4 ms·
Although the rules are complicated, I lived in Japan for awhile, and almost no one Japanese would be offended by a foreigner getting it only mostly right. This
by impendia 13y ago
Although the rules are complicated, I lived in Japan for awhile, and almost no one Japanese would be offended by a foreigner getting it only mostly right. This is not terribly hard. It suffices for foreigners to observe the basics.
As explained below, Karpeles referred to himself as "ore". "Ore" is mostly used by men, and carries a boastful tone. Moreover, pronouns aren't necessary to make grammatical sentences, e.g. "I went to the bank" = "Ginko ni ikimashita" = "[Bank] [to] [did go]".
The only function of the word "ore" is to emphasize your own high status relative to whomever you're speaking to. In a bar, after a couple of drinks, among equals, it's quite typical for all the men (usually not women) to use "ore". But in a formal business meeting --- this is known to be an absolute no-no by anyone who has formally learned even a small amount of Japanese.
A fairly close analogy in English would be to randomly sprinkle the word "fuck" in your speech.
- patio11 13y agoA fairly close analogy in English would be to randomly sprinkle the word "fuck" in your speech. I was once speaking to a good friend of mine here, in English. "Do you want to go out for yakitori?" "Go fuck yourself!" "... switches to Japanese Have I recently done anything very major to offend you?" "No, of course not." "Oh, OK, I was worried. So that phrase, that's something you would only say under extreme distress when you had maximal desire to offend me, or I suppose you could use it jokingly between friends, but neither you nor I generally talk that way." "I learned it from a movie. I thought it meant "No."" "You might want to not repeat it ever again."
- aculver 13y agoHaha! This is great. Along the same lines, I was getting a shave from a super hospitable barber last November in Gifu and the topic of conversation in very broken English (from him) and correspondingly broken Japanese (from me) was basically whether I had seen all of his favorite American movies. We were chatting and laughing quite a lot. When the time came for him to shave around the Adam's apple, he pointed right at my face and said: "You! Shut up!" It was so funny: He had obviously picked that up from a movie, but it took everything in me not to feel a little hurt, even though I knew he didn't mean to say what he said with that sort of edge. I can only imagine how many times I've done something similar in reverse. :-)
- gohrt 13y agoFor those who don't know, _Coming to America_ starring Ediie Murphy: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=6yZOUvyElo4 http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=6yZOUvyElo4