Episode 20 of CLAMP’s podcast, CLAMP Kanbukai, is out! You can listen to it on YouTube and all major podcast platforms.

This episode’s theme is “First time in Miyako-jima”.

For some reason, subtitles/closed captions are not available this time on the YouTube video. I don’t know if this was intentional or not, and I hope this doesn’t mean that future episodes also will not have subtitles. The lack of subtitles makes it harder to understand for non-Japanese speakers and it also goes against accessibility best practices. That being said, it was much more difficult to understand what they were talking about on this episode, due to the absence of the automatic subtitles.

They all traveled to Miyako-jima, in Okinawa, and this episode was recorded there (not at their usual studio). They begin the episode saying that they are using lavalier microphones (pin mics) for the first time, so the sound might be a little different than usual.

Last time they came to Okinawa it was at the beginning of this year right after the end of the Clear Card serialization. They attempted to record an episode on site with their smartphones but it didn’t turn out great. This time, they are recording on site with appropriate the gear.

It seems like just like last time, the weather was not so great…

They rode on segways (Segway PT) for the first time and they talked a little about it.

Ohkawa-sensei talked about how they barely took time off during the past 35 years of their career. They all remembered the very intense schedule they had been, particularly during the time when Tsubasa and XXXHOLiC were both being published weekly and they only had a few days off in a whole year. They would work from 10 am until 10 pm only to see each other again the next day at 10 am and repeat it all over again.

In fact, it’s funny because just yesterday I shared on my Bluesky account that in 2024 CLAMP have released just one manga chapter (the special Clear Card arc chapter, in March). It was probably a conscious decision they took this year, to take things more slowly after working almost non-stop for 35 years. It’s like Ohkawa-sensei is justifying themselves for going to Okinawa for some vacation. You all worked so hard, ladies, you deserve this ♡

Ohkawa-sensei mentions at one point that she wasn’t very into drinking alcohol at first. She used to like eating sweets more and going to family restaurants. In fact, Satsuki-sensei mentions that mascots like Kero and Piffle were originally created while they were doodling at a family restaurant.

At another point, they talked a little about all four of them living together. Some of the talk is very similar to what we heard before in the 2005 Top Runner interview (how Mokona-sensei used to sleep in the closet because she is the smallest of them, they even repeated the Doraemon reference here as well). They only started living apart once they moved to Shimokitazawa, in Tokyo, around their 15th anniversary.

For the remaining of the episode, they talked about things that they have done in the trip and useful travel companions/items.

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