Somewhere near you, there is a festival and a stage and a young boy and girl are doing their first ever live performance of this song:

Um, that is, if you live in Japan. This is a fairly recent track (lyrics by Ryouko Moriyama, music by BEGIN) that now turns up at matsuris and school festivals everywhere.

「涙そうそう」 (Okinawan reading “なだそうそう”, note the difference from the standard 涙　reading of ”なみだ”) is Okinawa-dialect for 「涙がぽろぽろこぼれ落ちる」. Which is Japanese for (roughly)  “Stream of Tears”

Here’s a translation of the song to English (Natsukawa Rimi version), and here’s  a few Japanese commentators talking about the story behind the lyrics .

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BONUS: If you like the Okinawan stuff, here’s one you’ll definitely hear being covered: 島唄　（”Shima Uta”). Here’s a super-subbed (English, romaaji, kanji) version:

AND FOR FELLOW SANSHIN STUDENTS: A Japanese-American who studied at Ryukyu university set Simple Sanshin Source, a site that teaches the basics of Okinawan Sanshin. (On hiatus, but lots of good stuff there.)

Aw, Kreva. You what? Made some kind of pimped out 3-D kanji speed reading drill?  With a beat? And put on a blue jumpsuit? Really, you shouldn’t have. (Kanji 3-D Magic Land opens for business around the 1:00 mark)

YouTube – 成功. And make sure you push HQ.

Elsewhere on the internet, other friend come together to provide us with the lyrics. The people, they are so good to us.

Fresh Japanese signs, ripe for the SRSing. Go!

(As always, the English is just approximate)

—

Hey Signs, whatchyou got to say about my dog?

犬を連れて境内に立入る事禁じます。大本山相国寺。

いぬ　を　つれて　けいだい　に　たちいる　こと　きんじます。　だいほんざんしょうこくじ。

Note:  大本山相国寺 is the name of the temple. The rest of the sign says, pretty much what you’d guess it would: You can’t bring your dog into the grounds.

—–

And what of men who have spectacular hair? What do they have to say?

路線図を見てるキミ！

ろせんず　を　みてる　キミ！

You (there), looking at the train line map!

乗換以外にも、心配すべきことがあるんじゃないか？
のりかえ　いがい　にも、しんぱい　すべき　こと　が　あるんじゃないか？

Aren’t there some things other than (just) train transfers that you should be worried about?

電車　飛行機　クルマ　徒歩
でんしゃ　ひこうき　クルマ　とほ

Train , Plane, Car, By foot
ケータイ総合ナビゲーション。
けーたい　そうごう　ナビゲーション

Comprehensive cell-phone navigation (system)

——

And, sadly, a sign with Japanese that lacks the charm of its English:

嵯峨野　観光　鉄道
さがの　かんこう　てつどう

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That last one just reads, roughly, “Sagano Sight-seeing Rail”

Apologies if that isn’t romantic enough for you. But that’s all the love I have to give.

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Worry not, the new years will bring some fresh signs and projects. Til then, we’ll stay irregular as your grandpa. (Might we suggest plopping the feed into Google Reader?)

Booyah! A rush of signs! Hiragana and English explanations follow:

1)

海でやろう。

Detail of bottom:

駆け込み乗車は危険です。おやめください。

2)

“Deleted” text reads: 献血いってエイズ検査してみよっか！

Red text reads:

感染病　（肝炎・エイズ等 )

検査目的の献血は、絶対やめましょう！

3)

—

Explanations (note: English translations are rough as always, we’re mainly here to get you signs)

First up, one of my favorite signs of all time, as it links cramming into subways to swimming:

1)

海　　 で　 やろう。

うみ　 で　 やろう

(beach) (at) (do)

Do it at the beach!

—

駆け込み 乗車 は 危険 です。

かけこみ じょうしゃ は　 きけん　です。

(cramming in) (train riding) (topic marker) (is dangerous)

おやめください。

(Please stop)

Please do not rush into the train as it is dangerous.

2)

“Deleted” text:

献血 いって エイズ 検査 してみよっか！

けんけつ　　　　　　いって　エイズ　けんさ　　してみよっか！

(blood donation) (go) (aids) (check) (try it out, shall we?)

How about going in to donate blood to check if you have AIDs?

—

Red text:

感染病　 （肝炎　 エイズ )
かんせんびょう　　　かんえん　　えいず

(infectious disease) (hepatitis) (AIDS)

検査　　目的　　　 の　 献血　　　 は

けんさ 　もくてき　 の　 けんけつ　 　は

(check up) ( goal) (の）　(blood donaion) (as for)

絶対やめましょう！

ぜったい　 やめましょう！

(definitely) (let’s stop!)

Let’s definitely stop donating blood as a way to figure out if you have an infectious disease like AIDS or hepatitis!

—

SIDENOTE: I was actually surprised to learn that this was an issue, but, now that I think about it, makes sense.

3)

衝撃、あらわる。

しょうげき　、　あらわる。

（impact) (appears)

Whoop, there it is.

—–

Okay, Scott, who’s helping me with these, is a professional translator, but he admits that last little translation is a bit unprofessional. But he hopes you get the gist.

As always, take pictures of any signs you like and send them over.

Our own Jason Ho sent this from his commute to work today.

He would like you to know that he enjoys signs that depict mutant figures.

And they are cutest when in ambiguous spacial relation to a bike, aren’t they?

自転車通行可

通行可；つうこうか

This one means: Bicycle passage permitted [i.e. walking or biking okay, no cars though]

—

Alas, they are sometimes on their own.

歩行者用道路

自転車も乗れません

歩行者用：ほこうしゃよう

道路：どうろ

自転車：じてんしゃ

乗れません：のれません

(a road for walkers [i.e. no cars], bicycles can’t drive here either)

NOTE: That も　is kind of funny, right? But it’s just because it’s implied first that cars aren’t allowed.

—-

Ah, young mutant family, how we love your delightful hand-holding ways. May you instruct us eternally!

AND: Keep them signs coming.

PLUS: Thanks to Scott as always for proofing this for me. He keeps me sharp on them long and short “Oh”s. (ほこうしゃよう, etc.)

Ooh, our first sign submission:

Gah, it’s so wee and hard to make out! Do you hate it? *

From Scott, who works as a translator in a building a few hundred meters from my desk. He says:

the text reads: 月極有料駐車場
I think this is one of those signs that people see and understand, but might have a hard time reading because of the first two characters, which are read つきぎめ and mean monthly or by the month.

So, we have:

月極有料 ( つきぎめ　　ゆうりょう）

駐車場 ( ちゅうしゃじょう　）

(i.e. a parking lot that charges a monthly fee)

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SIDENOTE: Dude in my office said (rough translation): “Yeah, that’s a mysterious bit of Japanese, right? Lots of kids would get that wrong, pronouncing it like “tsukigoku” or something.”

Then he handed me a kanji history of 極 (**), which apparently　referred to a tree in a very high location in ancient Chinese. Yup.

* ‘Cause it’s pieces of you-ooh?

** We also see this kanji lots in words like 北極　(north pole), etc.

Oh, we’ll still be bringing you THINGS. But we’re also going to be bringing you signs. Starting immediately.

If you’re in Japan, you can play along. See a Japanese sign that you don’t understand? Take a pic and e-mail (or keitai-mail) it over to (type it just like that and you’ll save me the trouble of filtering it. Pop it on in your keitai now, you never know when you’ll need it.)

Better yet, just pop your sign up on flickr and mail me a link to it.

THEN: Me and/or the Japanese dudes in my office will post it here and write a quick explanation like so:

横断歩行者はボタンをおしてください。

（　横断：おうだん

歩行者：ほこうしゃ　）

（　Crosswalkers: Please push the button. )
からだの不自由な方の押ボタンです。

（　不自由な　方: ふじゆうな　かた）

（　押ボタン：　おし　ボタン　）

（Handicapped people’s button [this is])

NOTE: The translations will be quick and rough, just enough to get you able to understand the sign, and, more importantly, get you the kanji/ reading so you can look it up yourself if so inclined.

AND: As always, I make no claims to be some kind of kanji-supergod or anything like that. I’m far, far, far, from it.

BUT I work in an office full of Japanese folks, and they are all kanji-supergods and would find it fun to check and make sure that their handy foreign pal is reading the signs right/answer questions about obscure signs folks find.

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WHY ARE WE DOING THIS? I’m in Japan, and I like putting things on the internet that aren’t already on the internet.

PLUS: It’ll help me with kanji/actual Japanese signage.

PLUS: It might help you with kanji/actual Japanese signage.

PLUS: If you don’t live in Japan, this is some real stuff that you can study before you get here.

PLUS: If you’re an SRSer (or use any computer based flash card program), you can just drop the images into your flash card program. More fun than typing sentences, right?

PLUS: It gives me an excuse to pay more attention to all the signsI usually just ignore while walking around my town.

Send me any suggestions that you have. And, of course, signs.

BONUS POINTS FOR: Funny/ weird ones.

…and last of all, a SHOUT OUT: To Learn Japanese Through Advertisements. They focus on print ads, and do a great job of transcribing/explaining. Harvey seems to have the project on hiatus, but lots of good stuff there.

I’m afraid we won’t be explaining all the grammar like they do (props to them for doing it, though). Our strategy is more throw some Japanese at you and run away as fast as we can.

Exhibit A)

Japanese text reads:

カンヌ映画祭

あなたの映画の大ファンです。ぜんぶ海賊版にしちゃいました！！

Exhibit B)

１）やれやれ！あっちも悲劇、こっちも悲劇だ！

２）ガソリンの値段がこのまま上がり続けるなら私もバスを使わなければいけなくなるかも！

Exhibit C)

１）考えてみたんだけどオバマとクリントンの「ドリームチケット」で2番目になるのも悪くないかなって

２）ばか言ってんじゃないの！

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Kind of hard to understand Japanese political comics, because to get the joke you probably have to understand concrete lobbies, LDP, etc. But (for Americans), American political comics in Japanese equal=Not so bad.

On Exhibit A:

All you need to know is that 海賊　（　かいぞく　）means “pirate”　(in both the swashbuckling and downloading sense), and you’ve already got that one.

On Exhibit B:

悲劇　（　ひげき　）　is a tragedy, and the newspapers in frame 1 (note: Japanese comic readers are used to reading from right to left, hence the numbers) lists a bunch of world tragedies, earthquakes, etc.

If you’re a flash-carder…

1. ひ‐げき【悲劇】
   １ 主人公が運命や社会の圧力、人間関係などによって困難な状況や立場に追い込まれ、不幸な結末に至る劇。トラジェディー。喜劇。２ 人生や社会の痛ましい出来事。「貧困がもたらした―」喜劇。

Exhibit C:

A little confusing, right? But if you miss the nuance (a bit hard to catch what’s happening in this version, I thought I got the joke but wasn’t quite sure until I verified), you can take advantage of the…

MOST EXCELLENT BONUS:

Original English versions of Exhbit A, Exhibit B, Exhibit C

Yeah, I know, you’re not supposed to read translations, etc., but it helps sometimes when you get a political cartoon with the kanji for ’superdelegates’ or some such. You can just google the cartoon’s author, dig through the archives and find the original.

Japanese Newsweek is on newsstands everywhere (uh, in Japan), fun to flip through whatever level you’re at.

DOUBLE BONUS FUN TIME:

The Japanese Newsweek site has an area where they list the week’s best quotes from news worldwide in their original English versions.

The catch is they’re only in English on the site, and only in Japanese in the magazine. They intend for Japanese readers to entertain themselves (and improve their English) by trying to match the quote in the magazine to it’s original.

We can, of course, flip that game. There’s some really dang fun sentences there

ジャガイモのことを考え、ジャガイモを育て、ジャガイモを食べよう。

“Think potato, grow potato, eat potato.”

(The slogan for a recent potato festival in Dhaka, Bangladesh, where the government is trying to get the population to adopt the humble spud in place of pricier diet staples like rice and wheat .)

—

子供よりビールを優先するなんて、前代未聞のケースだ。

“This is the first time beer has taken priority over a child.”

(Australian constable Wayne Burnett, on the arrest of a driver who had buckled up his load of beer―but not his 5-year-old son―for a trip across the Outback.)

—

TRIPLE BONUS:

For those of you who aren’t in Japan, here’s a couple sentences that you can try and match for kicks. OriginalEnglish page here.

「地球外生物の同胞」について話をしてもいいではないか。それも神が創られたもののはずだ。

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そのこどもたちがうまれたら「ゆかいなブレディ家」と同じくらい子だくさんになるね。

—

Sidenote to my mom: Hi Mom! Just writing to make sure you know that I didn’t write the underwear post that appeared on this site before! That was the other guy (note the byline)! I don’t write about underwear because I’m an innocent angel! Hope all’s well – Saleem

UPDATE: Thanks to Scott for correcting my careless typing on the　”神” quote. Now fixed. Because while aliens might have been made by God, they almost definitely were not made by paper

This method of Japanese language learning may be odd to some, but I couldn’t resist at least introducing this blog which rather tastefully documents pop singers whose underwear has accidentally appeared in event photos over the 80’s and 90’s.

I’m not sure of the practicality of this site, but as a pop-culture maniac, I find this insight into the pop-world intriguing.

Fascinating tidbit #1 is the writer’s formality. He uses 「です」and「ます」forms opposed to a more casual style, giving the blog a frank and polite feel. It documents pop idol mishaps with gentleness and sincerity. The writer is respectful and devoted to his readers and has constructed a bulletin board for readers to post pictures of idols for him to showcase on the blog.

Why he started the blog is not clear, but it appears the guy simply digs pictures of idols whose underwear shows. It doesn’t seem perverted or anything, he just digs it.

So what can one learn from this blog?

For one, the writer uses a lot of shortened words. The title of the blog is「愛チラ大百科」(あいちら　だいひゃっか), which I translate to “The Encyclopedia of Idol Panty Shots”.

But if you look at the word for “idol”, which in Japanese is「アイドル」、it is nowhere to be found in the title. That’s becuase it has been shortened to simply “アイ”. And for “Panty Shots”, the Japanese would is 「パンチラ」, 「パン」being the shortened form of「 パンツ」meaning “pants” as in “underpants”, and 「チラ」meaning to flash. The writer has changed the 「アイ」part of 「アイドル」into the kanji,「愛」which means “love”. This play on words with the same phoenetics gives it a double meaning.

The first meaning is, “idol”, as in “pop-idol”. By using the kanji for love, it gives a second meaning in which the writer can imply his feelings of fondness for these idol panty shots. I think it can also mean “lovely” in describing the idols. By simply changing the charcter to 「愛」the writer is able to explain what he is blogging and his feelings towards it in one word.

The author also shortened a sentence about a singing duo who dresses in maid outfits in which I found interesting:

「ワシントンDCで行われたアニメイベントに、アニメソングを歌うために渡米。」

This translates to:

“They flew to Washington DC where an anime event was being held to sing an anime song.”

It is in reference to a cosplay group called Funny Stones who was invited to perform in DC. He recaps and and shortenes with:

「アメアニソンイベントとかにも出てるんだ〜」

Which breakdowns like this「アメ」＝America, 「アニ」＝Anime, 「ソン」＝Song, 「イベント」＝Event. The sentence means, “Wow, they’re also doing American Anime Song Events”, with the writer expressing slight amazement.

In the shortened version, specifics on Washington DC is lost, but the basic meaning is still there in only 10 katakana characters.

The word “cosplay” itself, has become a part of the English language among Japan/Anime knowing peeps is the combined shortened form of the phrase “costume play”.

Shortened words is not only limited to katakana vocabulary. For example, a college student attending Waseda University in Tokyo is often referred to as 「早大生」(そうだいせい）. If you were to write this out in a more complete form, it would be 「早稲田大学の学生」. By plucking one kanji from each group of words, you can shorten a long sentence into something short and succinct. The way these kanji are picked are related to ease of pronuciation.

If you look at 「早大生」you can see they took the 「早」in
「早稲田」, 「大」of 「大学」, but when it came to 「学生」they did not use 「学」but the「生」part instead. As reader Jen points out, this is to differentiate between Waseda as a University, and a student of Waseda.

Besides the language points you can learn form this site, there is also a lot of information about pop-idols–something that may be useful when loading up on karaoke songs for your next enkai.

If you’re a Kurt Vonnegut fan, you’ll know that homeboy urged us to:

please notice when you are happy, and exclaim or murmur or think at some point, “If this isn’t nice, I don’t know what is.

Which seems nice, and is easy enough to do back home. But how does one murmur that in Japanese?

Which brings us to the January 1st issue of Brutus Magazine.

Yo, what? Yes, that’s correct, it’s no longer January.

But BRUTUS magazine’s stuff attempts to be ‘classic’ rather than just timely, so if you’re in Japan you can get recent back issues at most big book stores.

(In Japan you can also order back issues online. In America subscribe through Amazon (expensive) or get individual issues through Giant Robot.)

Each issue is themed. An art issue, a Music vs. Rakugo issue, a movie issue, etc. And the magazine’s design is hot (compare their covers to those of American upscale men’s mags, 95% of which feature a large picture of George Clooney with weird hair).

In many of these issues they ask famous people what their favorite nani-nani is, and let them chat a bit about it. There’s pictures of the things the famous people like, so all you have to do is find some famous person who likes the same things as you, and then you can get their other recommendations, kinda like low-fi J-Idol Netflix for intellects.

The January issue is about books, and features Hikari Ota of the most excellent 爆笑問題Podcast .

He, like me, is a big Kurt Vonnegut fan.

In said story, Hikari quotes the Vonnegut line as:

これが幸福じゃなくてなにが幸福なんだ。

（幸福：こうふく）

A pleasantly idiomatic translation of, “If this isn’t nice, I don’t know what is.”

If anybody actually tries saying this around happy Japanese people, please let us know the results.