Thread:Old McDonald/@comment-24259054-20140330143043/@comment-24494906-20140330171013

Suzuya says that Kaneki is 19 in the Japanese original, too. I don't know why he says that, though.

Kaneki's birthday is December 20th. That's the day he escapes from Aogiri. (I think the author chose that date deliberately.) So if he was 18 in chapter 1, he must still be 18 when Suzuya steals his wallet.

There are a number of possibilities that explain that discrepancy:
 * A typo in chapter 47. But that doesn't fit that Suzuya says that Kaneki is the same age, because Suzuya is really 19.
 * A typo in chapter 1. But that would make Kaneki 19 when he started university, so Kaneki would have been a year behind. It would mean that Kaneki either repeated a grade (which is hardly possible in Japan) or failed the university entrance exams. I think either possibility is unlikely because Kaneki was always an excellent student.
 * Suzuya didn't look closely or is bad at maths. Maybe Suzuya only checked month and year, but didn't check the day of the month. Or only the year of birth is printed on the student id (I don't know how Japanese student ids look like). I think something like this happened.