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I can’t help but notice that while more economically resilient parts of the U.S. have gotten lots of attention in the wake of Hurricanes Harvey and Irma—don’t get me wrong, as well they should—there is an American territory containing 3.5 million American citizens (more people than reside in Alaska, Iowa, Idaho, Hawaii, Kansas, Mississippi, Maine, Montana, Nevada, or New Hampshire) that is getting significantly less attention than its mainland counterparts.

Puerto Rico is in dire straits right now in the aftermath of Hurricane Maria. You can read all about the specific damage done (the entire island is now without power and will be for months, a major dam has a crack in it, entire communities are destroyed) HERE, but I don’t want to focus on the destruction right now so much as on the response to the destruction.

Yesterday, Kaila rounded up a bunch of reactions to the fact that Trump and his administration have been slower to act on Puerto Rico’s recovery efforts than they were to respond to Texas and Florida. As of right now, Trump is saying that he’s going to Puerto Rico next week, Tuesday, and the relief efforts are slowly going in. The reason Trump cites for a slower response time? The ocean.

“It’s very tough because it’s an island. In Texas, we can ship the trucks right out there, you know, we’ve got A-pluses on Texas and Florida and we will also on Puerto Rico, but the difference is this is an island sitting in the middle of an ocean, and it’s a big ocean, it’s a very big ocean, and I think we’re doing a really good job.”

I guess the U.S. doesn’t have the world’s largest military (including a Navy with boats), and I guess planes and aircraft carriers haven’t been invented? Anyway, he’s moving on it now, so great. Keep moving! (Though, I’m curious about who’s handing out these A-pluses. Do we grade humanitarian relief now?)

Though apparently, there’s this point:

Puerto Rico official says “no accident” Trump’s 1st tweets on crisis came as PR gov @ricardorossello described need for assistance on CNN. pic.twitter.com/kpjYtJY5yi

— Adrian Carrasquillo (@Carrasquillo) September 26, 2017

And the fact that he’s blaming Puerto Rico’s debt and faulty infrastructure for compounding the damage from the storm, when American economic policies, and American business owners like him with his Puerto Rican golf course that went bankrupt, are largely responsible for that debt and faulty infrastructure. You don’t get to take financial advantage of an island and then complain that they’re in debt and making it really, really hard for you to help them out.

In addition to the slow response time from our government, however, is the fact that Puerto Rico’s suffering is taking up a lot less of our media and social media landscape than Houston or Florida did when they lay in the path of hurricanes. ABC isn’t hosting a “Day of Giving” responding to Puerto Rican recovery.

And whereas my social media feeds were flooded with #HoustonStrong images from everyone (including Puerto Ricans), the only response I really saw leading up to and immediately following the storm was from fellow Puerto Ricans. It’s only now, nearly a week after Maria hit, that I’m starting to see the general population posting about helping Puerto Rico, and that’s because we’re finally receiving and spreading images of the destruction there (which are difficult to receive when an island has zero electricity). Because people love disaster from far-away places.

Back when it was Hurricane Irma we were worrying about, I wrote a piece commenting on the way the media and average American citizens were talking about Puerto Rico in the lead-up to that storm. As if it weren’t America. As if the people who live there aren’t American citizens entitled to federal aid. It was frustrating to hear deep concern over what effects the storm would have on Texas and Florida juxtaposed with mentions of Puerto Rico almost as an afterthought.

And I have plenty of blame for the media, but I have to acknowledge that the news media tends to cover what their viewers and readers think are important, what will get ratings. It’s clear that Puerto Rico doesn’t rate that high on most people’s radar, in large part because most American citizens don’t think of Puerto Rico as America.

In fact, as reported by The New York Times, 54% of respondents in a recent poll done by Morning Consult didn’t know that people born and living in Puerto Rico are U.S. citizens. Even more disappointing is that the findings varied widely by age. Only 34% of people aged 18-29 knew that Puerto Ricans are Americans, compared to 64% of people aged 65 and older.

Education matters, too. Only 47% of people surveyed who only have a high school education knew Puerto Ricans are Americans, compared to 72% of those with a bachelor’s degree. What exactly are we teaching kids in elementary and high school?

Why does this ignorance matter? It matters because all of these people can vote, and Puerto Ricans living on the island can’t. It matters, because people tend to be in favor of cutting “foreign aid” first when our country is in financial trouble, and if they see Puerto Rico as a “foreign country,” that affects public support for sending aid there.

The poll goes into that too, saying that 8 in 10 of Americans who know that Puerto Ricans are Americans support sending aid there, compared to the 4 out of 10 who support aid among people who were unaware of that.

It would be nice to think that Americans care about everyone all the time. Mexico is going through a horror show right now after the earthquakes they’ve recently suffered, and they, too, deserve our help. Especially since they gave us aid in response to Hurricane Harvey.

What’s troubling, is that today I saw a friend of a friend on Facebook talking about helping “the poor people in Mexico and Puerto Rico.” In the same breath. As if they were comparable. As if they were both places that are far away with brown people who speak Spanish and upon which the U.S. should have pity, as opposed to one of them being a part of the U.S. to which our government and our citizenry bear a responsibility.

To support relief efforts on the ground, the non-profit ConPRmetidos and The Foundation for Puerto Rico are working with local organizations to provide relief as needed. You can donate by clicking HERE.

(image: ABC)

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So, you’re finally taking the big step. You’ve seen the occasional words or titles in anime or games, and now you want to dive into the “real” stuff.

You want to learn Japanese.

There are plenty of resources to do so. Associations like the Japan Society offer classes, and there are a wealth of online opportunities both beneficial and questionable. But dealing with a Japanese class can sometimes send fans, especially older ones, into a frenzy of fandom-fueled panic.

They want to be taken seriously. So they ask questions like, “Should I take my pins off of my favorite messenger bag or backpack? Speaking of backpacks, is the Survey Corps backpack a no-go? What about my cell phone charms? Do I need to learn kana first—will other students there think I’m silly if I don’t already know it?”

In addition to these questions are others, lurking underneath the surface. The nightmares of becoming the eldritch shambling horror of the Actually Ridiculous Fan Stereotype who haunts other fans’ nightmares with, “Actually, the real meaning is…” or “OMG kawaii!!” The fears of cultural appropriation, of assuming a meaning that isn’t there. The fears of multiple writing systems to deal with and doubts of ever having a conversation in Japanese. Of any length.

First, calm down. Breathe. Continued breathing is good for your health.

Once you’re reasonably relaxed, I have three pieces of information for you:

Learning doesn’t make you a weeaboo.

No matter your reasons are for learning a language, making it part of your daily life helps you learn it. So what if you are a fan of anime or manga or Japanese dramas?

It’s the same rationale behind classes putting up sticky notes on blackboards or windows with the words for “the blackboard” or “the window” on them. It’s something you can relate to, something you see in school life.

It’s also why people learn phrases like, “How are you?” a bit more easily than isolated words like “airplane” or “alchemy.” Greetings can be used right away. Same with words like, “Thanks.” It sticks. I remember when I was first learning Spanish and the teacher taught us our first words: “No sé” = “I don’t know.” That way, even if we didn’t know the answer, we could at least respond in Spanish.

If you are a fan of something Japanese, be it anime or martial arts, you have a place or context to use the Japanese you learn right away. Learning a language does not automatically lessen your reputation. It’s just that with Japanese, people scrutinize other people’s reasons for learning it. And this leads me into the next point.

It doesn’t matter what other people think.

Most American learners are used to two languages being offered in classes: Spanish and French. Often, the reason for learning them is a simple “my school required one or the other,” so we don’t think much about our reasons or what others might assume of us. When I first started learning Japanese, I admit I was listening to songs from Yu Yu Hakusho, trying to do my own translations of the song “Nightmare.” I was reading about the puns in Sailor Moon.

Was I made fun of? Yes.

Did I get defensive? Yes.

Did I feel ridiculous? Still do, in fact.

But the trick to language learning is to not let that stop you.

It’s hard. But how do you get better at anything? You keep doing it. You might mess up, but you get back up and learn and do it all over again.

And now I can say that I can greet people in more than one language. I can have a conversation, even if it’s still a bit awkward and embarrassing, in a language other than English.

You’re not the only one.

If you’re in a Japanese class, chances are other fans will be there too.

If someone does makes fun of you for your fandoms, you can always say that you’re studying the Japanese language because you want to learn more. Yes, you’re a fan. But learning Japanese might help with other things as well.

For example, understanding translation choices. Puns. Talking about electronics in DenDen Town or Akihabara, as well as apologizing that you don’t know Japanese fluently. Or asking a friend about their ikebana class, or if you should check out that new karaoke place down the street.

Let me tell you a story.

In November 2013, I spent an evening speaking with my friends in English. My voice does not have a noticeable accent, even here in the city. To another American, I have no accent. I realize I might need to look at Japanese-style résumé templates (which are different than American-style ones), and so I stop in at Kinokuniya. It is the night before the Japanese Language Proficiency Test, and I am hearing English and Japanese spoken from many different people: different accents and dialects all over the place.

Hesitantly, I go to the information desk. I am white, I am very conscious of my weight, I have blue hair—I knew those things obviously, but here, in a Japanese bookstore, I worry how I will be seen and how I will sound. My language is not expected. I am taking too much time looking at pens and study books and fiction titles. I fear I will stand out too much. I fear I will be misunderstood, even though I have spent many years studying, even though I hardly speak in Japanese and my speaking is rusty. The forms have their own word— “rirekisho.” I have always had a problem with ‘r’ sounds in any language. I stutter.
I clear my throat anyway. And speak.

“<…Excuse me, but do you have personal history resume forms here?>”

The clerk looks up. “<Personal history forms? Japanese-style ones?>”

“<Yes, please.>”

“<Yes, they are in the stationery section over there. If you are applying to a job, I wish you good luck.>”

All of these fears, and it went more smoothly than expected. I was able to talk with someone and get what I needed.

Yes, I may have sounded awkward. Or used language in unexpected ways. But in the end, I accomplished my goal. I now translate written works, I now do panels, I now teach every now and then. Learning Japanese was difficult at times, but I hope that new learners to Japanese will keep going and never give up.

So what now?

Hopefully this article has helped ease your fears about learning Japanese. But where to go from here?

Moekana is a good way to start learning the kana syllabary (hiragana and katakana). After all, once you have learned the kana, you can “sound out” how kanji—the characters borrowed from Chinese characters over time, much like how English uses roots from Latin or Greek—are pronounced. So even if you do not know the word, you can know how to spell it and can look it up to add to your vocabulary.

I also recommend:

13 Secrets for Speaking Fluent Japanese — This book promises help in learning Japanese, and it does not disappoint! It helps all learners, from beginners to advanced students, play with the language and learn more naturally. It also includes short manga pieces to help with the ever-important context!

Fluent in 3 Months: How Anyone at Any Age Can Learn to Speak Any Language from Anywhere in the World (Also available in Kindle and Audible editions) — Benny Lewis describes his ways to learn languages via different methods. He also discusses free/low-cost ways of language learning which can be applied to different languages (not just Japanese), because many folks think it takes an expensive online or university course to “truly” know a language. While these courses may help, they are not required, and not being able to take one should not hold you back.

Influent is a language learning game, available on the Steam platform, that helps build vocabulary and is the price of a paperback book! For those who are visual learners or need the audio to help them get used to the sounds of Japanese, this is a low-cost way to practice. (Other languages besides Japanese are available as well.) For more advanced students, this game’s user interface can be set to Japanese as well.

I hope that gets you started! Remember:
頑張り続きてねよ。（がんばりつづきてねよ。）
Keep going and do your best.

The original version of the above article was originally published in Otaku Journalist. It has been reposted with permission.

(top pic by Nicola)

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Were you one of those people who cancelled their Netflix subscription after they tried that whole Qwikster thing? You might want to think about getting back on that train by 2015. That’s when Marvel Entertainment will premiere their first original content on the service – four solo-character series to be following by a mini-series titled, The Defenders. 

Netflix recently dumped a slew of Disney films onto their service (and Disney had deals set up from 2011) so we probably should have seen this coming (guess this rumory story was right), but most of us woke up this morning shocked by this majorly epic news. From Marvel.com:

The Walt Disney Co. (NYSE: DIS) and Netflix Inc. (NASDAQ: NFLX) today announced an unprecedented deal for Marvel TV to bring multiple original series of live-action adventures of four of Marvel’s most popular characters exclusively to the world’s leading Internet TV Network beginning in 2015. This pioneering agreement calls for Marvel to develop four serialized programs leading to a mini-series programming event.

Led by a series focused on “Daredevil,” followed by “Jessica Jones,” “Iron Fist” and “Luke Cage,” the epic will unfold over multiple years of original programming, taking Netflix members deep into the gritty world of heroes and villains of Hell’s Kitchen, New York.  Netflix has committed to a minimum of four, thirteen episodes series and a culminating Marvel’s “The Defenders” mini-series event that reimagines a dream team of self-sacrificing, heroic characters.

You may recall there was already a Jessica Jones series in the works, called AKA Jessica Jones, from Melissa Rosenberg. It was originally meant to find a place on ABC but the last we heard, Rosenberg said Marvel was trying to “set it up somewhere else.” We’re not sure at this point if the Netflix version will be the one Rosenberg had been working toward, though Luke Cage was set to appear in it as well.

Needless to say, this deal is a bold move for Marvel Entertainment but also a very smart one. Netflix’s original series have been doing very well. Orange is the New Black even premiered to better numbers than the new season of Arrested Development.

“This deal is unparalleled in its scope and size, and reinforces our commitment to deliver Marvel’s brand, content and characters across all platforms of storytelling. Netflix offers an incredible platform for the kind of rich storytelling that is Marvel’s specialty,” said Alan Fine, President of Marvel Entertainment. “This serialized epic expands the narrative possibilities of on-demand television and gives fans the flexibility to immerse themselves how and when they want in what’s sure to be a thrilling and engaging adventure.”

This news comes on the heels of some other exciting news from Marvel. Most recently, it was confirmed lesbian character Victoria Hand would be making her debut on Agents of SHIELD, brought to life by bisexual actress Saffron Burrows. On the comic publishing side of things, a new series featuring a Muslim Ms. Marvel, written by G. Willow Wilson, was announced (be sure to put in a pre-order for it at your local comic shop!).

While their work is compared on the regular, it’s certainly hard in this case not to look at the difference between Marvel’s live-action projects and Warner Bros./DC, who earlier this week announced an Hourman series was going to make its way to The CW. While Daredevil may be the only character of the four in the public’s consciousness (and even then, only because of the Ben Affleck film), Marvel is going big or going home, as it were, and is giving us a wider range of characters to learn about. Depending on how everything shakes out, the Luke Cage series will make him the first non-white character to headline a Marvel project and Jessica Jones will be the second female character to headline after Peggy Carter. Meanwhile, DC ladies are like.

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