You probably know more Japanese than you think (Hotel pt 14)

OK, first, there's this neat soda you can buy in Japan called "Ramune." Its carbonation is sealed by a marble at the top. The mable can be pushed down into the soda to release the carbonation. I know I'm making no sense. Here's a better explanation;
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ramune

What I thought was neat in above Wiki article was that the word Ramune is phonetically derived from an English word "Lemonade." Another Japanese word that is phonetically derived from an English word is ワイシャツ or Y-shirt. It is believed that(I could be SO WRONG on this)when English told the Japanese it is a "White Shirt," to Japanese, it sounded like "Y-shirt." And the letter "Y" sort of resemble a shirt, so the word Y-shirt was stuck. And to this day, any dress shirt is Y-shirt in Japan.

As this blog is read by people from all over the globe. I thought I'd list some Japanese words that are derivatives of German, French, and Dutch.

From German(Lots of medical and scientific terms. Thanks Wiki)
Aspirin
Gaze
Kaffein
Karte
Energie
Natrium
Baumkuchen(personal favorite)
Arbeit
Kategorie
Rucksack

From French
Objet
dessin
pas de deux
jupon
piment
choux à la crème
parole
pensée
enquête
oh hisse
concierge

From Dutch
alcohol (!?)
orgel
dans
bier
hysterie
pomp
mes

OK, this is getting boring. Enjoy the clip.
Thank you, Alex.


Read MOAR!

OK, so there are things that I don't know (Hotel pt 13)

Yamasaki is asked to impersonate SAKANA KUN (Fish Boy) in this clip. I had no idea who or what that was, so I looked it up. Evidently, SAKANA KUN is a man who possesses more knowledge about fish than anyone else(so he claims.) As you can see in this clip (where he appeared on one of BBC programmings,) he's pretty out there and very eccentric to say the least.


Another person Yamasaki impersonate is none other than Demon Kogure. His hard-rock band, Seikima-II has been around since the 80's. His ongoing shtick(I'm not sure if he's still like this but) back then was he was truly a "demon" and looked at the rest of us as being "inferior beings." Anyhow, here his bands' hit song from the 80's.　蝋人形の館　(House of Wax Figurines) Yeah! METAL \m/


Special thanks goes to Alex.
Enjoy,


Read MOAR!

What's New Onii? (Hotel pt 12)

So what is this 新おにぃ or "New Onii"?
For Gaki savvy, you may already know that the phrase "Onii" is used by Chiaki who initially called her ex-husband Endo by this. It literally translate to "Elder brother," but of course Chiaki is not using this term as such, but more to show her dependency towards the man as if to say "You're LIKE my elder brother"

Anyhow, there's not much information about this New Onii, other than he is known to have appeared in TV shows as the extras here and there.

Thank you, Alex
Enjoy,


Read MOAR!

Tooooooosu (Hotel pt 11)

From the get-go, if you're not familiar with this Manzai duo in Japan, you'd be left thinking, "What was that all about?" Well, they call themselves "Audrey" but only one of the two is the actual "Audrey." The guy with whispering voice is actually a guitarist from very famous J-pop group called the "ELT" or Every Little Thing. I hear he's a great guitar player with over the top persona on stage, but when outside of stage, he's a low-key type of guy and people seems to be intrigued by this dichotomy.

[little spoiler alert]: The whispering man says "Toooosu" which is one of the saying that the "Audrey" does. It doesn't mean much other than the football team they used to belong to in college used to say this in a huddle.

The two actual guys from "Audrey"


ELT, Every Little Thing


And for all the Gaki fans, this multi-talented man needs no introduction; Ituji Itao. I'm hearing the film he wrote, directed, and starred in called "脱獄王" (Datsugokuou, King of Jail-breaking) is a pretty good effort. I would like to check it out.


Thanks goes to Alex for his help.
Enjoy



Read MOAR!

Look this way, and you're OUT (Hotel pt. 10)

Ok, as if doing Jyanken with four other people isn't rough enough, Matsumoto suggests they tack on another rule to the Jyanken. It's called あっち向いてホイ！(Acchi Muite Hoi)

It roughly translate to something along the lines of "As a winner of Jyanken, I'm going to first point my index finger at you(loser.) Then, upon my abracadabra, I'm going to point my same index finger in one of four directions, right, left, up, or down, and God forbid, if you turn your head to the direction of my index finger, you lose AGAIN! YES, YOU JUST LOST TWICE! IN YOUR FACE!!

This is probably the only descent video that shows how it's played. Just watch the first 12 second and you get the idea.


Thank you Alex for another steller job.
Enjoy,




Read MOAR!

Just a headsup

Most of you know that the Veoh has pretty much gone down the hill.
And it looks as though my account with them will soon to be terminated as well.

People have suggested some alternative video site for me and I appreciated that.
But in a meantime, I will just embed the videos via dreaded utube.

Pt.10 should be up shortly.

Thanks,
Read MOAR!

Jyanken or Die (Hotel pt 9)

Growing up in Japan, many decisions on "who gets who" were customarily decided on the simple match of Jyanken aka rock, paper, scissors.


I would say Jyanken is used not only by kids but adults as well. And it is such an integral part of Japanese culture that nobody would ever argue about the outcome of the Jyanken. It is very respected and nobody questions it. The result of Jyanken shall be honored as it is the ONE. Of course, there's always the universally famous utter from the loser party; "Well, how about two out of three?"

In Pt.10, the Jyanken gets more complicated with the addition of "Acchi muite hoi"(rigth, left, up, down.) I will explain that on my next blog.

Special thanks to Alex for the fine job.


Read MOAR!