Author: Kurt

aramusha — reckless-behaving person, daredevil, rude-mannered samurai

This was part of the headline on a recent Sumo monthly magazine, which featured a picture of Yokozuna Asashoryu after he won the recent Natsu Basho. Asashoryu had upset many sumo fans, and the Japan Sumo Association, with his disrespectful and un-Yokozuna like behavior after a losing performance in one of his tournament matches. There were actually two headlines on the cover of the magazine, the other reading tsukisusumu, which means “to push forward with force or vigor.” However, the aramusha headline was in bigger font.

tanshinfunin — to commute over a long distance

An example would be living in Hokkaido but working in Tokyo, perhaps flying home on the weekends. This particular example was the plight of a student I interviewed recently, who flew home once a week to see his wife and two young children in Sapporo.

futsukayoi — hangover

It’s funny how you can study a language for the longest time and never come across certain words or expressions seemingly essential to one’s vocabulary. This is such an entry. I didn’t learn it on account of having one myself (at least recently); actually, I can’t remember the why’s and wherefore’s of how I picked this up. But I’m sure it’ll come in handy one of these days. I love the fact that a literal translation of the word would read something like “drunk on the second day.”

uwasa o sureba… — speak of the devil…

I heard a student utter this when I walked into the classroom recently. I grilled her on what she had said and what it meant, but she was unable to explain the meaning in English. But she insisted it had positive connotations. Later when looking it up I of course realized it only has positive connotations depending on what was being said before it was uttered. uwasa on its own means “rumor” or “gossip.”

suisui — swimming smoothly, unhindered
rakuraku — comfortably, easily

These were both used in an train advertisement for monorail service to Tokyo’s Haneda airport.

netto shinjuu — internet-assisted suicide

A new term, found in the “Changing Japanese” section of a recent Japan Times newspaper (each Thursday’s edition features Japanese lessons and related articles on the language). netto means “Internet,” and shinju means “double suicide” or a suicide committed with others. This term is an outgrowth of the recent spate of group suicides involving people who met through Internet sites.

fuan — anxiety, unease

I was watching one of the weekend sports shows and they had a very long segment on Japanese baseball’s Hanshin Tigers, who from the sound of it are the Chicago Cubs of Japanese baseball. In other words, they haven’t won a penant in a very long time (well, since 1985 at least). This year, at least at this point, almost halfway through the season, the Tigers lead their division by 9 games, with arch-rivals Yomiurui Giants in second. But Hanshin traditionally starts strong, and then goes into the tank in the second half of the season. They did this last year. Thus, Hanshin fans right now are full of fuan, or unease, that their lead will not hold up. fuan rendered in katakana script means “fan, ” ironically enough.

Definitions were garnered from my Canon Wordtank 3000 (which uses the New Anchor Japanese-English Dictionary), and Jim Breen’s WWWJDIC (and the Japan Times, where noted). I’m pretty much flying solo these days with respect to my language learning, so I would be ever so grateful if those with a better grasp of the language than I, could contribute, via comments, to this post. I.e., if I’ve gotten something wrong, or there are alternative ways to say the above, or additional meanings that would be relevant, etc., please add a comment so I and other learners don’t stray too far down the wrong path. Thanks!