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Tuesday, November 13, 2007

海千山千

うみ せん やま せん
umi sen yama sen

Another group of kanji that are oh-so-easy to read and yet, with today's post, I'm issuing you a challenge. The kanji are just "ocean" and "mountain" broken up by a couple of "thousands," but what does it mean?

I'll give you the strict definition in both Japanese and English, and then (without consulting web resources or Nirav) tell me what you think is the intended application of this 四字熟語。

Definition: 千年海に住んでいて、千年山に住んでいた蛇が竜二人になります。
A snake that lives in the ocean for a thousand years and in the mountains for a thousand years becomes two dragons.

Hint: It has nothing to do with rollercoasters.

3 comments:

Defendership said...

heh, this isn't even fair - there are a billion conclusions you can draw from that "translation"...

But I'm gonna say that it means powerfully different experiences will make you a more adaptive and able person.

そのブレットやつは大学の時に天下のことの中で一つずつ三ヶ月勉強した。何でもできるね、その海千山千やつ。

"During college, that Brett guy studied everything under the sun for 3 months a piece. He can do anything, that crazy bastard.

BilabialBoxing said...

I'm too lazy to make a sentence with it, but I imagine you'd use it to say that...uhhhh.....you become schizophrenic if you spend too long in two different places? Naw I give up.

By the way, I saw 一刀両断 the other day. One of my students had written it for calligraphy. I was like. "Huh. I know that kanji. This kid must be a nerd."

Claytonian said...

It's all about leveling up to 99.