Last week, I wrote a newspaper article about all the Japanese words I find difficult to pronounce- Ultraman, Portuguese, and baby food. Of course, I struggle with ronyakunannyo (men and women of all ages) too. But yesterday, I discovered the word that befuddles me more than them all—seakagokegumo, or the Red-back spider.
The first time I heard this word, I was convinced it
had to be Japanese English. I mean, geez! How long can a word get?? We foreigners have trouble reading super long katakana words, and I, especially, purposely avoid songs chock full of katakana at karaoke.
Anyway, back to the seakagokegumo. I finally was able to grasp the meaning of the word. A spider with a red back. But what about the gakegumo part? My linguistic questions are endless.
The gakegumo marriage is obviously not a happy one. For in it, the female ends up eating the males, making herself a widow—which is the meaning of the word gake.
A couple years ago, I racked my brain trying to think of the longest Japanese verb that I could. The answer was ikitakunakunatteshimatta, or “unfortunately, it became that I didn’t want to go anymore.” Weird English, but a great Japanese word.
今日は、1番アンちゃんを困らせるような文章を考えた。行くよ。。
Today I tried to think of the Japanese sentence whose pronunciation gave me the most trouble.
RT @9esora: Have you heard ‘【里音らむ・里音てむ】 アイボリー[UTAUカバー]’ by えそら on #SoundCloud? #np https://t.co/Pw4hM4US6P 里音姉妹誕生日おめでとう!いつもと場所違うけどお祝い!こないだのレッスンで大昔に書いたラフレベルの曲先生に見せたらうけるって言われたので、こんな曲も書いたことあんでって流してみる Have you heard ‘オーボエとピアノによる、とあるコンビニエンスストアの主題による変奏曲みた… https://t.co/3mRooPaEYk進化してる
Have you heard ‘Jace Mek – Photons’ by CONFESSION on #SoundCloud? #np https://t.co/0wwBvHkRzr
RT @only_invader: ドラムンベース的なやつです。 お題は「リズム:シンコペーションorアンティシペーションを用いた曲」です。 #深夜の2時間DTM Have you heard ‘Riff Rain’ by Only Invader on #SoundCloud…