During the speech writing correcting season, I have found that 60% to 70% of the entries I am put in charge of deal with the same topic. And there are two really popular topics that just swap in and out of the majority position. These topics are eco-friendly / anti-global warming stories and pro-peace / anti-war stories. Neither are particularly surprising to me, knowing Japan.
Also not particularly surprising is that Japan focuses on war stories that foster empathy and paint it as the victim. The most obvious case is in the atomic bombing of Hiroshima and Nagasaki. Hiroshima seems to be the focal point around here, though that may just be a geographical bias - more students have actually been to Hiroshima than to Nagasaki. The other stories that are routinely used in the classroom as well as in contests are those where the ground war hit Okinawa. Never mentioned are the military excursions in Southeast Asia, Pearl Harbor, etc. And I suppose I can understand that. But the lopsidedness is pretty sad sometimes.
I’ve read countless stories of children being killed, digging graves for family members, and people asking for water. It makes me choke up on occasion. (I got out of teaching a class earlier because I didn’t feel like I could correctly “enthusiastically” explain the vocabulary earlier without disrespecting the lives lost in the story and making light of a really grave situation. Also, the fact that I’m American can be awkward too.) The good thing is that students here all agree on a basic truth of life: war is awful. We definitely agree on that point.
So, you’re looking for something new to try in the grocery store. Wow! A little tiny can of corned beef catches your eye. This is a rarity in rural Japan. You think of maybe attempting a breakfast hash or something with cabbage. But then you look at the tin just next to it…the tin ominously marked “New Corn(ed) Meat.” The small parenthetical explanation underneath the product name suddenly leaps out. It reads “Contains horse meat and beef.” Mmmmm…HORSE SPAM. Yikes!
Some of you may remember my high praise of a good friend one year ago today when my application attempts got fouled up. That year she took a day of paid vacation, took a bus to a neighboring prefecture, bought an application, filled it out, and sent it in on my behalf. She didn’t tell me the extent to which she’d gone until she was on the bus back to Ehime and she wanted to know what to do about the required picture. Needless to say, I flipped out. Well, guess what? She has rescued me again. I bought the JLPT 2008 application online from Rakuten Books. They originally told me that it would ship in 1 to 3 days - but due to a backorder, they still have not shipped it to me. I placed my order 2 weeks ago. Tomorrow is the deadline for postmarking the application. I shall be refusing to pay for the application if they try to send it to me now. And I won’t feel bad about it. (Apologies to any other folks who tried to follow my hack. It didn’t turn out so well. 
) I called the Kinokuniya in Matsuyama, had them pull an application for me and hold it at the desk. The same brilliant friend picked it up, filled it out, and mailed it for me again. I would be truly helpless without the friends I’ve got. I’ll be failing the JLPT level 1 in December if all goes according to plan. (I’m praying I can pull off 45 - 50% on the level 1, which, while failing, would still be an improvement technically speaking on my performance on the JLPT level 2.) 
Yikes. Soooo unprepared.
Why do they want to die?! You’d think I lived on Christmas Island or something, the way crabs recklessly dash out onto the pavement during this time of year. They’re worse than squirrels, seriously. Rather than changing direction seven or eight times before finally committing to running for their life, they just brandish their oversized claws and buckle down before they meet someone’s tires. And what a sick crunching noise they make, too. I took this outside my apartment - barely dodged this guy on my scooter. (Wouldn’t have even tried had I not been going really slowly in a parking lot, though.) Lucky little guy.
I was asked to be the speaker at an ICIEA (Imabari City International Exchange Association) event this month, and recently decided upon my topic. I’ll be speaking about political correctness in American English. The announcement is up on the official page here: English / 日本語. It should be kind of interesting. The official title of the talk is “Political Correctness in American English: Changing Times and Shifting Diction.” It will cover, or at least deal with the following themes: why words change, meaning what you say (and saying what you mean), politics and politeness, using euphemisms, distancing language, social acceptance, and describing others. Of course, the scope may broaden or shrink as I approach the actual talk, but it’s a good starting point.
Anyway, while I was fooling around on the internet looking for ideas, I came across an interesting term I’d not heard of before. 「言葉狩り」 or ことばがり (kotobagari). It means “word hunting” literally, but refers to diction choices made in Japanese based on politeness and social acceptance guidelines strikingly similar to the American concept of political correctness. I’ve gathered a few cool examples of the euphemism treadmill at work in Japanese from the Wikipedia post on this topic (English / 日本語) that I hope I can use alongside some American English equivalents.
For example, a school janitor in Japan used to be called a kozukai-san (小使いさん “chore person”). Some felt that the word had a derogatory meaning, so it was changed to yōmuin (用務員 “task person”). Now yōmuin is considered demeaning, so there is [sic] shift to use kōmuin (校務員 “school task member”) or kanrisagyōin (管理作業員 “maintenance member”) instead.
This is a situation roughly equivalent to the odd titles we are now giving to jobs in America. For instance, janitors are not janitors. Now they’re called custodians. (Or in joking hyperbole, sanitation technicians.) Secretaries are administrative assistants. You see how the pattern works.
Anyway, this is a bit of a “bleg” (blog-based beg) for some help. If you’re proficient in Japanese and you’re aware of some words that have taken a trip down the euphemism treadmill or other word choices that may be related to “word hunting,” please please please post them in the comments section!
Japanese breadcrumbs are pretty fascinating to me. I first encountered them in the home cuisine cooked for me by my host mother. I fell in love with her tonkatsu (breaded pork cutlets). She still makes them for me whenever I visit. (Sweet!) Anyway, when I returned to the U.S. to finish up my degree, I tried to recreate her wonderful dish. When I tried it with traditional bread crumbs, it failed spectacularly. It was heavy and greasy. Then I hit the Japanese grocery store about 45 minutes away and picked up some Japanese breadcrumbs. (This was before they were widely available at places like Whole Foods in my area.) They made the biggest difference. I pledged then and there to never again fry anything using traditional breadcrumbs. I would reserve them for stuffings, where they belong.
近年、北米では日本のパン粉が料理番組などで「panko」として紹介され、グルメ食材として普及しつつある。北米の「breadcrumb」は日本のパン粉よりも固くて細かく、中には味がついているものもある。
“In recent years, Japanese breadcrumbs have been introduced to North America via food TV programming as panko, the diffusion of which has continued as a gourmet foodstuff. North American breadcrumb(s) are harder and more fine than their Japanese counterparts, and some are even flavored.”
- Wikipedia Japan, my rough translation
Interestingly enough, after I did my little experiment, I found that Alton Brown, long documented Food TV hero of mine, was in love with panko breadcrumbs. When I saw the clip that I provided above, oddly from an episode called Bean Stalker (Episode 10 of Season 11), it made me curious. What IS the difference between Japanese breadcrumbs and the kind I’d always used? I found this small hint on the English version of Wikipedia.
Panko is made from bread without crusts, thus it has a crisper, airier texture than most types of breading found in Western cuisine.
- Wikipedia
Not very satisfactory, is it? What do you reckon is the processing difference that makes panko so superior?
