Just a reminder when reading books the sweet spot for building literacy is 2 to 3 unknown words per page. If you have to look up more than 5 words on the page then it’s far enough above your reading level to cause burn out and if you don’t have to look up any words then the text is too easy for you
臭木[Kusagi] : C. trichotomum; lit. nasty smell tree
When the stems and leaves are rubbed or crushed, they give off a strong peanut-like odor, while the flowers have a pleasant fragrance.
Now, in the Muromachi Period(1336 or 1392-1573), there was a Zen monk who was well known throughout history for his eccentric and unconventional behavior. His name is 一休 宗純[Ikkyū Sōjun](1394-1481). The following is one of the many anecdotes. There are several variations of this story as well, and this is one of them.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ikkyū
[Sanzu no kawa no watashimori
Ikkyū oshō senshū sakai no ura ni mairareshi toki, sono chi no ryokaku wo yado suru ie ni, jigoku-dayū to ieru yūjo ari keru wo mite
Kikishi yori mite osoroshiki jigoku kana
to kuchizusamishikaba, jigoku-dayū hidari no isshu wo yomi tari to nan
Keisei wa sanzu no kawa no watashimori shi ni kuru hito wo nosenu hi wa nashi]
Ferry operator on Sanzu no kawa(lit. three world river)
When Monk Ikkyū came to Sakai no ura in Senshū(now, Sakai in Osaka), on seeing a courtesan named Jigoku-dayū(the highest rank courtesan named Hell) at an inn where travelers staying in that area were lodging,
You are even more stunningly hell(beautiful) than I'd heard in rumors
he hummed it, she is said to have composed the following poem
Courtesan(me) is a ferry operator on Sanzu no kawa, not a day goes by when I don't let people who came to die board the boat(I don't let people who came to make love lie on me)
禅学断片[Zengaku Danpen](Fragments of the Zen study) by 中川 愛氷[Nakagawa Aihyō](Researcher of the traditional Japanese music, 1872-1949)
Source: https://dl.ndl.go.jp/pid/823212/1/105
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hell_Courtesan
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sanzu_River
It is said that she was given that name because she was wearing a kimono embroidered with scenes from hell. It is also said that at that time, he looked like a beggar. And after that, she became his disciple, and when she passed away, he is said to have cordially buried her.
A monk who breaks the precepts, like Ikkyū, is called 破戒僧[Hakai-sō](Sinful monk) or 生臭坊主[Namagusa-bōzu](Depraved monk). In the case of meaning "smelling of fish", it is pronounced namagusai and written as 生臭い, while in the case of "smelling of blood", it is pronounced chinamagusai and frequently written as 血腥い. 血 means blood.
By the way, some of the reverse side of Neputa float (in the Tsugaru area, Aomori Pref.) often features an image of her. Incidentally, the family crest of the Tsugaru clan is Botan.
https://www.youtube.com/results?search_query=ねぷた+運行
Today's phrase is "人間至る処青山有り（jinkan itaru tokoro seizan ari）"
【Vocabulary & Grammar】
1．人間（じんかん, jinkan）
In classical Chinese‑derived expressions, 人間 means “the human world,” “society,” “the realm where people live.”
It does not mean “a human being” (person) in this context.
2．至る処（いたるところ, itaru tokoro）
A classical expression meaning “everywhere,” “wherever you go.”
至る = to reach / to arrive
処 = place
Together: “all places one may go.”
3．青山（せいざん, seizan）
Literally “blue/green mountain.”
Figuratively, it means “a place to bury one’s bones,” i.e., a burial place / final resting place.
4．有り（あり, ari）
Classical form of ある（to exist）.
Here it states that such places exist everywhere.
「人間至る処青山有り」 means that the world is vast and you can find a place to live, work, and fulfill your purpose anywhere.
It teaches the courage to step beyond familiar places, trusting that new paths and new “homes” will always exist for those who pursue their goals.
There isn’t only one place where a person can shine.
What challenge would you like to take on next?
I do kinda feel like ppl who teach languages approach it not dissimilarly to drug dealers giving you that first hit for free. They tell you that according to science if you learn like 100 words or something you'll understand 50% of the whole language.
This is a lie.
Often if you don't know one word, you're lost, you're done for. If I'm reading a book and I only recognize 50% of the words, then I'm not reading a book at all. There's no story playing in my head, no sensible meaning I'm able to derive from the page.
If I'm reading about a research study that concluded that eating one packet of natto a day will help me live forever, and I'm suspicious of this conclusion but am willing to believe, but the one word I don't know is the *kind* of research that was conducted (double-blind test, or survey sent via email?), then I have no ability to assess whether I trust this study or not.
Yesterday I was in the doctor's office and she diagnosed my condition, but the diagnosis was the only word I couldn't understand. All the other words I'd ever learned in my life up to that moment were of no use to me at all.
Yadda yadda. Basically what I am saying is god dear god when can I stop needing so many words i am so tired help helpppp
or, “How the transition to horizontal writing went both ways on the sides of cars”
In Japan, some company cars and trucks write the company’s name from the front of the car to the back: left to right on the left side, but from right to left on the right side.
It’s not well documented why people did that, but my personal pet theory is that this started when Japanese was still in the transition from vertical writing (columns right to left) and had to decide between which way to write Japanese horizontally.
Top to bottom, right to left
According to Wikipedia’s article on “horizontal and vertical writing in East Asian scripts”, before WWII, Japanese was written horizontally only in one row when constrained for space, and since columns went from right to left, the one row went from right to left.
Here is an old print ad for Calpico (カルピス) where the logo, being horizontal, reads from right to left, and the ad copy underneath goes from top to bottom, right to left:
This is a lot like writing words top to bottom with upright Latin letters. Here are two signs in Dutch for a liquor store (slijterij), one vertical and the other horizontal.
But especially after WWII when Japan rushed to Westernize, Japan adopted left-to-right horizontal writing to match the Latin alphabet. This follows the footsteps of the January 1915 issue of the Chinese magazine Science, which wrote Chinese horizontally to make various scientific formulae easier to read.
本雜誌印法，旁行上左，並用西文句讀點之，以便插寫算術及物理化學諸程式，非故好新奇，讀者諒之。
This magazine is printed sideways from the top left, and marked with Western punctuation. This is to make more convenient the insertion of mathematical, physical and chemical formulae, and not for novelty's sake. We ask for our readers' understanding.
Coincidentally, this solution was mostly equivalent to rotating vertically written Japanese 90° to the left, then rotating every letter 90° to the right.
Why not both?
The thing is that there was a pretty long time in Japan where left-to-right and right-to-left writing coexisted. So when writing text on vehicles, people wrote the name from the front to the back, so that a stationary observer can read it better when the vehicle is in motion. But it’s weird now that left-to-right won out by a huge margin.
Here are two advertisement plaques for Calpico—I don’t know when the specific dates are—that have motly the same design, but the older one (using the kyūjitai 戀) goes from right to left, and the newer one (using the shinjitai 恋) goes from left to right. (I don’t know why the character in the ad looks so blackface-y, but it’s what it is...)
This post was prompted by this Quora question, which listed some times when this practice went sideways (pun definitely intended). Translation follows.
平野 幸司 (Koji Hirano)さんの回答: 諸説ありますが、船は進行方向から文字を先頭にして書くことで「どっちが先頭か」をわかりやすくしており、それを真似ている…というのが有力ですね。トラックは別にどっちが先頭かわかりにくいわけではないので真似しなくても良いと思いますけど
Q: Why are company names, like on the side of a truck, written from right to left?
Answer by Kōji Hirano • president of idealShip, Inc. (2006–now) • 1215 answers written, seen 130.87 million times
There are various hypotheses, but the prevailing one is that it’s in imitation of ships writing letters from the front to the back to make it clearer which side it’s facing. Though, I don’t think a truck needs to imitate that, being obvious which end is the front end of one...
Also, I’ve directly heard before that many companies do it as a good luck charm to keep the company moving forward. They seem to associate going against the direction of movement with things going badly, and want to avoid that.
I often hear the hypothesis that it’s easier for a moving car to read it when the text goes from the front to the back, but I don’t trust that...
You see this↑ brand often! It’s Sujahta. [Note: written “スジャータ”, a dairy product company, and the #1 brand of coffee creamer and chilled soup in Japan as of 2009]
Writing backwards causes these kinds of... mishaps...
Not 送輸—トイレ : [portTrans — Toilet]... but レイトー輸送 [Reitō Transport]
Not わかいあの肉 [That Young Meat]... but 肉のあいかわ [Aikawa Meats].
Not 所業エロ山 [Actions Lewd Mountain]... but 山口工業所 [Yamaguchi Industrial Works]
Not クッサア [EW, IT REEKS!]... but アサック [Asack]
I’m personally against this practice of writing right to left...
Realizing that work doesn’t feel like it’s helping my Japanese improve because it’s teaching me things that are NOT what I want to learn.
At this point I’m upper intermediate, so I know most of the essential skills that carry over between different settings. Basic grammar, function words, listening fundamentals.
Now, it’s most filling in the vocab, and unfortunately I’m spending 40 hours a week learning things like INVOICE and LOGISTICS and TAX WITHHELD and surprise surprise these things don’t help me read my fantasy mystery romance manga any more smoothly
seriously though, this is what ive been talking about. Like they lure you in with "100 words cover 50% of the language!" or whatever bs factoid, and then it's like 15 years later and you have learned 250,4346,43222.642 words and somehow it is not enough
I've been watching a lot of isekai anime lately and I've heard the word 支配者 enough times that it stuck. I think how many words you "need to know" varies depending on what you want to use words for. Everyone's interests are different, so making a huge vocabulary list and saying "know this list and you'll be fluent!" is a huge misconception.
Concept art of Athena's first outfits from Extra Credits with Athena.
The greatest student in the history of Olympus University (Zeus' words, not ours), Athena's initial design was built around the idea of Classical Warmth.
Unlike many of her fellow students, Athena retains her traditional robes and iconic helmet, but we wanted the colours and softer features to reflect the kind, compassionate and intelligent person she really is.
The goal was to create a warm, freckled redhead whom Medusa could gradually learn to trust, confide in and feel safe around - a stark contrast to the loneliness that has defined much of Medusa's life.
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