I was testing out the new search engine Cuil (yes, yes, I was "Cuil-ing" myself, if you must know), and an article I had forgotten about popped up. I think I posted it straight to the Fukushima list-serv, and then someone asked to post it on a blog/newsletter. The article is my explanation of how to use Amazon Japan. I just used it again recently, and it’s even better in Tokyo. I ordered three things. Two of them were delivered within a few days. I got a shipping notice for the third item on Sunday at around noon, and it was delivered Sunday evening at around 7 or 8pm. Highly recommended.
Cool Kanji – ※
Today’s cool kanji isn’t actually a kanji! I’m so excited about this! Aren’t you!? It’s called the 米印（こめじるし） and it’s used in Japan as a marker of clarification/warning. It’s called 米印 because it looks like the 米 character if you rotated it 45 degrees. You often see it below a chart used to explain something. You also see it on instructions warning you to do something a specific way. I just bought a desk and had I paid attention to the 米印, I would have realized I didn’t need to hunt down a weirdly shaped screwdriver – one came with the desk.
One of the coolest things about this character is that if you type in こめじるし and then 変換（へんかん, change from kana to kanji） it, ※ will be one of the options. On Windows, it changes the whole thing, but on my Mac it only changes こめ. I need to experiment further on Windows.
Another cool character is the Japanese post office mark – 〒. Also not a kanji, but like 米印 it can be accessed by typing in equivalent kana, in this case ゆうびん.
Friday Puzzle – A Boy Named Who?
This week I’m channeling my inner Will Shortz.
Today’s puzzle is all about the romanization. There is a type of Japanese cat such that when you romanize the Japanese word, you get a common boy’s name in English. What is the cat and what is the boy’s name?
The prize if you win? One can of 100% barley malt beer – e.g. Ebisu, Suntory Malts, Asahi Premium.
Please do not post your answer in the comments. Send it to me via email or facebook. My email address is るぱんさんせい (romanized) at-mark gmail dot com.
Friday Puzzle – Bodacious Answer
Well, I was right. It was an easy puzzle. Probably easier than I initially imagined. I tried to get clever and talk about radicals (awesome! bodacious!), but four people flooded me with correct possibilities – 手、頭、目、髪、耳、お尻、鼻、指、足、口、顎、爪先、首。Hell, all of them, basically!
Which got me thinking, why is that the case? Sure, 月 is often associated with body parts, but it isn’t used in any of the main ones. The reason is, I believe, because many of the other body parts are so useful in the kind of basic explanation required in pictograms, that they themselves become radicals.
手 The hand, manipulator of things, is used all over the place. Of course it gets in on the finger character (指), but it also grasps (握る), points (指す), holds (持つ), picks up (拾う), and digs (掘る).
口 The mouth, drinker of booze and consumer of grilled chicken parts, is another one you’ll see all over. It eats (喰う), yells (叫ぶ), beeps (鳴る), and cries (鳴く).
I could go on for a while, but I’ll save that for another post when I have more time. Matt from no-sword emailed me with a link to one of his archives where he talks further about the 月 radical. First of all, read the link – a great classic no-sword post. He explains that the body part radical is actually 肉 which eventually became the same as 月. It makes sense if you think about it. The characters that have the 月 radical all are internal organy type parts – 腸、腹、心臓、肝臓, etc. Much more purely fleshy than our external sensory organs.
The winner by random number generation (everything is officially on the Internets, hooray) is Jens. Congrats.
Punishment
A man moves from the prefectures to Tokyo and the ensuing madness…uh…ensues. Me and all my stuff are in Tokyo, but things haven’t calmed down enough to resume serious writing duties, so you get another pun. This one I thought up in the shower the other day.
If someone asks you, 「おしっこしてきたの？」, you can always reply, "I don’t 尿" and shrug your shoulders.
Well, I thought it was funny.
Hope you all had a nice Marine Day weekend. See you here on Friday.
Punt
This week’s final pun is one of my own invention. I was at the Aizu Festival last year with some Japanese friends, and when some samurai on horses came by, I said 「馬、うまそう！」
My Japanese friends were only amused enough to mutter 「おやじギャッグ」
This pun only works if you are within pointing distance of this:
Or this:
This gag works better in Aizu, which is famous for its 馬刺 (ばさし) – yep, horse sashimi. They eat it with soy sauce and a bit of miso instead of wasabi. It’s surprisingly tender.
Punch
Today’s pun is a legendary elementary school pun:
「I’m sorry. 小泉総理。安倍総理。福田総理。ひげ剃り。」
Little kids turn English they don’t understand into Japanese they know and "sorry" is close enough to 総理（そうり）, that when they hear it, they’ll repeat "I’m sorry," and then go into a list of Japanese Prime Ministers that either starts or ends with ひげ剃り（そり）- a shave.
Puns
I’m down to my last week in Nishiaizu. With 送別会 every night and packing and cleaning to worry about, How to Japanese takes a back seat. I’ll give you guys three puns this week, and regularly scheduled programming will return next week.
One of the new English teachers at the junior high school uses some ridiculous puns in the classroom to get the kids to laugh. Recently they learned the word Asian, and his pun for this was, 「なかなかええじゃん」
ええ = いい
じゃん = じゃない
But together it sounds a little like Asian.
Friday Puzzle – Bodacious
This fortnight’s puzzle is somewhat easy. I’ve wanted to do a kanji puzzle for a while, but couldn’t think up a good way to do one until now.
Everyone knows that radicals are a fundamental part of kanji. Your job this week is to provide me with the kanji for a body part that doesn’t use the radical 月, the radical that is used in many of the body part kanji.
The prize if you win? One can of 100% barley malt beer – e.g. Ebisu, Suntory Malts, Asahi Premium.
Please do not post your answer in the comments. Send it to me via email or facebook. My email address is るぱんさんせい (romanized) at-mark gmail dot com.
Friday Puzzle – You Little Pun(k) Answer
Yes, it’s a pun. 用がない or 用なし (ようなし) and 洋梨 (ようなし) or pear. And puns are funny.
Before kids enter the staff room, they have to stand at the door and say, 「X年生のYです。Z先生に用があってきました。」(Or at least that’s what it sounds like to me. Correct me if I’m wrong.) In English, "I’m Y from the X Grade. I need to see Z-sensei."
I’ve translated it as "need to see Z-sensei," but it’s actually the word 用 (よう), which means reason – so it’s almost like "I have a certain need/reason to see Z-sensei." It’s also used in the very similar 用事 but not in 予定. Watch your long vowels.
(In the original puzzle I translated it as "and I’m here to see Z-sensei," which I think is even more natural in the English.)
Aleisha and Robin both provided correct answers, and the winner by coin flip is Aleisha.