Astro Girl

            On Sunday morning it was snowing. It happens every year in early spring but it’s nonetheless disappointing. 

            I revised my translation of the first verse of “Le régiment des mal-aimés” (The Regiment of Broken Hearts) by Boris Vian, but I still need to fix the chorus to fit my better understanding of the meaning. 

            I translated “L’ethylique” (Ethanolaholic) by Serge Gainsbourg, memorized the first verse, and then adjusted my translation again. Serge Gainsbourg wrote the lyrics while the singer, Jacques Dutronc wrote the music. But Gainsbourg wrote it so it is Dutronc talking about writing the song with Gainsbourg and the role alcohol plays in the partnership. 

            During song practice, I saw one lone squirrel venture across the snowy wires to the south side of Queen. That one squirrel always comes from the west and is always the first of them on any day. 

            I weighed 86.6 kilos before breakfast. 

            I worked on my essay. 

            I weighed 87.2 kilos before lunch. 

            In the afternoon I went for a bike ride to Yonge and Bloor. It was suddenly winter again today and so I put on an extra layer of clothes. I stopped to pee at The Horseshoe Tavern on the way home. 

            I weighed 86.1 kilos at 17:30. 

            I worked on my essay, comparing Mulk Raj Anand’s Untouchable with Harriet Beecher Stowe’s Uncle Tom’s Cabin. Both authors are of a higher social class, writing about protagonists that have no social status. While Uncle Tom is feminized to make him appeal to white women, Bakha is made to excel at field hockey, a sport in which India at the time was a global superpower. Uncle Tom is essentially a Christian martyr but Bakha is neither a Christian, a martyr nor even a hero. Untouchable is a Bildungsroman that sees Bakha emerge from a childlike state to a more mature understanding of his situation. 

            For dinner, I had a salad made from avocados, a tomato, grape tomatoes, a mini cucumber, two scallions, lemon juice, and a glass of Garden Cocktail while watching an episode of Astro Boy. 

            In this story, it is the one-year anniversary of Astro Boy’s birth and so Dr. Elefun gives him the present of a little sister in the form of Astro Girl. If Astro Boy is emotionally ten years old then Astro Girl is about seven or eight. It doesn’t mention how powerful she is in this story but I have read elsewhere that she has all of Astro Boy’s powers divided in half. For example, while Astro Boy’s strength is 100.000 horsepower, hers is 50,000, etc. She doesn’t demonstrate it here but supposedly Astro Girl has the additional power of being able to talk to animals. Astro Boy has always wanted a baby sister and so he is very happy. 

            He takes Astro Girl on a tour of the city, but she keeps slipping away to cause havoc. He takes her to a robot fighting arena and after seeing a few fights she slips away to try it herself. She faces a giant robot fighter and easily beats it. The owner of the arena says she is legally bound to defend her universal title and so she has to keep returning to fight. Astro Boy tells her it’s time to come home but she wants to stay in the arena and wishes she could be two Astro Girls so she could both go home and stay. Astro Boy says she can’t, but suddenly an old man emerges from the shadows who says, “Don’t be too sure.” He introduces himself as Professor TwoTwo and says he’s developed a method for separating anything and anyone into two. He introduces his dog Sandwich and shows how it has become two dogs. He gives Astro Girl his card. 

            That night as Astro Girl fights and defeats the next giant robot, Astro Boy is waiting to take her home but she sneaks away and goes to see Professor TwoTwo. He performs his procedure on her while Astro Boy searches for his sister. Astro Boy goes to tell Dr. Elefun, who looks up Professor TwoTwo. He finds he’s a crackpot who used to be called Nitwit Nutty. Astro Boy goes home to find his sister in bed. When she gets up later she feels funny and then suddenly splits in half but comes back together again. She says, “Mother and father are going to spank me for this!” 

            The next night Astro Girl is scheduled to fight the giant robot KO Clunker. Astro Girl is torn between going to fight and staying home and suddenly she splits in two again. This time each half forms into a separate Astro Girl and so one of them goes to fight Klunker. But then Professor TwoTwo calls Mr. Pompus to tell him he forgot to tell Astro Girl that each of her halves only has half her strength. Meanwhile, at the arena, we see this is true, as Klunker is pounding Astro Girl and about to crush her underfoot. When Astro Boy finds Astro Girl at home she tells him the problem and they both fly to the arena to save her double. Astro Boy defeats Klunker while Astro Girl cries over her incapacitated double. The owner of Klunker is angry and has several large robots attack them but Astro Boy tears them apart. In the end, Dr. Elefun is able to put Astro Girl back together. 

            In the original Japanese script, Astro Girl is called Uran. 

            I felt tired after dinner and went to bed for an hour before writing about this story.