Category Archives: get used to it!

That’s What All the Ladies Say

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My understanding of だろう and でしょう are tenuous at best. I remember being puzzled by these when I took my first Japanese class – an intensive summer class, which I would not recommend (slow down, everyone, you’re moving too fast).

Two encounters have shaped my understanding of these phrases. Today, encounter one.

I was up in Fukushima, I think during my first year as a JET, watching TV. There was a small variety show where a host was interviewing different celebrities who came out one by one. After the host asked a few questions about the kind of work they did, the audience had to guess the celebrity’s annual income. One of the people on the show was パックン – Patrick Harlan, a Harvard grad who parlayed English teaching into Japanese study into fame as a manzai comedian. I don’t remember exactly what the host said to Pakkun, but he responded with a highly suggestive でしょう, which got a lot of laughs. I immediately noted the tone of his phrasing and added it to my mental catalog of funny phrases to use.

It felt like he was confirming something, just as you would with ですね, but this something was overly obvious and a little silly. A phrase you could substitute it with is the equally laugh-inducing よく言われます – literally, and extremely awkwardly, “That is often said about me.” I guess the English equivalent would be, “That’s what they all say.”

The tone on でしょう here is important – it’s slightly inquisitive with the hint of a smile. Amirite? でしょう？

Cool Kanji – 肉

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niku

肉 (にく) – the character for meat. It always reminds me of a ribcage or a little rack of lamb or something. Maybe a bizarro chicken tulip.

The concept of meat in Japan is slightly different from that in the U.S. Here, to the great collective unhappiness of all vegetarian expats, it refers to mammal meat – beef and pork, mostly – and not the flesh of living things in general (at least when talking about food). So, saying you don’t eat meat (肉は、食べません) won’t always earn you a meal that meets (har har) your dietary restrictions, especially if you take into account broths and pastes and flakes (many of which are fish-based).

(On a side note, I once knew a “vegetarian” who ate ramen and just gave away the チャーシュー on top – what a joke! Ramen broth is, more or less, pig rendered into a delicious liquid form.)

When I was a CIR on JET, I was forced to explain strict vegetarianism to Japanese people for expats on a number of occasions. (Including one Lithuanian artist who wouldn’t eat mushrooms for some reason. His English was really bad, but from what I could gather, spores are little people.) I found the best way to explain it is to say that you don’t eat 動物 (どうぶつ, doubutsu) – animals in general. But even that was not general enough sometimes, so I would always bastardize the pronunciation to 動き物 (うごきもの, ugokimono) – things that move – and then add the sentence, 動くのなら、食べません. If it moves on its own (and not in search of photons to photosynthesize), they don’t eat it. This always gets the point across and makes people laugh as an added bonus.

～ている – Stative Gerunds

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現在進行形 is the name of the tense (present progressive in English). You’re probably well familiar with this pattern. 食べています (tabete imasu). 飲んでいます (nonde imasu). Eating stuff. Drinking stuff. Doing stuff in general.

But I was reminded last week by 落ち着いている that you have to be careful with this pattern in Japanese because the same construction can be used as stative description depending on the verb. One of the best examples of this is the phrase 変わっている. This should not be translated as “is changing.” If something is 変わっている it means it is “in a changed state,” i.e. it is strange or weird. This is often used to describe quirky, unusual people.

You have to be vigilant not to fall into this traps. I recently had to pull myself out of one. In the Murakami story “The Town and Its Uncertain Wall,” there is a short introduction where the narrator meditates on the uncertainty and ineffectiveness of words:

語るべきものはあまりに多く、語り得るものはあまりに少ない。

おまけにことばは死ぬ。

一秒ごとにことばは死んでいく。路地で、屋根裏で、荒野で、そしで駅の待合室で、コートの襟を立てたまま、ことばは死んでいく。

お客さん、列車が来ましたよ！

そして次の瞬間、ことばは死んでいる。

I initially translated that last line as “And the next moment words are dying.” But it actually should be “And the next moment words are in the state of being dead”; in other words, “words are dead.” This passage is interesting because you have three different conjugations of the verb die: 死ぬ (shinu), 死んでいく (shinde iku), and 死んでいる (shinde iru). Here is the translation I ended up with:

There are too many things I want to say and too few things that I am able to say.

And to make matters worse, words die.

Every second words are dying. Words die in alleyways, in attics, in the wilderness, and in waiting rooms at stations with the collar on their coat turned up.

Excuse me, sir! The train is here!

And the next moment, words are dead.

I guess if you wanted to be more dramatic and read into it a little you could go with “Every second words are uttered and then go off to their death” for 死んでいく. Anyone have other ideas?

If you are trying to say “is changing” you should probably say 変化している (or possibly 変身している), or you could bust out some ところ action and say 変わっているところ.

Other frequently used examples are:
開いている。 It’s open.
閉まっている。 It’s closed.
冷えている。 It’s chilled (and ready to drink).

Maintain gerund vigilance.

～てくる – Changes

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The pattern ～てくる is also really useful way to express a change in state. I remember it being a confusing pattern when I first started studying Japanese, but I solved that problem by using it constantly (regardless of whether or not it was appropriate) because, let’s face it, shit be changing, yo. (Cue Tupac track.) Gradually I’ve narrowed down the appropriate usage conditions.

Here’s a quick example sentence: この2ヶ月間仕事が忙しくて大変だったけど、やっと落ち着いてきた。

The first clause sets the scene – work was busy and it sucked. But (there’s the fulcrum for the change) things have settled down (or so he thinks). The second clause shows how things have changed from the first clause. They have gone from an 落ち着いていない condition to an 落ち着いている condition. The きた, I feel, helps emphasize this transformation and the やっと impresses exactly how long the subject was waiting for the きた to くる so he could キター！

So the next question is what’s the difference between ～た and ～てきた? It’s pretty subtle. Another example. I got a birthday package from a friend in the US the other day. If my friend spoke Japanese I could say that it got here with a simple 荷物が届きましたよ. Just the basic way to say that the package was delivered. I could also say 届いてきたよ, which feels more urgent – as if my friend or I were awaiting the arrival of the package slightly more desperately. Maybe the package was delayed? Maybe there was a kitten inside?! Or maybe we were just waiting to compare the USPS with Japan Post. (Japan Post wins.) As in the example yesterday, the きた・くる seems to address a sort of mutual understanding that exists whereas the plain form of the verb is best for communicating brand new information.

〜なってきた・くる is another pattern that you can use to express how something changes. An example: 寒くなってきた. Like Monday, the timeframe feels more specific, as in 最近 or 今日 or 今週. And once it’s cold enough, (you can use Monday’s pattern to say…) 雪が降ってくる.

～てくる – Going to Do Stuff

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This week I’ll explore the glories of the pattern ～てくる。The eternal caveat: trying to get back to the core of How to Japonese, this week will be especially unfounded in textbook “learnin’.” I’m looking back through the fog of time, thousands of hours of study, and countless repetitions in an attempt to narrow down the “sense” that I’ve developed for this pattern and how I came to that sense. How I’ve gotten used to it, I guess. Hope it’s helpful.

For me, this pattern represents the earliest stages of getting used to it. Jay Rubin’s book Making Sense of Japanese is the Bible of “getting used to it.” I first read through it my sophomore year of college. Not all of it sank in immediately, but this pattern did. He has one short section titled “Go Jump in The Lake, But Be Sure to Come Back” where he calls 〜てくる an idiomatic expression; in English we say “go do,” and in Japanese they just happen to say “do and then come.” Get used to it.

The most basic ～てくる pattern is 行ってきます, which is what people say when leaving the house in Japan. When translating, it’s probably best to go with something like “I’ll be back” or “I’m stepping out” or even “See you later.” The expression literally breaks down to “I will go and then come (back)” but really only means “I’m going.”

That’s easy enough. You can extend this to any activity:
弁当（を）買ってきます。 I’m going to buy a bento. (Because I can’t be asked to make anything.)
一服してくるよ。　I’m taking a cigarette break/rest. (Because this office is hot as hell!)
まい泉でトンカツを食べてきた。 I went and had tonkatsu at Maisen. (Which is why I can’t get up from the couch.)
年末ジャンボを二枚買ってきた！ I bought two New Year’s Jumbo tickets! (And when I win I will retire at 28.)

The big question is what is the difference between plain, old 買いました and 買ってきました. The former conveys only the basic information – you bought something. The second one feels more like an event, one that the person being addressed was previously aware of – you went out and bought something that you had been talking about earlier. (You can see this implied information in parenthesis for the examples above.) And 買います and 買ってきます？ The former to me feels undefined in terms of timeframe, whereas the latter is going to happen sooner or at least in a more specified timeframe such as これから or 明日 or お金がたまったら.

I’m going to go ahead and say that you should be using this pattern 40% more often than you currently do. So go on. Get out there and go do some stuff. And come back when you’re done.

Chillin’ Out

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After two straight weekends of awesome globetrotting madness, I finally had a weekend to myself and could make use of a couple of terms my host mom in Nishiaizu taught me:

骨を休め – literally “rest one’s bones,” take a physical rest

羽を伸ばす – literally “spread one’s wings,” a similar pattern but also includes a mental rest aspect, and another alternative is…

鬼の居ぬ間に洗濯をする – literally “do laundry while the oni is away,” where oni = unpleasant boss-like person/situation that oppresses you

Get the scoop on these and other idioms at this awesome ことわざ dictionary.

カメラマン ≠ cameraman

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The Google Image results for this one are so awesome that I won’t even bother embedding images. Just check out the difference in the results for cameraman, and then the results for カメラマン.

A cameraman always works with video, whereas a カメラマン works with photographs most of the time, and should therefore be translated as photographer. It can be a video cameraman, but Yahoo gives that as the second definition and provides 撮影技師 as a more specific alternative.

It’s kind of cute to think that カメラマン is simply a “man with a camera” in Japanese. It tickles me in the same way as when this Portuguese girl once told me she bought a new “photographic machine,” which is the literal translation from Portuguese. Remember, laughing at and being laughed at is a good thing when learning a language.

And the moral of the story is… don’t submit to the katakana! Know how to use them and make them work for you! And think before you translate them.

ジュース ≠ juice, except when ジュース ＝ juice

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I was at Ryoanji Temple in Kyoto a couple weekends ago and stopped in the 湯豆腐 (boiled tofu) restaurant on the grounds as I almost always do. A friend and I split a single serving (enough for two unless you really like your boiled tofu) and took in the view of the pristine garden.

A couple came in at some point and ordered their food and drink. When they ordered their drinks, the guy said, ビールを一つと、ジュースを一つ. Simple enough: one beer and one juice.

The lady’s reply was awesome: ジュースは、コーラ、アップル、どっちがいいですか。Something like, “Which juice do you want, Coke or apple?”

I smiled and basked in the linguistic awesomeness that allows me to make the following sets of equalities and inequalities:

ジュース   =  juice1

juice          =  juice1

juice          ≠  juice3

ジュース   =  juice3

ジュース   =  juice2

ジュース   =  juice4

ジュース   ≠  juice5

Wikipedia explains that beverage companies long sold soft drinks under the label ジュース, and the name has stuck despite the Japan Agricultural Standards’ best attempts to define it as stuff from fruit.

I was surprised that Wikipedia didn’t mention anything about alcohol. I have this impression that ジュース implies non-alcoholic, which is why I added that last equation. Part of this comes from vast 宴会 experience. At the start of an enkai, tables or trays are supplied with bottled beer and a selection of non-booze – usually ginger ale, orange drink, oolong tea and cola. (People dip into nihonshu and shochu after the initial toast.)

ジュース also happens to be one of my favorite words to over-enunciate. ジューーース.

Cool Compound – 初耳

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hatsumimi

Short and simple today. 初耳 (はつみみ) is a nice quick way to say that you’ve heard something for the first time. Makes sense, right?

This:

それは初耳だ。

is 40% more efficient than this:

それを聞いたのは初めてだ。

And 初めて聞いた (the pattern I always used that now makes me think of an Eastern-European-accented “First time I hear this!”) I think should really only be used as a modifier, i.e. 初めて聞いたとき.

クリーム ≠ cream

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Well, at least not always:

クリーム = cream2

cream      = cream1

The Japanese クリーム often refers specifically to the whipped variety that goes on top of cakes or inside tasty treats, most notably the シュークリーム. I often see this romanized on packages as “chou cream” for whatever reason. For those of you who can’t read Japanese, it actually sounds like “shoe cream,” which is a funny thought.

The Japanese and English Wikipedia entries are subtly different. In English, whipped cream is only listed below under “Other cream products,” whereas in Japanese whipped cream gets its own section and the photo at the top of the entry is a photo of a bowl of whipped cream.

I rest my case.