Japanese words via the West

April 21, 2009 by admin  
Filed under Insights

Terebi - Sort of like ‘televi’ which is short for television.

Bideo - Video

Karaoke - Actually a mix of Japanese and borrowed English. Kara means open (as in karate, open hand) and oke, which is short for orchestra.

English words born in Japan

April 14, 2009 by admin  
Filed under All, Insights

Skosh : a little bit as in ‘I’ll have just a skosh of that pie…’ From sukoshi.

Honcho: A person in charge of some group or of some function, usually a male person. A Japanese word, often mistakenly thought to be of Spanish origin. In Japanese it’s a term for a small-time yakuza gangster in charge of just a few underlings, but the underworld flavor has mostly been lost as the word has been adopted into English.

Rambo: I don’t think this is an English word per se, but the word means violence.

This from Urban Dictionary: 

rambo
 
Action powerhouse movie starring Slyvester Stallone about a Vietnam veteran who is forced out of a town. Using his advanced military techniques, Rambo manages to fight off the entire police force of a few towns utilising his bare hands, a dead cow, and a machine gun with seemingly unlimited amunition.
“You might have superior numbers, but I’m Rambo!” 

Bimbo: of poor quality.

Do Chinese and Japanese use the same characters?

April 14, 2009 by admin  
Filed under All, Insights

Yes, and no. Japan borrowed their writing system from China long ago. China has taken steps to simplify the strokes in their writing system so more people can read and write while Japanese uses characters that are closer to the original Chinese. Also, Japanese uses about 2,000 characters while Chinese uses many more.

The difference between kana and kanji

April 14, 2009 by admin  
Filed under All, Insights

Kana is more like an alphabet, while kanji are more like root words.