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Japan has an interesting and unique culture that is well
worth investigating. Upon modest investigation, the
average foreigner will encounter numerous examples of
delightful/disturbing cultural weirdness.
In most countries there are trees. In Japan there are
trees
too, but some of them
are twisted and stunted captive
trees maintained by skilled sado-arborists. Many
countries
have trains, suited for the transport of low-value cargo
such as ore, commuters, or waste products. In Japan
they
have adapted the system to efficiently move humans
around at near-jet speeds. Many people choose to eat
fish
that aren't horrendously toxic. Japan thinks differently.
The examples go on and on.
Sadly, between international travel, the internet and
other
media, Japanese weirdness has eroded. There are
numerous factors contributing to this, some of the
weirdness was made up, some of the weirdness isn't that
weird when you get down to it and some of it becomes
normalized through exposure and even appropriation.
How
weird do L.A. residents find sushi when they've had
California rolls for decades? Not very, that's how.
To stem the normalization and spread of understanding, I
propose a government agency tasked with promoting and
communicating Japanese cultural weirdness.
At a very basic level, arts funding could be preferentially
awarded to promote really odd art*. Maybe the Japanese
ambassador storms out of a UN summit, deeply offended
by the Russian delegation's mention of Wednesday.
Shocked tourists might post Instagram photos of cat-
vomit
flavored Kit-Kats. Trade analysts could discover that
87.3%
of the world's toothpick output is bought by Japan.
Australian car enthusiasts struggle to understand the
purple dashboard light that illuminates only when
reversing
their imported car at precisely 9mph. Well-funded
Japanese students swamp the application process of any
University offering Welsh language courses. And so on.
*The best way to freak out the international arts
community might involve the introduction of merit, and
taste.
Chindogu
https://www.tofugu....apanese-inventions/
[not_morrison_rm, Mar 06 2019]
Gomen nasai
https://en.wiktiona...A%E3%81%95%E3%81%84
I humbly demand honorable forgiveness... [lurch, Mar 08 2019]
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Annotation:
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You haven't but scratched the surface... |
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Bun for the term "sado-arborists". |
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//I propose a government agency tasked with promoting and
communicating Japanese cultural weirdness// I believe that
was tried back in the 1940s. |
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I was quite taken by the communal 'piss slippers' you have to wear instead of your own footwear if you go to the loo. |
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For me its the bizarre mystical character whose
balls expand so large as to crush its enemies. That,
and 'Hello Kitty.' How popular is a cat that you say
hello to or says helo to you but has no mouth and
that's its whole reason for existence? |
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Kawaii is pretty strange, too. Maybe its the
necessary yin to the Southern monster truck
'Murican yang. |
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You let a culture develop on an island away from the
mainland, the pick up some odd behaviors... |
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Not playing...or it'll take all day |
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What I find to be the oddest trend in Japan is this fashion for
Hawaiian dancing that seems to have affected everyone.
They often go the whole hog and wear those grass skirts and
leis, and use authentic Hawaiian instruments for the music. I
have no idea why it's such a fad. |
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No, hang on, I was thinking of Hawaii. |
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Here's how you tell them apart. In Hawaii they have
Japanese people and mangos, and in Japan they
have Hello Kitty and manga. |
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Amatuers....everyone one knows Hello Kitty
lives in London, with her boyfriend Daniel. |
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//necessary yin to the Southern monster truck 'Murican
yang// |
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No! the Monster Truck yang is opposed by the
Shakotan/Bozozuku yin. |
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I've always thought it interesting that the following concepts: |
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1. You are trash.
2. You are in my way.
3. I'm cutting you
down with the sword.
4. I'm discarding you.
5. Prior
statements notwithstanding, you at least merit the courtesy of an
apology (albeit a truncated one). |
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can all be rolled up into a single seven-syllable phrase. That's
efficient... but weird. |
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<bookmarks this page to later find out what seven syllable phrase meets all of these requirements since he understands absolutely no Japanese other than arigato and feels stupid asking> |
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There is a minor parallel with HB and Chindogu - the
Japanese art of things which are almost, but not
quite, useful gadgets. |
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My money is on the back scratch guide. Link |
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NB the Hello Kiitty film is allegedly being knocked up
Hollywood as we speak. |
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Sp. weirdness, sado-arborists |
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They could take inspiration from Austin, Texas's "Keep
Austin Weird"
campaign. |
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The other day I mentioned my friend who has avoided
becoming a
member here and prefers to just ask me what's happening
here every
couple of weeks. Anyway, he claims Chindogu is his
preferred silly
invention club/subculture. He also claimed they have
some single-
digit-thousands number of inventions when I asked, while
we have over
50,000, though according to him, Chindogu inventions
have to be
physically built to count, so it's not directly comparable.
Before he
brought it up I'd only seen it occasionally online, with the
frequently
used pictures of the toilet paper-dispensing hat for runny
noses and
the plunger hat for holding your head up while you sleep
standing up
on the train and such, and didn't know much about it. |
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[-2fries] - that's "kiri sute go-men"
As in "kiri", with an "r" that isn't a Western vowel-r, it sounds more like a "d", except your tongue doesn't actually touch your teeth; from "kiru", to cut, implies the sword since it's being addressed to a person
"sute" from "suteru", to throw away, an action only done to garbage, hence the implication of trash (remember that the "u" in "sute" is unvoiced, since you're male, and the phrase is supposed to be spoken by a Samurai, and saying this phrase in a female voice would be an eyebrow-spraining incongruity [there are more sexist when/wheres in spacetime than feudal Japan, but not a lot of them])
"go", the honorific, because, well, it's Japanese and a little weird, don't lose track now; you're just killing somebody, not insulting them
"men" is a regret, sorrow, apology (and note that it's two syllables, "me-n", with the n [the last kana in the phonetic syllabary] denoting finality, you can hold that "n" in your teeth until the sword is wiped on the victim's rag clothes, I don't understand why you can take time for that but not for the poor peasant to get out of the way, I guess that wouldn't give the image that the movie director wanted to portray, but, anyway... ). |
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Yes, but what does Kiri te Kanawa mean? |
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I don't know Maori - but I do know the Haka is designed to insult you, your family, your status, your loincloth and everything it's purportedly hiding, and that puny little island you live on *before* they get around to killing you. It's only a difference in marketing. |
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//I don't know Maori// me neither, but apparently it's the
second-largest island of Hawaii. |
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//"go", the honorific, because, well, it's Japanese and a little weird, don't lose track now; you're just killing somebody, not insulting them// |
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Interesting. I get different definitions for "go" in Japanese.
From Google translate it is "rear" or behind or afterwards.
You say it is honorific. Does that mean something along the lines of 'noble' as in, "My sword is parting you from your perhaps noble heartbeat... sorry 'bout the family that put you in front of it." kind of way? |
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'cause that's pretty bad ass. |
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Nah, the honorific is only a modifier to the apology; the only respect
that the blade-catcher gets is that he was apologized to. |
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Looking up short words in Japanese is a hazard-fraught enterprise.
English has over 2000 possible syllable sounds; Chinese, over
5000. Japanese has precisely 107. So you've got a language where
almost every word you can say has at least a half-dozen
homonyms. Even in casual conversation, there's often a situation
where context doesn't sufficiently disambiguate, and you end up
drawing a kanji character on the palm of your hand to show which
meaning you really intend to use. |
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Japan is very strange when contrast to the UK and
USA in particular. For example in Japan there are
trains which run at 250mph and arrive on perfect
time, regardless of how many hedge clipping
leaves or snow flakes there are on the tracks.
These trains feature creative bonsai pruning
classes where you can learn how to make amazing
self portaits out of miniature trees on your
journey, assisted by fawning geisha girls. |
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Sp: transport of ore and low-value cargo such as waste
products and commuters |
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No idea how such an otherwise efficient culture
ends up with such a horrific linguistic system. It
almost sounds like Yooper, where there are only a
few distinct grunts that refer respectively to 'fire,'
'snow,' 'beer,' and 'hockey.' |
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On the plus side, it's a strong combination of the K.I.S.S. principle,
and plausible deniability. |
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The drawback is that it has created an entire nation of people who are
completely confused by the concept of a pun. |
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