Rocking in Hakata

I was doing some unsupervised surfing through Japanese political message boards, and found something that delighted me. There is an inclination to turn various candidates names into puns. I love it! Here are some that I found.

Hillary Clinton → Hillary → ヒラリ → ひらり
Hirari means “nimbly” or “lightly” according to Rikaichan.

Barack Obama →　Obama → オバマ → 小浜
This is the same old story about the town in Fukui Prefecture called Obama (English).

John McCain →　McCain → マケイン → 負けいん
Makein is a really rough, colloquial way to say “I will not lose!” Lucky match for a candidate, no? Ok, maybe it’s a little shoehorned, but still. Ha ha.

Mitt Romney →　Romney → ロムニー →　ロム兄さん
Yes, I know Romney is out. But the pun was too good. They shortened his name a bit and turned it into Romuniisan or “Older Brother Rom.” (It’s cute in Japanese, because it also sounds like “Mister Romney.” Trust me.)

On a related note, something that bugs me here is that people walk up and ask me, “Hey, who are you voting for, Hillary or Obama?” My response is usually “Those are just the choices for the Democrat nomination at the moment. One of them will run in the general election in November as the Democrat candidate. You do realize that, right?” They’ve usually already glazed over at this point - and who can blame them? Ha ha. Politics. Anyway, I searched around using the katakana approximations of the big three names at the moment, and dredged the bottom of the web. Without further ado, here’s a quote I turned up, which has been altered to remove a reference to women reducing them to their reproductive organs (too common a problem in the scary, roughly-hewn, back room discussion boards I stumbled blindly through, I’m afraid).

2008/03/21(金)
「ぶっちゃけ、米国はまだ黒人と[女]が大統領に指名するほど
成熟した国家ではない。

よってマイケンが当確。

日本のマスゴミは偏向してるから、オバマとヒラリーの
一騎打ちと報じているだけよ。」

March 21, 2008 (Friday)
“Frankly speaking, America is still not a country mature enough to elect a black person or woman as president.

McCain’s got it in the bag.

It’s just that the propensity of the Japanese mass media** is to report on the subject as though it is a one-on-one contest between Hillary and Obama.”

**Pun alert!
マスコミ = Mass Communications (mass media)
マスゴミ = Mass Garbage (mainstream pap and chaff, tabloid journalism)

This fascinates me. I mean, I like the pun, for one thing. I find the depth of the mass media reports to be lacking, for sure. And the result seems to be a misunderstanding that the race is between Obama and Hillary only. However, I completely understand the tendency to report on the Obama and Hillary side of things - it is way more exciting historically speaking even if it is for superficial reasons like race and gender. (Which is not to say that I am putting either of them down due to this; I am simply not inclined to think that they’d do a better job than anyone else because of race or gender. That’s pretty fair, I think.) Also, the anonymous commenter seems to think that America’s not mature enough to elect a black person or a woman. I disagree there, too. I think it’s pretty obvious that America’s ready. And I find it ironic that the tone is (in my poor Japanese reading) slightly condescending or disappointed in America’s supposed lack of maturity while at the same time using a pretty sexist slur. I obviously need to refine my searching skills and find some more reputable sources. But it was kind of interesting.　Also, I prerecorded a phone call for the Dennis Miller Show last Saturday morning about the pun-nicknames - it might air this coming Friday, if you’re interested.

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So, I definitely crashed on my scooter this morning. Blah. Stupid rain. I was driving (at a reasonable, safe speed, despite having played Mario Kart a bit recently) through the constant drizzle this morning, and I got to a snaking portion of coastal road on Oshima, and I hydroplaned through a hard right into a skid. I separated from the scooter as I went down on my right side, and it spun out ahead of me as I slid after it mostly on my right side and then on my face. As in previous experiences, the weirdest crap went through my mind. I remember worrying that the friction would give me burns and being thankful that I’d warn a full face helmet today. Luckily, I was covered head to toe in my rainsuit and had gloves on. They took the brunt of the damage. Both the rainsuit and suit are ruined, though. My slacks were torn through in 3 or 4 places.

I collected broken pieces of my scooter, my belongings that had been strewn about, and checked myself over for substantial injury. When I was sure I was gonna make it to the city, I said thanks to the kind soul who stopped for me. He told me to be careful, and I said I would be. I put my jacket back on and kept going. I stopped at a convenience store. That was preplanned, actually. I needed the 200 yen for the bridge, so I was going to buy a drink to break my 1000 yen bill. But instead, I bought gauze and a towel. I just wanted to prevent myself from bleeding onto my clothes. I finished the drive in the cold all the way to school and walked in looking pretty bad. Despite my crash, I made it in just after morning meeting.

A teacher I’m friends with walked me to the nurses’ office, and they disinfected my cuts, put patches on my bruises to help with swelling, and arranged a change of clothes. I am wearing black track sweats. Ha ha. With a tie. It’s a weird combination. But that’s life. They treated me really well. So now I just have to deal with classes today and then I’ll be free to head to the store. I need to buy a new rainsuit, a haircut, a new suit eventually, and try to accept the damage done to my scooter and my pride. Ha ha. But thank goodness I’m ok. As they say here, 不幸中の幸いだ。 A bit of happiness in misfortune.

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Or should I say blue shells?

Ok, so while I usually stay away from writing about video games, I thought I’d offer up this quick one. I am very pleased with the brand new Wii version of the Mario Kart franchise. But after playing it myself, I am a bit dismayed at the game mechanics. And, shockingly, for the first time in a long time I found myself in pretty solid agreement with the folks who write critiques and reviews. They nailed this one, and they gave it a reasonable score. It is a great game, but it is not superb. It is wholly fun, but it is not addictive. I love the inclusion of the steering wheel accessory (even though I’d laughed about it being a worthless hunk of plastic prior to using it). But man, the AI has got to be nerfed a bit.

A quick vocabulary lesson. In the world of gaming, something that has been “nerfed” is an item, character or ability that has been softened up or taken down a notch in intensity since its last version. Usually it is a matter of trying to balance the game out by toning down something that is unfairly powerful. (And this could be avoided with more playtesting prior to release.) The word is obviously derived from the series of Nerf toys that I used to love so much. (My Nerf longbow rocked.) Anyhoo, back to the discussion.

The thing shared by 80% of the writers who reviewed the game is….drumroll please…frustration at the “comeback AI” and the way the item boxes mete out their goodies. Your position in the race at any given time directly alters the odds of pulling certain items out of the boxes. If you’re in front, you will most likely pull bananas or shells. If you’re in the middle of the pack, you’re going to wind up with turbos and shells most of the time. If you’re in the back, you get the hilariously comical kill-everything-in-your-way weapons that put you back in the race automatically. The result? You don’t want to be in first place until the very end of the race. Why?

Well, I found that I could race my butt off, be sitting on the edge of my seat as I rounded the last bend into the home stretch, and watch a ridiculous cataclysmic series of events unfold. Despite leading the race for around 3 minutes, in the last 14 seconds I was hit with two blue shells (which seek out the person in 1st place), two red shells (which seek out the enemy directly ahead of the shooter), a banana (from someone who swerved around me and dragged it in front, not from someone who threw it), and a bomb. And I was jostled by the other players bumping into me as the overtook me. Getting hit means losing your items, and I had a turbo. That went out the window. I placed 11th, just managing to edge out the last guy. You get hit once, you get piled on. You can race well, and then the AI decides it wants to win, so every character hits you on their way past. Now, let me add that this was the last race of 4 in the grand prix I was running. In the previous 3 races I placed first. But my ranking was, duly, smashed thanks to my 11th place failure. These fluke races are insanely discouraging.

Similarly, multiplayer is messed up. People who are equally gifted at racing are duking it out, and you might as well flip a coin, because nobody knows what is going to happen until the last 10 seconds or so. It’s totally warped. On the other hand, it makes the game crazy easy to pick up for a total newbie. They just have to fail for most of the race, get handed a wild powerup, and blow past everyone for the victory. Awesome. Not. Anyway, it’s weird maybe that this game restored my faith in the objectivity of game reviewers. It’s still a must-own game. But for crying out loud, let’s call the drawbacks drawbacks and not give it a pass since it’s part of the Nintendo stable. Sheesh! Ha ha.

By the way…anybody want to race?
Deas’ Wii: 6967 1406 3772 0289
Shoot me a message and I’ll give you my MK license number.

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Alright, the gallery of pictures from the second half of my trip, all of which were taken in Malaysia, is here at last! You’ll see shots of Kuala Lumpur, Taman Negara, and Pulau Gemia. Impressive, primordial, and gorgeous. The video clips will be coming soon. For now, continue reading to see the 60 shots.

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This post is about Japanese in The Office (US), not about actual Japanese in an actual office. For that, I highly recommend that you go read Will Jasprizza’s posts at Nihongojouzu about phone skills, etc. He’s on the ball. For this post, however, you only need about 1/30th of an introductory course to Japanese in order to comprehend what’s going on.

Meet Dwight Schrute of the American adaptation of the UK’s brilliant sitcom export, The Office. He thinks the word senpai is nearly equivalent to co-sensei. It’s pretty common for his power-grabbing, control freak, egocentric character to mistakenly prop himself up with falsehoods. But let’s just do a rudimentary review for those who may have been duped by his big talk. Senpai (先輩) is a word that is best understood in its proper context. It’s part of a relationship dynamic - you need to know the word kohai (後輩) to get a better grasp of senpai.

The easiest way to help define this situation is to look at junior - senior relationships. When someone is new to something, they look up to people who’ve got more experience. When you are orienting someone to a new situation, you’re acting as a superior. When you’re receiving instruction and doing menial helping tasks for the superior, you’re the subordinate. Now, factor in ages, and you’re getting closer to approximating the idea of a senpai-kohai relationship. A freshman looks up to a sophomore, and the sophomore takes the freshman under his wing. In this situation, the freshman is the kohai. The sophomore is the senpai. But if you bring a junior into it, the sophomore is a senpai to the freshman, but a kohai to the junior. The terms are relative, and they change based on the relationships involved. You wouldn’t call and tell your sensei that it’s his senpai, unless you were his superior… Ha ha. Wrong relationship, Dwight. You’re a senpai to the kids, not the teacher. Anyway, I may have muddied the water even further, but hopefully that vaguely explains the words a little bit. Better than Dwight’s misleading snobbery, in any event.

For the curious, this clip came from Episode 6 of Season 2, “The Fight.” Also, just in keeping with the completely subjective grading scale used for the first season of Heroes, I’ll score this performance. Dwight Schrute (Rainn Wilson : 2).

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