SBS Volume 16
Drum Island arc opens. The BIRD-NAMES volume — Oda canonizes Kuina (rallidae), Tashigi (snipe), and Nojiko (yellow bunting) as bird names, all flightless or marsh-bird kind; the famous “though a bird cannot fly, doesn’t mean it never will” gloss is delivered here (the foundational Tashigi/Kuina thesis). Also: Vivi (Feb 2) and Chopper (Dec 24) birthdays canonized, Dr. Kureha’s “sickness = happiness” gloss, “Karoo is a Super Spot-Billed Duck (no webbed feet, has teeth)”, and Oda admits the SH birthdays in Vol 15 were just lazy gag-puns.
Q&A
Chapter 137, Page 19 — Question Corner (20 Doctors hijack) — VIZ rendering
Q-Intro — 20 Doctors hijack (VIZ rendering)
Reader: Mr. Oda and fellow readers!!! I’d like today’s Question Corner to be started by the hugely popular 20 Doctors! 20 Doctors, go ahead! M.D.s: “Let’s begin the surgery.” Oda: Surgery!!? All right, then I’ll respectfully begin the Question Corner.
Q15 — Kuina & Tashigi & Nojiko bird-name etymology (VIZ rendering)
D: Mr. Oda!! Good afternoon! Are the names Kuina and Tashigi derived from bird names? Please tell me. — A peruser of picture books about birds A: I guess so. And the cool thing is that they’re both flightless birds. But not all flightless birds can’t fly. In the cartoon The Wonderful Adventures of Nils that I watched as a kid, there was a big duck that could fly. By the way, Nojiko is also the name of a bird.
Chapter 147, Page 19 — SBS Volume 16 opens
Q0a — Some Small Mistakes Corner — TonyTony Chopper (no space)
O: Before we begin the SBS corner… We have the S (some) S (small) M (mistakes) Corner!! This is for everyone who purchased the first printing of Volume 16. First, about Chopper’s name: “Tony Tony Chopper” is what it says, but this was a typo. It should really be “TonyTony Chopper”, so please remember that. What? It doesn’t matter!? Oh well, I just thought I’d bring it up. All right, on to the Question Corner!
Q0b — SBS will now begin gag
Reader: Hello, Oda Sensei. Recently, a lot of people have been wanting to shout out the start of the SBS Corner. Actually, I’m one of them. But I’m sure you want to say it, too. So, let’s each do half. Ready? “SBS will now be—” O: “—gin”… Um… Huh!?
Q0c — Oh Come My Way gloss
Reader: Where is Oh Come My Way? Is it near my house? O: Hmm… Oh Come My Way? Well, this is a difficult question. But, it’s a place where people who have “come out” go to walk. And I think it exists anywhere. Yeow!!
Q0d — WARRIORS OF ELBAPH = VIKINGS (Celtic + Swedish Vendel Period helmets)
Reader: Oda Sensei, a question about the helmets worn by the giants Broggy and Dorry. One resembles a Celtic horned helmet and the other seems to be from the Swedish Vendel Period (not sure when that was). Am I correct? O: Well, the inspiration for the “Warriors of Elbaph”, the tribe of giants, was my favorite pirates of the north, the Vikings, so you are absolutely right. Banzai to those intrepid spirits!
Chapter 137, Page 28 — Question Corner (alt rendering — Ishi-20/MD-20 hijack)
Q1 — Ishi-20 (MD-20) hijacks
D: We’re going to have today’s SBS started by the wildly popular “Ishi-20” (MD-20)! All right, Isshi-20, go ahead! I: START THE OPERATION. O: The operation?! Oh well, I guess I’ll go ahead and start the…
Q2 — Sneeze gag
D: Odacchi! Today is the day you will start the SBS! Odacchi? Oda-chaaaan! ODA-CHA…AAH…AAAH…AAAACH—START THE SBS!!—OOOOO! OH NO, I SAID IT!! O: Sneezes don’t sound like that!
Q3 — KUINA / TASHIGI / NOJIKO = BIRD NAMES (flightless)
D: Are the names “Kuina” (Rallidae) and “Tashigi” (Snipe) actually taken from the names of birds? O: That’s right. More specifically, they are the names of birds that cannot fly. But just because they say a bird cannot fly, doesn’t mean that it never will. After all, I saw a duck fly in an anime I watched when I was little, called “The Wonderful Adventures of Nils”. By the way, Nojiko (Yellow Bunting) is a bird’s name, too.
Synthesizer note: The Ch. 137 SBS Q-Corner page appears on p. 19 in the VIZ edition (renderings above), and the same content is canonicalized in the SBS Volume column also on p. 28 (Q1-Q3 above). VIZ’s bind-by-volume placement for the Ch. 137 SBS page lands it in Vol-16’s SBS slot (Vol-16 covers Chs 135-143). The synthesizer-proposal to file under Vol-15 was redirected here per the proposal’s own note.
Chapter 138, Page 48
Q4 — Onion-Bear Maria (multiplying onions)
D: On page 137 of Volume 15, the woman appears to have spring onions in her basket! Three of them! But the same lady later appears on page 162! Is it me, or does she have a bunch more of them? Just tell me what she was going to cook! O: Whaaat?! I seriously jumped out of my seat when I read this postcard, and this wasn’t the only one. When we were drawing the chapter, my staff said, “Look, the onions multiplied”, and I laughed, “Whatever, nobody will notice”, but clearly the readers are not to be trifled with! Let’s see, the woman’s name is Negikuma Maria (Onion-Bear Maria), age 43, housewife, and today was her eldest son’s birthday. She wanted to bake a delicious onion cake for her son, so she was running about the town, gathering up onions wherever she could. So the answer to your question is “Onion Cake”. Word is, it’s horrendous.
Q5 — Dr. Kureha “sickness = happiness” gloss
D: I read Volume 15… and in it, Dr. Kureha says not to forget about his sickness, but sickness is written additionally with furigana as “Happy”. What does she mean? O: She’s talking about how being sick reminds you of the happiness you take for granted when you’re not sick. Kureha: Don’t you forget about THAT sense of happiness just now!
Chapter 140, Page 88
Q6 — “I’m gonna be Pirate King”
D: Hey! Monkey D. Luffy! I’m the one who’s gonna be the Pirate King! O: All right, everybody, let’s all be a Pirate King! Hey, wait!!
Q7 — Eat Luffy → become rubber human?
D: IF I EAT LUFFY, CAN I BECOME A GOMU HUMAN?! O: You’d get food poisoning.
Q8 — Catchphrase: weirdos
D: “Friends and enemies, they’re all weirdos”. O: “Readers and author, they’re all weirdos”. Wait, no, the author is normal!
Q9 — SH BIRTHDAYS were lazy
D: Those birthdays (in Volume 15) were way too convenient! I want to have a word with their parents! Who are Luffy, Zoro, and Sanji’s parents?! O: Ahhhh… did I really take the easy way out? I just made them up as jokes, based on their personalities. I’ll reflect on my thoughtlessness…
Q10 — VIVI & CHOPPER BIRTHDAYS
D: What are Vivi-chan and Chopper’s birthdays? Are they February 2 for Vivi and December 24 for Chopper? O: YES, PERFECT! BWAHAHAHA, I LOVE IT!! Those are Vivi and Chopper’s birthdays!!
Chapter 141, Page 108
Synthesizer note: The Ch. 141 propagation queue proposed a dedicated per-chapter file
External/SBS/Vol-16-Ch-141-SBS-Question-Corner.md. Per the existing convention (Ch. 137 / 138 / 140 SBS columns folded INTO this Vol-16 note), the Ch. 141 Q&A is folded in here as Q11-Q14. The MC for this SBS column is Nami (with a basket of spotbill-Karoos behind her).
Q11 — Karoo is a SUPER spot-billed duck
D: What kind of spot-billed duck is a SUPER spot-billed duck? O: You mean Karoo? Well, he’s an amazing spot-billed duck. He’s huge, he has no webbed feet (land-walking type), and most importantly, he has teeth when he eats. Karoo’s awesome!
Canonized facts about Karoo’s species (the Super Spotbill):
- It is a huge spot-billed duck.
- It is a land type — no webbed feet (and therefore can run rather than swim, which the Vivi-arc has demonstrated).
- It shows its teeth when it feeds — a duck-with-teeth zoological-impossibility.
Q12 — Black Den Den Mushi cover
D: Please take a GOOD look at the Black Den Den Mushi when its lid is on. O: Uhhh… I… I don’t know? I don’t remember drawing it, exactly… but looking at it, it seems like poop to me… like a big twisty turd pile… (refer to Volume 15, p. 31)
Side-illustration: a Black Den Den Mushi drawn with its lid closed (showing it looks like a soft-serve / poo silhouette). Cross-reference: vol. 15 p. 31. Meta-joke about the Den Den Mushi design.
Q13 — Half-circle special letter pronunciation
D: How are you supposed to pronounce ぴº (Vol 15, p 180)? O: This is how you sound it out. Without letting your lips touch, you must explosively let out a deep breath and stick your chin out at the same time. Ready, set, ぴº!!
Q14 — Couldn’t find Oda’s playfulness
D: When I saw this Q&A Corner, I wanted to write my own postcard, and “find some sign of Oda-sensei’s playfulness!” But then I couldn’t find any. So here’s my question. What should my question be about? O: Are you totally cracked?!! SBS IS OVER.
Notable canon leaks
- Kuina, Tashigi, and Nojiko all named after birds (flightless ones) — first Oda-canon confirmation of the East-Blue female-character bird-naming convention; pre-loads the Tashigi-Kuina-double Loguetown reveal. → Kuina Nojiko / Tashigi (no vault note yet)
- Kuina (water-rail) / Tashigi (snipe) / Nojiko (yellow bunting) = bird names — all flightless or marsh-birds; “though a bird cannot fly, doesn’t mean it never will” doctrine confirmed → Kuina / Tashigi / Nojiko / Tashigi - name encodes flightless-bird Kuina-succession / Kuina Tashigi Nojiko Bird-Name Etymology SBS Canon
- VIVI birthday: February 2 → Vivi
- CHOPPER birthday: December 24 (Christmas Eve, reindeer pun) → Chopper (if exists)
- Karoo (Super Spot-Billed Duck): land-walking duck (no webbed feet) with teeth → Karoo (if exists). 13+; the species Super Spot-Billed Duck is canonized here in Ch. 141 SBS p. 108).
- Dr. Kureha’s “sickness = happiness” furigana glossed → Kureha (if exists)
- Oda admits Vol-15 SH-birthdays were arbitrary gag-puns based on personality → personality-based-naming canon
- Tony Tony Chopper typo confirmed by Oda — proper name is TonyTony Chopper (no space). “Doesn’t matter,” per Oda → see Tony Tony Chopper (note: vault uses the spaced form Tony Tony Chopper per common-usage / VIZ-rendering convention).
- Warriors of Elbaph (Dorry and Brogy’s giants) explicitly inspired by the Vikings — “my favorite pirates of the north” — including Celtic horned and Swedish Vendel Period helmets → Elbaf Code Of Honor, propose forward-canon Elbaph Vikings Inspiration if a dedicated note becomes warranted.