方言恋愛 Vol.1

I am slacking, as always. That doesn't mean that I haven't been listening to any drama's lately. On the contrary, I've listened to a whole bunch of them, but that I'm not writing about it. But I bring new Reviews! :'D

After wondering for ages about which drama I should write I finally settled down on *drumroll*

方言恋愛 Vol.1

Hougen Renai! Which translates into something as 'Dialect Love', which is exactly what it is. There are two reasons why I chose this drama 1: everything is spoken in dialect, 2. 'you' actually have a voice.

But lets start at the beginning. Hougen Renai tells two stories, each one takes place in a different part of Japan. The whole charm of the series is that the dialect of the location where the story supposedly takes placed is used. Most drama are in standard Japanese, and hearing characters talk to each other in dialect feel quite refreshing really. (other than hearing someone talk kansai for the humor effect every once in a while).

The first story is about a young OL that moves from Tokyo to Aichi for her work, and meets Mase Akihito (CV: Sakurai Takahiro), who happens to be working 6 part time jobs at once.  She's having some problems with adjusting to the dialect so he offers to teach her words and expressions. 

In the second story a girl comes back to Kouchi to get her drivers licence. Exactly why she'd go all the way to a prefecture where she only lived for one year in the past just to get her drivers licence is a little beyond me, but let's not question that. There she meets her childhood friend Hirose Yuuichi (CV: Ono Daisuke) who now happens to be an instructor at the driving school she visits. Convenient plot indeed.

The first thing that surprised me is that 'you', the listener, are actually given a voice. I've become completely used to a character talking on his own and little pauses in which you apparently say something, but here you actually talk. And you sound very cute :3

Other than that, it has Sakurai Takahiro and Ono Daisuke, who I both love~  Sakurai his dialect sounds very natural to me, I still overlap his voice with Alice though. Ono Daisuke sounds... very different when talking in dialect? Or maybe this is just one of the first times that I've heard him where he is not acting out the 'perfect boyfriend' (well technically he still is, but to a lesser degree). Either way I liked his performance :3

I liked Sakurai his story most, but I may be biased :P
Really recommended if you'd like to hear something else than standard Japanese every once in a while. The stories on there own were not really that special, but entertaining none the less.