind that the characters in pictographic writing systems rarely resemble the picture of what they are as time has morphed them into something easier to write.

One of the things that held back translation of ancient Egyptian hieroglyphs until the Rosseta Stone revealed the secret was that they were so complex in appearance that everybody assumed they were pictographic with each symbol being a word, but in fact it was a syllabetic writing system in which each character was overly detailed.

[Rolex]

Those scans are great, nrshida.  

(Actually, sometimes a Japanese word can come from a combined kanji and hiragana. Hiragana and katakana are syllabic, kanji is the only pictographic. Japanese kanji is derived from Chinese kanji, but there are significant differences. A Japanese kanji has two "readings" or pronunciations - one Japanese and one Chinese reading. It's no fun making things simple when you can make them complex and confusing. )

[ink]

funny story about kanji.....

long ago I worked at a tattoo shop, and in that shop was sheet of Kanji symbols....

with the American counter part....

so it listed the English Alphabet with a Kanji equivalent............

people would write out there names with the symbols thinking they were spelling out their names in Chinese....

some Chinese guys came into the shop selling Kanji and saw the sheet of "Kanji Alphabet" and started laughing..... I asked what was up? he explained how it works.. ..I immediately tore down the sheet...


 

[Mitsu.]

nrshida, thanks. I can read it with no problem.

[PFactorDave]

This thread is very interesting to me.  I would love it if you guys that are transalating post the translations in this thread too.   

[HighTone]

This thread is very interesting to me.  I would love it if you guys that are transalating post the translations in this thread too.   

Same here. I would love to know what it says. 

[Midway]

nrshida, thanks. I can read it with no problem.

 

[Ruah]

much better

it is an interesting document for sure and is a complete manual on the plane including basic maintenance, takeoff, night time flight, and on and on.  Obviously there is the table of contents and the intro page (which is written in a style that is simply not used anymore - but - is also more grammatically 'correct' then contemporary style). It was published in Showa 19 (1944) Jan 3rd and is clearly marked as secret.

There are some issues to get clear here - first off - translation is not really a 1 to 1 exchange but an interpretive process.  This is less obvious in technical guides like this and quite obvious in more literary works - but it is still there.  This means that a cooperative effort will create a slightly disjointed translation with multiple voices.  In the translation world, this is overcome with heavy editorial oversight and in the end actually increases the workload a lot (depending) as the editor has to take the translation of someone and alter it to standardize it to their voice - which sometimes causes anger (translators become attached to their work).  So, while I am more then happy to work on this (and would love a copy in the original anyway) I want to know the division of labor and who ultimately has editorial oversight.

Sorry if that all sounds a bit serious, but as someone who does translations professionally (I work with Taisho political philosophy mostly) it is important that these sorts of things are set before we start so there is no bs down the road.  And since I am actually quite busy with some 文明開化 translations (Meiji journal on modernization) I just want to make sure that this is not some political time sink. And i am sure we all agree on this.

Anyway, definitely interested to work on promoting the appreciation for such a fantastic airplane.

Regardless of how you want to do this, would love to get a copy of the document if it is ok.