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[my_rain_face]

OH dude,　I just remembered the MOST amusing t-shirt I saw today. I'm not really sure how to describe it -- I guess it was a fake ad or something, sort of, that said "100% legal drug!" And then, under that, in huge letters:

PSYCHEDERICKAnd there was more writing under that but the guy walked past before I could read it. Still -- classic,

Comments

[raedances]

You've had your first Engrish encounter! You're going to see a lot of those T-Shirts in Japan! By the way, the T-shirt was probably trying to say "Psychedelic." That awful L/R stereotype of Japanese people pronouncing with the wrong consonant *does* come from somewhere. You've probably heard about the "liquid r" already, but just in case you haven't, I will explain. L and R are actually the same sound in Japanese, it's kind of a strange hybrid between the two, and is a bit weird for non-native speakers at first. Basically, you vocalize an r sound, but you put your tongue on the roof of your mouth as if you were making an l sound.

Probably the easiest way for you to get a sense of it is to listen for the word "arigato," which I'm sure you hear often, and are already able to pick out. Notice how it's not said Arr-igato, but it's also not al-igato. I guess just practice the little toungue flick until it feels normal (to get the right sound, it's a kind of quick flick of the tip, on the roof of the mouth right behind the front teeth.) I'll see if I've got any songs here where you can really hear it, I'll bet "Graceful World" would be a good one ^_~. If for no other reason, set up gmail so I can email you music, eh? ^_^

PS - When you get a chance to call, I'm expecting to hear a beautiful liquid r sound ^_^ I'll test you on it!

[my_rain_face]

Hahaha -- TRUST me, Casey, that wasn't the first encounter I've had with Engrish! I know all about the Ls and Rs. Remember -- I do live here now, and I'm teaching Japanese people how to speak English, eh? They confuse those sounds ALLLLLLL the time. Actually, on more than one occasion I've been confused because students were talking about the "flea market" but they were pronouncing it "free market." So, yes. The shirt was indeed trying to say "psychedelic". Another pair of sounds they often struggle with (though not quite as badly) are B and V. In one of my private lessons, we were talking about count words for units of particular things, and the word I was trying to elicit from him was "bolt" of lightning. He said "bolt" almost immediately after I asked him, but I realised a little while later that he was saying "bolt" but meaning "volt," as in, volt of electricity -- so he had given me the right word but the wrong answer, if that makes sense. Fs and Hs can be a challenge with lower-level students, but I think that's because when japanese is written in romanji, the sound represented by F is closer to "wh" (as in "what" or "where") and really nothing like an English F at all.

Anyway, yeah, I think I've got the "liquid R" down. It's actually sort of similar to a Spanish single R sound, but smoother and less crisp. I finally got a phone today, so hopefully I'll be able to make international calls on it soon (I have to get the details on a particular long-distance card specifically for mobiles from my coworker). I'm in the process of looking into a conversation school near my house and also into some language exchanges. . . my goal is to be able to car