4 ms·

Why do some of the manhole covers have English, not Japanese, text on them?

cbhl 8y ago
Maybe to fit in better with the surrounding neighborhood? There's a lot of English on signs in Tokyo; in part because foreign cultures are cool, and in part because it's friendlier to tourists. (They also have the Olympics coming up in 2020.)
- spectramax 8y ago
  Japan always had English signs since I remember visiting it. Even small towns have English street names and billboards. All subway and JR stations, busses and taxis have English information. Also, all post offices have at least one person that can speak English. It’s surprising given the fact that China (more so than Korea) have serious lack of English signs. I’m not saying it’s a bad thing, just unfriendly for tourists and foreign visitors.
  - wst_ 8y ago
    That is not true. Maybe except for the stations' names. Ten years ago you couldn hardly find any English on the streets. Tokyo 2020 changed a lot.
SllX 8y ago
So in the same way that some Americans with no Asian ancestry in the slightest, or any spiritual inclinations towards the Tao or Buddhism or anything like that might get a tattoo or article of clothing with certain symbols, i.e. yin-yang, or some bit of Arabic or Chinese or Japanese writing as decoration, the Japanese take a similar attitude to English or Spanish or Christian (Catholic in particular) writing and symbols. They use English as window dressing because it’s cool. Most Japanese kids will take English in school, but few will ever attain any real fluency in the language. So if you sprinkle in some gratuitous English into your signage, clothing and television scripts or character designs, then you are cool, and you can still effectively communicate to some degree because while almost no one is fluent, they can still understand at least small amounts of English at a time. I’m not sure that still holds up with younger generations, but at least at one point it was the case.
- stordoff 8y ago
  Superdry is perhaps the most obvious example (in the opposite direction). In the same way that Japanese products often include gratuitous English, they include gratuitous Japanese on their clothes: > The company's products include meaningless excerpts of Japanese text generated by machine translation. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Superdry https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Superdry
  - james_s_tayler 8y ago
    I really love this brand because it's just a troll brand but it became popular. Because 'oh look it's got funky asian writing on it' cool factor. It's just perfect. Every time I walk passed someone wearing that shit and read what the hell it says I crack up laughing.
bookofjoe 8y ago
Pocari Sweat https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pocari_Sweat https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pocari_Sweat
thousandautumns 8y ago
Japanese people like English a lot. They all learn it in school. Most aren't that great, but they are good enough that English words and phrases are appealing, even if many of those phrases end up nonsensical. If you visit Japan for any length of time, you will notice English phrases used all over the place, from restaurants, to street signs, to advertising and television, to the clothing people wear. I lived there for a few years right around the time Obama won the election in '08, and I encountered kids probably 6 years old who would shout "Yes we can!" when they saw me pass by. They tend to be more culturally aware and interested in Western culture (particularly American culture) than we do of them (which is saying something, given that Japanese culture is fairly popular in the West).

cbhl 8y ago

Maybe to fit in better with the surrounding neighborhood? There's a lot of English on signs in Tokyo; in part because foreign cultures are cool, and in part because it's friendlier to tourists. (They also have the Olympics coming up in 2020.)

spectramax 8y ago
Japan always had English signs since I remember visiting it. Even small towns have English street names and billboards. All subway and JR stations, busses and taxis have English information. Also, all post offices have at least one person that can speak English. It’s surprising given the fact that China (more so than Korea) have serious lack of English signs. I’m not saying it’s a bad thing, just unfriendly for tourists and foreign visitors.
- wst_ 8y ago
  That is not true. Maybe except for the stations' names. Ten years ago you couldn hardly find any English on the streets. Tokyo 2020 changed a lot.

SllX 8y ago

So in the same way that some Americans with no Asian ancestry in the slightest, or any spiritual inclinations towards the Tao or Buddhism or anything like that might get a tattoo or article of clothing with certain symbols, i.e. yin-yang, or some bit of Arabic or Chinese or Japanese writing as decoration, the Japanese take a similar attitude to English or Spanish or Christian (Catholic in particular) writing and symbols. They use English as window dressing because it’s cool. Most Japanese kids will take English in school, but few will ever attain any real fluency in the language. So if you sprinkle in some gratuitous English into your signage, clothing and television scripts or character designs, then you are cool, and you can still effectively communicate to some degree because while almost no one is fluent, they can still understand at least small amounts of English at a time. I’m not sure that still holds up with younger generations, but at least at one point it was the case.

stordoff 8y ago
Superdry is perhaps the most obvious example (in the opposite direction). In the same way that Japanese products often include gratuitous English, they include gratuitous Japanese on their clothes: > The company's products include meaningless excerpts of Japanese text generated by machine translation. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Superdry https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Superdry
- james_s_tayler 8y ago
  I really love this brand because it's just a troll brand but it became popular. Because 'oh look it's got funky asian writing on it' cool factor. It's just perfect. Every time I walk passed someone wearing that shit and read what the hell it says I crack up laughing.

bookofjoe 8y ago

Pocari Sweat https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pocari_Sweat https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pocari_Sweat

thousandautumns 8y ago

Japanese people like English a lot. They all learn it in school. Most aren't that great, but they are good enough that English words and phrases are appealing, even if many of those phrases end up nonsensical. If you visit Japan for any length of time, you will notice English phrases used all over the place, from restaurants, to street signs, to advertising and television, to the clothing people wear. I lived there for a few years right around the time Obama won the election in '08, and I encountered kids probably 6 years old who would shout "Yes we can!" when they saw me pass by. They tend to be more culturally aware and interested in Western culture (particularly American culture) than we do of them (which is saying something, given that Japanese culture is fairly popular in the West).