Do you speak Japanese and English? Are you interested in internet archaeology and history? Are you a mental heath advocate? Do you identify with, or relate to, the labels of #menhera or #jirai ?
I'm looking for others to collaborate with me on a project to translate Nanjou Aya's diary into English. 南条あや (Nanjou Aya, real name: 鈴木純, Suzuki Jun) was an internet presence in the late 1990's. She wrote diary entries she shared online on the site 町田あかねのおクスリ研究所 and later on her own website, 南条あやの保護室, in which she detailed her struggles with self-harm, suicidal ideation, and her hospitalization from June 1998 to March 1999. She passed away on 3/30/1999 from an intentional drug overdose shortly after she graduated from high school, and her diary entries were published posthumously as the book 卒業式まで死にません (I Won't Die Until Graduation).
Here is the archive of her site: https://web.archive.org/web/20030805035852/nanjouaya.com/hogoshitsu/memory/index.html
There is almost NOTHING about her on the internet in English, and so I have begun slowly working on translating her journal entries. I have almost no experience with Japanese translation! It's a slow process for me, so I would love to collaborate with anyone else who also wishes for English speakers to be able to read Aya's writing.
I find it very striking how much comfort and solace people who are struggling find in her writing, even today, and I would like to bring that to the anglophone web.
Please contact me if you're interested!
