Osaka Today As Well / P.E., Volleyball / Hiccups / The Brain... / Brand New (Japanese: 『今日も大阪』 『体育・バレーボール』 『しゃっくり』 『脳が』 『おにゅー』) is the second episode of Azumanga Daioh.
Osaka evaluates her past rural and present urban lifestyles. She is told by Koyomi "Yomi" Mizuhara that Chiyo is highly gifted and talented. Osaka is oblivious to the chaos around her in the classroom caused by a cockroach, being focused on eye floaters instead. She shows her lack of physical fitness in physical education, unable to sprint in track and field and unable to execute an overhand pass in volleyball. After eating spicy food, Osaka develops hiccups, which Chiyo, Tomo, Yomi, and Sakaki try to get rid of using traditional and foolish methods. Osaka ends up transferring her hiccups to Chiyo. She then plays on a Japanese idiom between "bean knowledge" (Japanese for "useful trivia") and "knowledge about beans". She later unknowingly daydreams about Chiyo's theoretically detachable pigtails during class, soon being caught by Yukari nonetheless.
The reason Osaka uses a handkerchief when washing her hands is that most public Japanese bathrooms do not have paper towels or dryers.
The omelet Tomo buys here is actually just flavoured egg. Moreover, Japanese fried chicken is only coated in starch (not in batter), while meatballs, if served by themselves, often refer to little balls of deep-fried hamburger meat, which are not covered in any kind of sauce.
Yomi buys a chili croquette. Though there are many varieties, they are most commonly patties, made from a mixture of mashed potato and meat, which are then breaded and fried. Therefore, they generally look whitish on the inside, not red like here.
Yomi talks about dishes that are considered exotic, such as cayenne pepper, shark-fin soup and swallow's nest.
Osaka uses a vending machine. In Japanese schools there are seldom any water fountains, which is why students buy drinks from vending machines or bring thermoses with tea.
The girls attending a music class.
Yomi calls drinking boiled persimmon stems a folk remedy.
Sakaki suggests for Osaka to "give her hiccups to someone else". This is because a common Japanese suggestion to cure a cold is to "give it to someone else". This, however, does not work for hiccups.
Osaka plays with Japanese words in this episode. In the original version, Osaka says "Mame-chishiku" which means "useful trivia". However, literally broken down, mame means "bean" and chishiki means "knowledge". Osaka then goes on to say, "Edamame are a kind of soybean, you know." And her punch line is, "I wanted you to say, that's not bean knowledge (mame-chishiku), that's knowledge about beans (mame no chishiki).
Unanswered Questions[]
What Yukari was teaching the class when the cockroach entered.
What Osaka meant by "making it back safe and sound" in the cafeteria.
Why Osaka still played the flute during the English lesson.
From where the girls found out about the strange methods used to cure Osaka's hiccups.
Memorable Moments[]
This episode is a "Day in the Limelight" for Osaka.
Osaka shows her unusual way of thinking through trying to catch eye floaters when everybody else freaks out because of a cockroach. After inadvertently taking out Chiyo and Yomi, Tomo manages to kill the cockroach and then asks Yukari what to do with her textbook, which the latter has no stomach to help since the dead cockroach is on it. Ohyama and another male student try to figure out who screamed in the first place, as Sakaki tries to make herself look inconspicuous.
In PE, Osaka loses to Chiyo-chan in a foot-race. Later, a volleyball game goes awry when Chiyo gets hit hard in the back of the head by a ball served by Tomo. Kurosawa (not yet named) decides playing a match right off the bat is too dangerous, so they instead practice throwing and catch. Both Chiyo and Osaka constantly fail to catch the ball, as Kurosawa looks on in disbelief.
Yomi causes Osaka to get the hiccups, only because she thought it would be funny to trick Osaka into eating spicy food. Tomo proceeds to put her through all forms of abuse to cure them.
Incidentally, in the manga version, Kagura was the one putting Osaka through the abuse, but this, of course, had to be changed as she hadn't been introduced yet in the anime.
Chiyo getting Osaka's hiccups.
The "Next Episode" preview is an argument between Yukari and Kurosawa.
Quotes[]
Back when I lived in Osaka, people used to say I was slow, or spacey. Sometimes I wonder about it myself, thinkin', am I really that spacey?
— Osaka
You know those tiny bubbles inside your eyes you sometimes catch? Yeah, I'm trackin' 'em down as we speak.