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#35 Welcome to the world of Japanese-English
Transcript ↓
There is no exaggeration to say that the past year for me has been a battle against Japanese-English.
We Japanese has a culture called Katakana which is based on English words but turned to different meanings in the Japanese language. Today let me introduce some interesting Japanese-English which is used commonly in Japan and also made me confused a lot here.
I should probably start with the word “dryer” in Japanese ドライヤー. I remember a certain episode that someone from Japan told me. He wanted to use a hair dryer and asked his host mother “where is the dryer?” He was taken to the laundry because "a dryer" usually means the machine to dry clothes after washing. In this case, you have to say “hair dryer” if you want your hair dried.
The next word is “note PC” which is Japanese-English that means “laptop” in English. When I started joining the class, I had some opportunities to mention about this machine. When I said, “Hi Teacher, sorry, My note PC doesn’t work”. It didn’t make sense. The other day, I said “Hi Teacher, sorry, My personal computer doesn’t work.” It slightly didn’t make sense. It was because we had to say “laptop” to present this machine. So you can say “I’m sorry my laptop doesn’t work so I’m not able to submit the assignment now!” Good excuse.
The last one is tricky. We have lots of Humberger restaurants. Hence, we sometimes want to order some side menu. As you want to say “fried potato” in Japanese フライドポテト, it is going to be some troubles. You can’t find “Fried potato” in the restaurant here. Instead, you can say “French fries” if you need that salty potato. By the way, in Canada we can order “fish and chips” here especially in some seafood restaurants. In this case “chips” always means french fries. unfortunately, you can not get “potato chips” as Japanese people can imagine.
Interesting. Having said that, sometimes you can communicate with people in English even though you use Japanese-English. It would be more exciting than you are expecting.
Do you have any ideas of the words if it is Japanese-English or English? Let’s build a new dictionary of useful Japanese- English!
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By Charlie BlueTranscript ↓
There is no exaggeration to say that the past year for me has been a battle against Japanese-English.
We Japanese has a culture called Katakana which is based on English words but turned to different meanings in the Japanese language. Today let me introduce some interesting Japanese-English which is used commonly in Japan and also made me confused a lot here.
I should probably start with the word “dryer” in Japanese ドライヤー. I remember a certain episode that someone from Japan told me. He wanted to use a hair dryer and asked his host mother “where is the dryer?” He was taken to the laundry because "a dryer" usually means the machine to dry clothes after washing. In this case, you have to say “hair dryer” if you want your hair dried.
The next word is “note PC” which is Japanese-English that means “laptop” in English. When I started joining the class, I had some opportunities to mention about this machine. When I said, “Hi Teacher, sorry, My note PC doesn’t work”. It didn’t make sense. The other day, I said “Hi Teacher, sorry, My personal computer doesn’t work.” It slightly didn’t make sense. It was because we had to say “laptop” to present this machine. So you can say “I’m sorry my laptop doesn’t work so I’m not able to submit the assignment now!” Good excuse.
The last one is tricky. We have lots of Humberger restaurants. Hence, we sometimes want to order some side menu. As you want to say “fried potato” in Japanese フライドポテト, it is going to be some troubles. You can’t find “Fried potato” in the restaurant here. Instead, you can say “French fries” if you need that salty potato. By the way, in Canada we can order “fish and chips” here especially in some seafood restaurants. In this case “chips” always means french fries. unfortunately, you can not get “potato chips” as Japanese people can imagine.
Interesting. Having said that, sometimes you can communicate with people in English even though you use Japanese-English. It would be more exciting than you are expecting.
Do you have any ideas of the words if it is Japanese-English or English? Let’s build a new dictionary of useful Japanese- English!