Nihongo wa muzukashii desu (Japanese is hard)
I've made a few of the classic language learner blunders in my time in Japan. A few highlights:
-Telling a mother her newborn baby was kowai (scary) instead of kawaii (cute). To make matters worse, the baby had a cleft palate.
-Calling a room full of children kudamono (fruit) instead of kodomodachi (children). Made worse by the fact that an hour later at lunch I told them I was eating ningen soup (man soup, or, in popular slang, semen) instead of ninjin (carrot) soup.
-Ordering oshiiko maki (urine sushi) instead of oshinko maki (pickled radish sushi).
-Asking if a cake was filled with eunko (shit) instead and anko (red bean paste). This was compounded by the fact that while I was searching for the right (wrong) word for bean paste, I desperately told the bakery guy that what I wanted was chaairo (brown) and oishii (delicious).
But today I added yet another winner to the bunch. When offered some squid jerky (which I loathe) I turned it down by saying, "opai desu".
IPAI desu means I'm full. OPAI desu means I'm a breast.
Yup, not gonna live this one down for a while!
-Telling a mother her newborn baby was kowai (scary) instead of kawaii (cute). To make matters worse, the baby had a cleft palate.
-Calling a room full of children kudamono (fruit) instead of kodomodachi (children). Made worse by the fact that an hour later at lunch I told them I was eating ningen soup (man soup, or, in popular slang, semen) instead of ninjin (carrot) soup.
-Ordering oshiiko maki (urine sushi) instead of oshinko maki (pickled radish sushi).
-Asking if a cake was filled with eunko (shit) instead and anko (red bean paste). This was compounded by the fact that while I was searching for the right (wrong) word for bean paste, I desperately told the bakery guy that what I wanted was chaairo (brown) and oishii (delicious).
But today I added yet another winner to the bunch. When offered some squid jerky (which I loathe) I turned it down by saying, "opai desu".
IPAI desu means I'm full. OPAI desu means I'm a breast.
Yup, not gonna live this one down for a while!