津津浦浦

つつうらうら
tsutsu uraura

This week we're gonna look at two-kanji 四字熟語. In our post headings we'll write each of them out in their entirety, but they're just as often written out using the くりかえし mark： 々, Like this： 津々浦々。

To date, we've only posted one other two-kanji yo-ji. You remember it?

Researching this week's posts have given me tons of cool trivia and info to discuss with Japanese friends, and to show off my yo-ji knowledge. Test your friends by asking how many two-kanji yo-ji they can think of. By the end of this week, you should know more than they do!

Let's get into 津々浦々。

Definition:
いたるところの港や海岸。全国くまなくいたる所という意味。
Translation:
1. All over/Everywhere (geographically)
2. Every part of the country

You'll notice that the first part of the Japanese gives the literal meaning of 津々浦々, based on it's kanji. 津, meaning port, harbor, or haven, gets used an awful lot in the names of places in Japan, like 唐津, here in Saga-ken, famous for its beaches, pine forests and festivals. 浦, meaning inlet, gets used similarly (the picture above is of one of Kyuushuu's most famous inlets and rice paddies, located in 浜野浦, in 唐津).

When you take into account the Japanese linguistic practice of repeating something twice to imply a multitude or succession (人々、国々、日々, etc) and the fact that Japan is an island nation, you get a sense of how "Every port, every inlet," came to mean everywhere. 「津々浦々」wouldn't go far in a landlocked country, or a country with less 海 adjacent property...

Attach particles like の, から, and で for the most common usages.

例文：あいつはモテるよ。津々浦々に恋人が居るそうです。
That guy's a pimp. I heard he's got a girl in every port.

教科書に載っていない日本語

Even More Japanese That Ain't in the Textbook:

Yet another installment of words and phrases "to help make your 言い回し more 日本人ぽい."
This time we've got three helpful phrases that Japanese people use ALL the time, and you can incorporate into your speech just as easily.

別に
べつに
betsu ni

not particulary; nothing special.

You'll recognize 別 as meaning 'separate,' or 'apart.' When you need separate checks at a restaurant, you say "別々."

別に、however, is the best way to answer "Do you like" questions when you don't have any strong feelings on way or the other, but it has tons of other uses as well. Technically it should take something afterwards, like "別にない," to make "nothing special," or "別に構わない," for "It' doesn't particularly matter," but in conversation, people say 「別に」 as a standalone phrase all the time. It's so common that Brett and I debated introducing it here; we say it so often that it seemed too basic.

Did you do anything fun this weekend? 別に.
Do you like natto? 別に.
Do you want to read the first draft of my novel? 別に.

You can use 特別にない as well, to highlight your lack of specific preference, as 別に can often sound detached to the point of being very cold, so be careful with it.

When I was going to meet Yuri's family for the first time, we talked a lot about how to get him to take me seriously as a boyfriend. We also used to joke about things that I should NOT say if he asked why were seeing each other. Top of the list was 「ゆりの事は別にきらいではない。」 Translation: I don't really DIS-like your daughter. Winning words? 別に。

役に立つ
やくにたつ
yaku ni tatsu

to be helpful; to be useful

役 means 'role,' 'position,' or 'use.' An actor or actress's role is their "役," for example. But in this case, it gets used to mean to be of assistance, or to help someone out.

「役に立ちたい」 means "I want to help out."

「学校で習うことは将来に役に立つはずです」：The things you learn in school are supposed to help you out in the future.

You can use 役に立つ in all kinds of ways, and you'll hear it all the time. The Daily Yo-jiは皆の役に立てたらいいですね。

無事
ぶじ
buji

safety; peace; quietness; nothing

Literally meaning "the absence of things," 無事 gets used to mean "without incident." You'll hear it most often with the verb 着く, as in 「無事に着いて良かった: It's good that you arrived safely." I heard it tons of times on my hitchhiking trip from people who asked me to let them know when I made it to my next destination. You can use it with verbs like 届く for packages or letters, with 終わる or 終了する, pretty much anything you can attach "without incident" too.

Japanese Language Trivia of the Day

If you're preparing to go to Japan, the internet will provide you with an endless checklist of things you should or should not do to make yourself less of a foreign barbarian. While a lot of it is encapsulated in phrases accompanying this or that action, half or more is registered through gestures that would be seen as harmless in some other cultures. There are a few notions that rank as chief among these faux pas: standing your chopsticks upright in a bowl of rice, treading over tatami mats in shoes - muddy or otherwise - or chomping on some food while walking around, to name a few.

Beyond the big ones, though, the personal awareness one must exert to adhere to the minutia of manners is intense. Zen Buddhism intense. I used to think I had a fairly good grasp on dinner table etiquette when my girlfriend's mother suddenly pointed out to me that I was doing EVERYTHING wrong. There was, apparently, an order in which I was supposed to pick up my respective bowls. Nested within this order was a new way for me to pick up my chopsticks that involved first lifting a bowl with my left hand, then my chopsticks - from above, and at the exact center - with my right, tucking them between the pinkie and ring finger of my left hand, gliding my fingers about a quarter of the way down the newly suspended chopsticks before shifting my hand below them so as to not break contact while also refraining from touching the tips, and finally adjusting the chopsticks to a usable position (ie the proper position, which is a whole different lesson) with just one hand. If it sounds complicated (and vaguely run-on sentencey), that's because it is. I still practice it from time to time when the mood strikes me, but as a ravenous eater I can ill abide cultural nuances asserting themselves between the food and my mouth. And that's where today's trivia comes in.

遠慮の塊
えんりょ　の　かたまり
enryo no katamari

I can guarantee that anybody who has been in Japan for any more than a week or two will have experienced this phrase, even if they did not know the meaning or even detect anything unusual about it. Breaking down the words is not only helpful, but fun for two reasons.

First, 遠慮 is a great word. Why? It summarizes the traditional Japanese psyche: reserved. While this word is not nearly so definitive today as it might have been hundreds of years ago, it will still serve as an excellent label for the diffidence you will puzzle over from students, coworkers, etc. It will also give you the stock phrase "遠慮しないで", or "don't hold back," "don't be shy," as well as the not so stock phrase "今度は遠慮します," which can help you politely decline something you don't want to do. Use them wisely, padawans.

Next - and also, high-geek warning - 塊 is the first word in the title of the bizarre but ridiculously amusing game "Katamari Damacy," or 塊魂. This, sadly, has almost nothing in common with today's trivia save the kanji 塊, which means lump, chunk, clump, bit, etc. For this phrase, though, I'm going to flex my editorial muscle and add in "morsel" as a potential translation.

Put it together - the morsel of reservation, ie the last bit of food on a communal plate that nobody is willing to be responsible for taking. The idea is that everyone is being gracious by saving the final piece for everybody else. Rather than make a big deal about who is going to enjoy the last, tiny, delicious bit of food you've been snacking on, nobody takes it, and the problem is solved. But - much like no-walking-and-eating, always using bathroom slippers, and not referring to your students as the Japanese equivalent of "that little bastard" during class - this is another convention I break unrepentantly.

On a final note, our long-time readers might remember we covered a similar phrase that would've been enriched by this bit of trivia: いいとこ取り. If you use these two phrases together in a single sentence, there is a very high chance you will actually KILL the person you are speaking to with impressiveness. Consider yourself warned.

A little sampling of my usual dinner chatting:

暴食と言われてるこの俺様が遠慮の塊をとってやる！逆らう奴がおればかかって来やがれ！
Brett "The Eating Machine" Staebell has dibs on this last piece! Anybody who thinks they can stop me: BRING IT!

電光石火

でんこう　せっか
denkou seｋka

Reader consensus seems to be that a little yo-ji is better than no yo-ji at all, so get ready for The Daily Yo-ji lightning round!


Definition:
きわめて短い時間のたとえ。
Translations:
1. Lightning-fast.
2. Quick as a spark.

How fast do you have to be going to qualify for 電光石火 speed? Survey says "At least 88 miles per hour."

例文: 電光石火の恋と電光石火のセックスとどう違うか？下のＰＶを観てごらん。どちが面白いと聞かれても、俺は決めれない。
What's the difference between lightning-speed love and lightning-speed... 'love?' Watch the music videos below and see. I can't decide which one is funnier.

電光石火の恋


電光石火のセックス？


Here's the lyrics to 電光石火の恋, for those of you who like J-pop (or who just LOVED that guy's dancing).

Japanese Language Trivia of the Day:

This week I'm celebrating having come one step closer to Nirav-like awesomeness in the following way: I've finally achieved お得意さん status.　While お得意さん (おとくい; otokui) means "regular customer, or valued client" the Japanese nuance of it is a little bit stronger. I think that it implies more of a sense of friendship or value than a word like 常連 (じょうれん；jouren) which also means regular customer.

The お得意さん is someone who's pretty damn 仲良し with the owner of a restaurant or bar, and Brett and I have noticed that there are two kinds of 常連. There are the those who know the owner through their patronage, and those who are friends with the owner outside of the business establishment. The latter is more likely to be an お得意さん than the former.

We've met a lot of the former、and most of the time, they're えらい調子乗っている. They'll start a conversation with us, ask all the typical questions for foreigners, offer us a drink saying that they "know the owner well," and pretty soon they've got the staff running to get their "キープ" bottle, ordering things that aren't on the menu, and generally bossing the boss around to show off how special they are/how much they know. In my opinion, these kind of 常連 aren't any different from the clients at a snack bar (hostess bar). The owner puts up with them and acts like he likes them because their money is made of money.

In Saga, there's a chain of 焼き鳥 restaurants called かちがらす ( a crow-like bird, maybe a magpie?), and they serve THE BEST カルビ in Kyuushuu. We've been going there for the entire time that we've been in Saga, but only in the last few months have I gotten to know the owner. The かちがらす本店 isn't a very busy location, so one night I was sitting at the bar, chatting a bit, and the owner decided he wanted to close up his shop early and take off to go drinking somewhere else. I got invited along. After that, I brought him some お土産 as a thank you, and now, everytime we go, we get tons and tons of free food (ox-tail, side salads, bizarrrrrrre fish), and every couple of weeks, the dude calls me at home to say "No customers tonight; come hang out."

So in addition to the definition of 常連, and a small hint about how to go about gaining favorable 常連 status (give お土産! They never expect it from customers, let alone foreign customers), the real piece of language trivia I wanted to share was something I finally got to use on the last occasion I was enjoying a meal at かちがらす。

ご馳走様です！
ごちそうさま　です！
gochisousama desu!

I know, I know... You're going "WTF, Daily Yo-ji? Did you just put 「ご馳走様です」 in a trivia post? Are you retarded?"

「ご馳走様,」 as everyone knows, is what you say when you finish a meal, it means everything from "Thanks," to "That was great," to "I'm done," to "It was a glorious feast!" Along with 「頂きます,」pre-eating, it's one of the most basic 決まり文句 this side of 「お元気ですか.」

The reason it counts as today's trivia is because of its other usage, which I recently learned, and if you all knew this one already then, to answer your previous question, yes, we are retarded.

Contextual Translation:
1. TMI (too much information!)
2. WHOAH, that'll be enough of that.
3. STOP talking please.

Playing off of the "I'm all done, thanks" nuance it contains, ご馳走様 is Japan's version of telling you they don't wanna hear it, for whatever reason. My girlfriend's mother jokingly says it when I'm saying something saccharine-sweet about Yuri. Japanese people will use it to let you know that your 自画自賛 is not appreciated.

I'm planning on using it to deal with the 文化違い whereby adults find it appropriate to discuss things like diarrhea and vomiting as parts of casual conversation. Oh, and it would be great for the tendency of adults to announce things like 「おしっこしたいな」, which in English, doesn't get put so directly in mixed company. 「ご馳走様です」 might tell my Japanese friends that I don't really want to talk about those things more effectively than my current 皮肉れている response, which doesn't work as well in Japanese as it does in English: 「おめでとう。お前クーキー欲しいか？」

Here's the context I originally used it in, when another 常連さん at かちがらす were discussing the differences between Japanese and American bread:

Me: ただ僕の感覚だけど、日本人はフワフワなパンが好きじゃないですか？アメリカのパンはね、中がフワフワで、耳がカリカリで、本当にいい食感です。
It's just my lowly observation but, don't Japanese people enjoy really soft airy bread? American bread is more likely soft and light on the inside, but with a crisp or crunchy crust. It's a great texture.
Him (drunk, 60-something): 外が硬くて、中がやらかいか？
The outside's hard, but the inside's soft?
Me: ええと。。。　その感じ。
Awwwww, man.... yeah.
Him: 俺のちんちん一緒やん！
Like my dick! OH!

Everyone together now: ご馳走様！

Anyone else have an experience where you used this or wished you had used this to escape awkwardness?

意志堅固

いしけんご
ishikengo

My apologies to all of you for the long delay between posts(except for you, Sash the Red. I'm the prettiest thing on this website!). Now that school is back in session and I am looking for a job for the summer, finding time to write yo-ji's is getting more and more difficult. Hopefully things will calm down a little bit, and Jeff will get his internet back, so he can start carrying us again.

Now you see, that last sentence is an example of the EXACT OPPOSITE of what today's yo-ji is. If I were a better person, I would have said, ok, I'm going to keep to a schedule of x posts/week, no matter what! And then I would keep to it. That's the essence of 意志堅固 as I see it.

意 should be familiar to you from, if nothing else, the word 意味　(imi), which means... meaning or definition. 意 here, though, rather means desire, especially when added to 志, which means ambition. Fun fact: 志 is read in kun-yomi as kokorozashi. Break that into its components and you get 心 and 指す（さす）. Note that this is the same sort of construction as you see in the word 目指す, which means to aim for something as your goal. The two words are similar, although I would say that 志 is more serious. Anyway, put them together and you get 意志, which means "will or desire."

Both 堅 and 固 can be read in kun-yomi as kata(i). That's because, yes, they both mean "hard." The former has a connotation of "reliable;"　the latter means more along the lines of "stiff." That really does only hold to a point, though. Here, however, we don't have to worry about it, because this word contains both of them, although not their cousin 硬. One of these days I swear I will write out all of the differences....

Which brings us to our:

Definition
物事をなすに当たってのこころざしが、しっかりとしていること.

Translation
1) Strong-willed
2) With a solid sense of purpose

and....

例文：彼は勉強に関しては意志堅固で、その志が彼の真面目さで伝わるが、ブログのほうはもう少ししっかりしていただきたい。
He's got a good sense of purpose when it comes to studying, and you can see that in his seriousness, but I wish he'd take the blog a little more seriously.

Here I am, studying hard!

The Internets are Gone!

Hey guys,

Just a quick post in response to Sash the Red's comment on Brett's Nanpa part 2. The reason postings have been sparse lately is largely due to the fact that I FINALLY moved out of Brett's apartment and into a new one. When you move in Japan, it takes anywhere between two and four weeks to get your internet up and running again, so until today, I haven't been able to even read the Daily Yoji, let alone update it. But I have some free time next week so I can (like today) steal Brett's internets and bring you a couple of good posts that I've been saving. And my own internet will be officially up and running on February 5th, so we should be back to business with our usual semi-regularity.

In the interim, does anyone have any requests? Would you like more 諺, more 教科書に載っていない日本語? More Language Trivia? More cultural trivia? More pictures of Nirav? It's always good to get your comments, even better to get your corrections, and we would love some suggestions as well.

(Keep in mind that our content rich 四字熟語 posts, despite being fun to research, can be time-consuming and pretty taxing to write, so at our best we'll probably only hit three a week.)

Thanks,

Jeff