re: #191 Barefoot Grin

If you have a year or so you could hang out in a manga kissaten (cafe) and read as much as you want for the price of a cup of coffee. Not my thing, but my kids are into soccer, so they read “Captain Tsubasa” and “Whistle” (soccer manga) and “Dragonball Zed”; I have a few history manga.

I found something similar in Hong Kong, Comix Homebase. They have a huge collection of comics from all over the world, mostly in bound compilations, and they’re free to read but not to check out. HK also has a vibrant comics culture, which is not as widely known worldwide as Japan’s. They have their own local comic book heroes and heroines.