Project To-Ki-YO!

Project "To-Ki-YO!" is oneof my non-game related side projects

The intention of this project is to learn and master the Japanese language, and be my first sort of language-learning experience. Well, not my first - my first was french back in my earlier high school years. And I wasn't that great at it, my french was terrible. I rebuked a while ago about how it wasted my time, and I still largely agree (even though I still know a few phrases).

Perhaps the biggest thing I got out of French was that it did not help me get a consistent knowledge of it; it was more of just write down new vocab, memorize them and regurgitate them for a nondescript test. Rinse and repeat.

Now, I don't need to study french - I have less on my plate (I only have History, graphics and photography), which allows me to learn Japanese. Why japanese? Why pick the most weeaboo language of all existence? You are just going to learn it to not need subtitles when watching anime aren't you?

Well maybe that might be a starting motive, but not the whole picture.
It's actually because I find the characters interesting; they look like odd symbols or something.

I first decided to learn Hirigana and Katakana - which I found out, was barely scraping the surface of Japanese. Filthy Frank (2011 - 2017) wasn't wrong when he made fun of Japan-obsessives learning Hirigana and claiming that they know plenty of Japanese.
Let me tell you why he did; they missed the completely brutal part of learning the language that would make them quit. It's not Katakana, it's Kanji. If you look at the majority of Japanese sentences, you will see at least one Kanji word embedded into it, it's so common that you've got to learn it, you don't have any other choice.
Worse yet, there's over 2000 of them!
Yes, I didn't make a typo there! Two-Thousand.

But, thanks to a few resources on the internet (namely MattVsJapan) it turns out there is a book called "Remembering the Kanji" which many Japaneses learners have used to learn Japanese in the most efficient way. The concept of this book is to create little stories to associated with the small Kanji strokes (known in the book as "Primitives"), which makes the bigger Kanji much easier to learn as you can just break it down into the aforementioned strokes. The Kanji with the least components are taught first so that you can associate them with objects (like "rice field" or "mouth"). This is also called "holistic" learning where you create links in your mind between two supposedly similar things (like, say mathematical concepts with programming concepts).

Lately (for about 2 or 3 weeks), I've been reading pages of this book (printed from a PDF format) every time I walk back home from school. I don't try to fully understand the Kanji but I try to cover as much as I can possibly do in the shortest space of time so I can spend more time trying to actually decipher these things. It's like speeding though a video lecture at 1.5x speed, you're just trying to get a basic idea of a concept rather than fully understanding it right away. Sometimes I have a freind assist me in coming up with stories - all in all, this gives me something to do on a tedious and drenching 1 hour and 30 minute walk back home.

I'm pretty sure people would be asking by now, "Do you want to go to Japan?"

Well, yes. I find the place quite nice-looking as if it were another London. However you can't guarantee these things happening, maybe my interests will change and it may have been some dumb pipe dream of mine meant to fill in some missing part of my heart at this point in time. Or Japanese politics may have gone down which would demotivate me from going there. I'm not too sure about this quite frankly.

But one thing I am sure about is that I'd love to keep learning Japanese, because if I just drop it, I won't see any benefits of learning it. You never know, it could definitely aid the learning of other things, or help with learning other languages efficiently or be a way to brag about knowing more than just English.

Perhaps I'll make a part two to this - once I have something to mention or say (like reaching a milestone). Maybe I'll do so when I have mastered most of the Kanji, I'm around 1,200 words into the coverage of Kanji so there could be some progress going on here.

That's all from me!

Micatato and Acavadden

Author's note (09-12/06/2018):
This is yet another of my old stories that I've kept for a while; I started this story around November 2014 and like "Honour among the Replicate" it was canceled just as quickly as it was started. My inspiration behind the story was after playing the "Banjo Kazooie" games, namely the original and it's sequel (Banjo Tooie). I also wanted it to be a 3d platfomer game that I would make at some point in the future, but nothing came into fruition. I recall tonnes of times where I doodled the characters of this book and day-dreamed of what the game would be like.
Are you seeing a pattern here?

If you have ever played the games, than you will probably notice I was clearly ripping off Banjo Kazooie here, Rhyming witch, easy-going main character. But there's no bear and bird so I guess that's a plus.

I have also done designs for the characters, one of them [Accavadden] was based on a friend's character called 'Aarazen'. At some point (well after I gave up on the book) I changed Micatato to a frog. I intended this book to be released in November 2015, but that never happened - instead at that time I was finishing the 2nd Chapter of Evermoral (around the part where Loki, Sinro and Okami meet Kaj), despite not being as great as I remember (in retrospect), a much better book. Without further ado, cringe away!

Once upon a time, there was a small island known by the name of Isle O’ Potatoes, inhabited by two close friends. One was a potato-like creature called Micatato and the other was an elf named Acavadden. Things seemed to be going on finely on the island but the small situation (that no-one was aware of) was the fact that a big-nosed hag known as Brentile had recently set foot on the island. She built her own castle made out of grey bricks with the help of her two companions, Perrydil, a hawk and Naro, a chubby mouse. They took months to build it and the castle was very high. Brentile lived on the highest floor which had her golden throne that she stole from another castle and the walls had many portraits of her.

“Hah hah! I finally built my own base! Now ruling the island will be my case!”  Laughed Brentile hastily.
“But… how will we do it, your ugliness?” asked Naro as he didn’t know what he was doing.
“Maybe if you LISTENED TO MY PLAN YOU WOULD KNOW, YOU OLD KLUMP!” yelled Brentile.
“Sorry, I was just, er… thinking of owning my own arcade and bookshop and theme park, your ugliness,” replied Naro absent minded.
“Get your own act together Cheddar-boy!” yelled Perrydil, “Your smelly butt is too poor for that stuff!”
“Scruffnubs… poor Naro won’t get future job!” cried Naro.
“CUT IT OUT YOU TWO!” snapped Brentile, “GO AND POLISH MY THRONE FOR A PUNISHMENT, WHILE I PICK ON SOME PEOPLE TO DESTROY!”
“Well at least I gets more money for theme park,” said Naro somewhat potentially.
“Pah, like that will ever happen!” laughed Perrydil as she got out the bucket and a bitten sponge. “Did you eat that sponge Naro?”
“Err… ye- I mean no!” replied Naro guiltily as Perrydil was staring at him suspiciously, “What, I thought it was cheese!”

Meanwhile, outside Micatato’s house, he and his best friend Acavadden were slacking like usual in the sun. He and Acavadden had been with each other ever since they were babies, and both of them were raised by Acavadden’s parents. They were home-schooled and usually worked and played together. Micatato was a brown potato-like creature with skinny arms and legs and a moustache. Acavadden was an extremely pale elf who had grey skin from her waist to her legs (sometimes confused for trousers) and bluish-black hair.
“I wonder if we could go on an adventure someday,” wondered Micatato as he was laying on the chair in the sunlight.
“Well, if something big happens, it could be a great opportunity” replied Acavadden.
“So, what do ya wanna do today?” asked Micatato.
“Maybe banana picking and cooking banana pie?” replied Acavadden.
“That sounds good! But only after I spend two hours just relaxing here…” replied Micatato as he shut his eyes.
“I wouldn’t think now is a great time for slacking off!” told Acavadden as she saw a small hag-like figure in the sky.
“Why? Anything bad happening?” asked Micatato as he got up to see.
“WAH HA HA HA!” sniggered Brentile as she was flying on her wooden broomstick, “YOU’RE THE FIRST ONES TO BITE THE DUST! AND NOTHING WILL STOP ME FROM BEING UNJUST!”
“That was the one I was warning you about!” warned Acavadden as the Hag shot a magic ball at them, “Quick, dodge her attack”
Micatato and Acavadden quickly lept and Micatato spit very hard potatoes out of his mouth at the Hag.
“OW! Yeaowch! You can defend yourself, eh? Well I’ll show you how to deal with me in my LAIR!” exclaimed the Hag as she flew away, “THIS ISLAND WILL BE MINE!”
“We’d better get her!” reminded Acavadden as she ran with Micatato to the mountain. On their way, strolling the field full of flowers, they came across a huge jungle with expansive trees. In front of them they saw an odd-looking hut.
“Maybe we could find some answers in there?” said Micatato. Suddenly, a short and brown sloth-like creature strolled out of the hut and saw the two with a very welcoming smile.
“Hello Sloth man! I am Micatato and this is my good buddy Acavadden!” greeted Micatato.
“Hello fellow strangers, me Karoka. Me make masks for living and me know lots of magic. Me best magician in all of Potato Land. What brings you here?” asked the Sloth very friendly.
“Well, I was peacefully chilling with my buddy here,” explained Micatato.
“Me like chilling, I do it all time,” replied Karoka, out of context.
“Anyway, then we got attacked by some lady with a big nose and green skin and orange hair!” explained Acavadden.
“I know bad witch, me work with her before. She good before but now she bad. Me can help potato boy and elf girl”
“That’s great! We need all the help we can get to save our island!” replied Micatato.
“You welcome to Karoka’s hut” added Karoka as he waddled inside like a penguin; Micatato and Acavadden followed him. In the wooden hut there were masks pinned all over the walls all made by Karoka and there was also a small crate that had several crafting knives.
“You really have a thing for making masks huh?” assumed Acavadden.
“Me love making masks! Me made masks since child!” replied Karoka as he was sitting on his crate.
“You seriously made masks since you were a child? I really hope you did not cut yourself!”
“Mother taught Karoka how to use knife, and me wasn’t good at making masks but with time, me best mask maker in Hamza’s book!” explained Karoka laughing.
“So you’re a good magician and a mask maker? Wow! I never knew sloths could do magic and make masks!” said Acavadden wondrously.
“Me was man fairy but big-bad-green-feather-bag cursed Karoka and me turned into sloth” explained Karoka as he was crafting a mask that looked like a dark brown face with a pointy nose, “Also, me is working on special magic mask, would you like to try Potato boy?”
“Well, that depends on the effect on the mask” replied Micatato being concerned with what would happen.
“Wedge boy must not worry, it transforms you into wood creature when worn. You revert when mask is off!” comforted Karoka as he gave the mask to Micatato.
“Well, here goes nothing!” worried Micatato as he put the mask on. Micatato’s skin texture changed from skin-like to wooden and his body form changed smaller.
“This mask holds the power of a creature called ‘Wrubie’, read about them in one of Karoka’s books” explained Karoka cleverly.
Micatato tried to speak but he played out saxophone-like sounds as if he were an instrument.
“English please! I don’t understand Saxophone language” yelled Acavadden
“Only other Wrubies understand Potato-boy’s notes,” replied Karoka, “Also Potato-boy to remove the mask, pull face off”
Micatato pulled his mask off and he reverted back to his normal form.
“Woah! That felt… weird and different, I… I gotta get used to this thing!” replied Micatato as he gave it back to Karoka.
“No thanks! Karoka give mask to potato-boy for gift,” neglected Karoka, “Wrubie mask useful for journey.”
“Well thanks anyway! Pleasure meeting ya!” replied Micatato.
“Karoka want to travel with Potato boy and Elf girl,” offered Karoka.
“What about your house? You can’t just leave it there!” asked Acavadden worryingly.
“Hut is portable. Me carry hut all time,” replied Karoka as he put his hands out to execute a magic power that minimized the hut to cushion size. Karoka then put the house in his green backpack.
“Let’s get going now!” encouraged Micatato.
Meanwhile, back in the castle…
“Geez I’m bored, nuthin’ t’do!” whined Perrydil.
“Maybe, GET RID OF THAT NASTY POTATO-HEAD AND ELF! SO I CAN BE PROUD OF MYSELF!” screamed Brentile like a spoiled baby that wants more.
“Your ugliness, where are they?” asked Naro.
“Last I saw them they were lazily slacking off!” replied Brentile arrogantly, “In some kind of peaceful field with plenty of trees probably over there”
Brentile pointed out of her window at the small field near the jungle.
“There! NOW GET GOING YOU TWO PILES OF DINGLE-BINGLE DONG!!” ordered Brentile madly.
“Whatever you say, your ugliness,” both replied dully as they slumped off.
“Ha ha ha! I shall possess all the creatures in this island to fulfil my lust and those two shall bite the dust!” laughed the Hag as loud as a speaker as she got her broomstick out and flew away.
Back in the jungle, the three came across many wrubies as they were walking. The three heard songs that sounded very ambient as if they were birds.
“Quick, Potato boy put mask on!” whispered Karoka as he pushed Micatato behind a tree. Micatato then put his mask on and transformed.
The three were spotted and many wrubies ran to Acavadden and Karoka.
“Uh oh! They seem more hostile than they used to be. Possibly that witch we saw earlier used a spell!” yelled Acavadden as she tried to hide. Many wrubies were honking like a smoke alarm constantly going off. Micatato seemed to understand that they were not welcoming his two friends. Acavadden got her hands and legs embargoed by the wrubies’ vine arms.
“By the Hag’s orders we were told to get rid of an elf like creature and an ugly moustached potato man!” played one of them.
“We captured one of them!” played another one as he was carrying Acavadden, “We will roast her!”
“C’mon there’s nothing wrong with my mo- I mean he went the other way!” played Micatato.
“Alright! Let’s find him and poison his body!” played one of the wrubies very demandingly as he ran with the others. A big elderly wrubie, who had many vines on his body and several twigs on his head, walked out of a big treehouse.
“What’s the racket?!” screamed the wrubie elder as he saw Micatato, “You! Yes you! Say your name!”
“Micatato,” played Micatato.
“How come old man speak English?” asked Karoka.
“I studied it 40 years ago,” replied the elder, “Is that potato-like creature your friend?”
“How you know wrubie is potato-boy?” asked Karoka, “And yes he friend”
“My magic can tell he is wearing a mask and pretending to be one of us,” replied the elder.
“Yeah, I am wearing a disguise mask,” replied Micatato as he took of his mask, “My friend Karoka here made this fabulous mask, and he’s a magic mask maker.”
“I see… Are you going to do anything bad to us?”
“Of course not! Why would we try to hurt anyone innocent? But why exactly are these other people of yours evil and taking my friend away?”
“Well there was this ugly looking lady on a broomstick and she summoned a guardian that has her possessing power that controls my people, but the reason I’m not possessed is that I have magic that makes me immune to spells.”
“Old wrubie has too much witchcraft” replied Karoka.
“I knew it! That hag possessed them!” yelled Micatato, “Where is that guardian by the way? Why can’t you defeat him?”
“In a cave somewhere possibly the direction that the wrubies took and I can’t defeat him because I can barely walk without losing my stick” replied the elder.
“Cos you’re old and you’ve aged so much?” asked Micatato obviously.
“Yep about 150 years!” replied the elder, “Before you go Micatato, you should put your mask on. The wrubies will never listen to you if you aren’t one and pretend the hag ordered you to tell them to release Acavadden. Creatures who are possessed will listen to anything their possessor orders, even if someone lies about the order.”
“Couldn’t you lie to them that the hag ‘ordered’ you to tell them that she was possessing them and making them bad?” asked Micatato.
“They would never attack their possessor because they are following them,” replied the Elder, “I would really like to be here and talk to you but there is no time to loose! Your friend will perish and they will cause more trouble”
“Let’s go and save our friend, Karoka!” exclaimed Micatato optimistically to Karoka as they ran off into the jungle like two dogs looking for their lost owner. As they were hurrying through the bushes and trees of the jungle they saw a load of wrubies holding Acavadden.
“What shall we plan?” whispered Karoka silently to Micatato.
“I will put my mask on and, like that old wrubie said, I should then lie to them about the orders and ask them where the guardian is then tell them to clear off. While that happens you hide behind this bush until I tell you to get out”
“Me will hide then,” replied Karoka as he quickly scuttled behind the bush like an arrow being shot from a crossbow.
 “Get off me you vine-instruments!” yelled Acavadden as she was trying to struggle herself out of the marching wrubies’ vine arms.  The wrubies were marching towards a very hollow and mossy cave which was very dark on the inside.
“The hag ordered you to let go of her and get outta here!” played Micatato, ”and also the mostache guy is in the distance somewhere” The wrubies instantly let go of Acavadden.
“Ok men! Let’s find that other guy! March! On your toes now! March!” honked one of them loudly with pride as they marched away like soldiers in a war.
“Karoka, it’s safe to come out!” yelled Micatato as he took his mask off. Karoka stepped out of the bushes.
“Thanks Micatato! Their grasp was too hard for me to get out of!” thanked Acavadden, “What’s going on?”
“A guardian, summoned by that ugly hag we saw earlier, is making the wrubies do bad things and obey anything that hag says”
“But how come you told them what to do?”
“The elder knows about the spell and he said that the people who are possessed easily fall for tricks” replied Micatato.
“Well I hope they don’t go aggressive on us again. Let’s go and fight that guardian” replied Acavadden. The three went into the cave and it was extremely dark.
“Me use fire magic to light cave” said Karoka as he casted a fire ball on his hand and “held” it like a wizard holding a crystal ball which somewhat illuminated the area.
“That’s better” thanked Acavadden.
“Oh! We see a door! That might be where the guardian is” yelled Micatato curiously as he started to run to it.
“Not so fast!” yelled Acavadden as she grabbed Micatato by his moustache, “You can’t fight it on your own! It might trap you in and keep us out.”
“How do you know?” asked Micatato.
“I have heard of it in books” replied Acavadden, “Let’s all go in!”
So all three strolled through the door to see an extremely huge stone chamber which had wrubie-like printings on it. It was as expansive as castle hall and had an enormous golden statue which looked like ancient armour used in medieval times and it also held a spear.
“So this is the sacred wrubie chamber huh? Well according to the scrolls I have read about this, the chamber had a lot of precious things like gold, wands and things. But this chamber has nothing” explained Acavadden, “, maybe that witch may have stolen all of it! Plus, there was never a mention of any statue here even though there is one right in front of us”
“Wait where the guardian is? I can’t find it anywhe-” stopped Micatato mid-sentence as the door behind them closed down like closing a tap. The statue’s helmet glowed green and came to life as if a robot had been turned on after it had been turned off for so long.
“Me knew statue bad!” yelled Karoka as he sprang into action. Micatato spat out many potatoes out of his mouth at the statue but they just bounced off like a load of frogs bouncing. The guardian slammed his spear on the ground causing a shockwave and Micatato and Acavadden lept like a bunch of kangaroos. Karoka got slammed to the ground by the shockwave. Micatato and Acavadden jumped up to the guardian’s shoulder. Micatato grabbed Acavadden by the hand and threw her up and she put her hands above her head; spun around really fast and soared down like a bird and drilled the helmet like a jackhammer until it broke which revealed a green crystal ball. Karoka got up and shot ice magic at the guardian and it’s whole body became frozen. Micatato and Acavadden punched and kicked the Crystal ball until it blew up into green smoke and glass. Micatato and Acavadden jumped off like a ninja to the ground.
“Yeah! We defeated the evil guardian!” yelled Micatato in victory.
“Let’s go back to the village!” exclaimed Acavadden. The trio ran out of the cave like a mouse escaping out of its trap. They then went to the village and the wrubies didn’t attack them but they were playing songs that sounded like they were at a party. They walked up to the elder.
“Thank you for restoring my villagers! I wish you good luck on your quest and you will defeat that hag” praised the Elder optimistically.
“No problem! Let’s go to the castle and defeat the Hag, boys!” instructed Acavadden as she, Micatato and Karoka ran off like cheetahs. They went out of the palm tree infested jungle to see a view of the tall tower which was as tall as the empire state building being surrounded by many elevated mountain and bordered by a body of water. The three swam to the mountains and scaled the mountains like monkeys climbing vines. The three sprinted to the tower and tried to go in but they felt an invisible wall around the tower. Two figures appeared out of the sky and one of them fell down head-first and the other smoothly glided down like an air- balloon. They were revealed to be Naro and Perrydil
“Ow! You should have carried me rather than drop me!” yelled Naro as he was struggling to get his head out of the dirt.
“It’s cos you were too fat you greasy pile of meat!” ridiculed Perrydil as she grabbed Naro’s leg with her beak and yanked it like a dog trying to pull something out of the ground.
“Who are you guys? ” demanded Acavadden, “And what do you want with us?”
“I am Perrydil and that fat old clobber is called Karo” explained Perrydil, “And we’ve come to eliminate you”
“Don’t you mean mouse? Cos that guy you call ‘Old clobber’ is a mouse” asked Micatato.
Perrydil commanded, “Tch. Whatever, Naro get your butt up and get into action”
Perrydil grabbed Naro and flapped in the air and dropped him like a bomb to Micatato. Micatato dodged Naro once he fell into the ground and couldn’t get up.
“Time to butt you Perrydil!” joked Micatato as he did a mighty kick to Naro’s bottom which sent him flying to Perrydil, who was too busy mocking about how Naro was lazy.
“Oww! You smelly bag of rotten beans!” shrieked Perrydil in pain as she struggled to get out of Naro’s body.
“Sorry! Shouldn’t of eaten that extra cake!” apologised Naro.
“That cake wasn’t even yours it was our masters! She will whop your butt real bad” whined Perrydil.