Hanashippanashi 18

Hanashippanashi

Page 199
Chapter 18
Myrrh

*Gototon Gototon Gototon

*Gototon

*Gototon *Gototon
I skipped school and took the train to the sea.

Page 200
*Zaaaaaaaaaaan....

Page 201
*Zaaaaaan...
A crow's head...

*Zapa

What are you doing with that crow?
Huh?
*Zaaaaaaaaaaaa...

Page 202

Once you get the stench of death on your hands [Alt: stench of a corpse]
It's a real hassle.

*Za...
It's cold-
*Pacha Pacha

*Zaaaaaaaaan...
It won't come off.
*Cough*
Come this way
I've got something to get rid of the smell. [Is there a word for this? Like a disinfectant is for germs... dis...smell..ifier...]

What are you going to do with that crow?
Use it.

For what?
Work.

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*Zaaaaa....

Where are we going?
My work place.

Here?
*Zaan...

Page 204
*Zaaaaaa...

*Gishi

These are...

Mummies. They're not finished yet.
These are the real deal, huh.

Page 205
Do you make these mummies? [Lit: are you a mummy making person...]

Try putting your hand in this.

Ah, it got rid of the smell. [Lit: took it away]

Removal/treatment of smells is,
an important component to the art of the preservation of remains after all.

Page 206

For example the mummy of Kenu, the second emperor of the Yuu dynasty, is one that is said to give off the most elegant fragrance. [He might be making up these dynasties and emperors]
The secret is that the raw essences that were used were beyond imagination. [beyond imagination might be stretching it for this idiom, but it's hard to think of one that might fit better atm.]
キジの根　ムラサキヨロイの根　コキの葉　カテの粉末　クイナの骨　黒こしょう ハナヨモギ　ブリナスカの樹脂　オレンジの皮　ミルラ　ちょうじの蕾　マヨニの枝先
Kiji essence[root], Purple Angelica root, koki leaves, kate powder, the bones of a rail, black pepper, flower mugwort, burinasuka resin, orange peel, myrrh, clove buds, mayoni boughs...
[Kiji: wood grain, pheasant it's hard to tell exactly which it's referring to as you'll see that there are animal parts in this as well, though ne would imply root meaning a plant, it's possible that he made it up again...][Okay, Murasaki is purple, but also a flower (gromwell) Yoroigusa is a plant too (gusa of course being grass): Angelica, both can be used as herbs. MurasakiYoroiBatta is a Japanese Grass hopper... Psophus stridutus, again ne implies root, but I could not find any plant known as murasaki yoroi, another possible invented plant][Koki leaves, I found 1 site on google for koki leaves, and it was about involved a reforestation project, it seems this is a plant's name, but I have no idea what the plant is and the site really didn't give any information about it either. But I guess it might have something to do with a plant local to Angkor watt?. God dammit I'm not a botanist or a herbalist.][Kate powder, haha this reads pretty funny in English, I have no idea what the Kate is in reference to... running searches for it doesn't give any hits either][Rail, as in the bird][Mugword flowers, Yomogi is obviously mugwort, but if it was mugwort flowers, it'd generally be Yomugi no hana, here, it's just hanayomugi, maybe it's a combination of plants like murasakiyoroi, I HAVE NO IDEA and can only guess :/][Burinasuka, searching for this in japanese gives me nothing, I can only assume it's some kind of fictional plant, as it has resin][mayoni boughs, again I have no idea what this is supposed to be, but I guess some fictional plant]

It is said that during the French Revolution the masses that uncovered the catacombs in the royal church [temples] of their [successive] sovereigns discovered the beautifully preserved remains of their monarchs along with the lengthy list of the medical essences that were used in the preservation of their bodies...

... Sorry about keeping you here with this kind of talk.
Ah, am I in your way?

That's not what I was trying to say...
Good, I actually rather like this kind of thing.

Oh yeah, this room doesn't have any heating but it's still pretty warm.
Yeah, it's for the mummies below.

Page 207
When you heat up a dead body in order to completely seal it off it's inner liquids [Lit: Death juice lol, see if there is a more specific term to use for this, maybe taxidermy related] start to gush out over its entire body as if it were sweating and it dries up.

To finish it off the power of the sun is borrowed.

The smell down there is really something else but, [that's what she said... hooooo!]
with this method you're able to get a finish product that is close to one that has naturally mummified.

Are the ones here all made like that?

Page 208
There's another method of drying the body by putting it in a solution of arsenic and natron [Na2Co3 Sodium Carbonate] after you take out the brain and other internal organs. You can even do it with salt.

There is also a method where the body is put into a calcium solution and it's lipids coagulate and it becomes adipocerous.
*Adipocere: The lipids of the body, when left for long periods within water or the like, change into a wax-like substance
[http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Adipocere]

Do you decide which based on the condition of the body?
That, along with whether or not there will be any modification to it's appearance.

Since I get requests for sculptures and chimeras too.

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*Zaaaaaaaaaa...
What kind of people make those requests?
A lot come from temples and such. Like for a mummified Kappa or the claw [hand?] of a Gyuuki... [Kappa and Gyuuki, both Yokai/demons from folklore of Japan, just wiki these]

*Zaaaaa...n
Ah, I see.

I get requests from museums, they're used as souvenirs for foreign tourists [is this redundant?]

Requests to preserve dead infants as they appeared while they were alive also come relatively frequently.
...

Page 210
Recently, with the growth of plastination, requests for autopsy specimens have become remarkably scarce.

They substitute the body fluids of the corpse with plastics so it's possible to produce a specimen that's close to living flesh.

They can even cut them into cross sections just like that. As specimens they are certainly excellent, but they seem to lack a certain quality.

When I was 10 years old I saw the dead body of a dragon.

Page 211
When a dragon dies, it becomes lighter than air. It rides the wind and drifts in the sky.

It neither rot nor hardened, its body, whose color has faded to white, was merely set adrift on the air's current and tossed about by the wind.

I watched as it was carried off somewhere, undulating as if it were almost still alive.

Page 212
What a beautiful corpse...

a beau-ti-ful corp-se... [To emulate the difference in enunciation here]

Suikos are on sale today~ [Suiko, another yokai]

Page 213

10 of 'em for just 50 yen~

Suiko Jerky, 10 for 50~ [Okay, jerky might sound crappy, but Himono is sundried food, and the only thing I can think of in English that's an equivalent is jerky right now. And it fits with the later translations because I can use it as a noun]

... Jerky, mummies, is there really a difference?

Mummies are just the empty shells of yest'day, but jerky'll become the flesh'n blood of tomarrow. [In other words you eat them and they become a part of you]

Don be shy, they're jes' 50 yen...

Jerky is just tasty dead bodies.