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Japanese idioms

Zauriel

The Angel of Justice
13 Mar 2005
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Westerners have interesting idioms such as "Face the music", "Spill the beans", "Wet behind the ears", "a thorn in one's paw", "I'm all ears", "The tip of the iceberg", "Icing on the cake", "Hit the road", "Penny for your thought", "Cat's got your tongue", "Why the long face", etc.

It appears Japanese have their own figurative expressions. I have noticed many idioms in the English translations of Sakura Taisen games by a webmaster codenamed Kayama.


'hara ga tatsu'- which literally means 'the belly stands out.')
Literal translation: 'the belly stands out'
Figurative translation: 'Unable to control one's anger'


Atarimae
Literal translation: "before the hit"
Figurative translation: "of course" or "naturally."


テゥ O-tagai no kokyuu wo awaseru - Literally, 'to make
each other's breathing be in harmony,' it is an idiom used to mean 'to be
in perfect tune with each other.')
Literal translation: 'to make each other's breathing be in harmony'
Figurative translation: ''to be in perfect tune with each other.'


Japanese idiomatic proverb:
'mizu mo shitataru ii otoko.'
("It is true that a good man is one who is dripping wet.")
(窶廩窶堙ゥ Shitataru - to 'drip.' This was a difficult line to translate. First
of all, the actual wording is just awkward to work into English. Second,
this is a pun based on a Japanese idiom for which there is no real
equivalent in English. First of all, we have 'mizu mo shitataru ii otoko.' This literally means, more or less, 'a good man dripping wet.' 'mizu mo shitataru' is an idiomatic expression used to mean 'breathtaking,'

Source:
http://db.gamefaqs.com/console/saturn/file/sakura_taisen_episode_01.txt

Are the info about Japanese idiomatic phrases accurate?

Are there more Japanese idiomatic expressions do you know of?
 
They are all understandable idioms, except this one: Why does "before the hit" mean "of course" or "naturally"? What's the connection?
 
I don't know, but I would imagine, that 'before the hit' would mean 'naturally' in the way that something is obvious (as in 'of course') - 'atarimae'... well, my Japanese isn't too good but I know that 'mae [ni]' means 'in front of' (or 'before' in that sense), so maybe it just doesn't translate too well into English, but..................... I reckon (sorry my language isn't good in trying to explain these sorts of things 😌 ) it carries a meaning of anticipating, i.e. that something is 'naturally/of course' so it is anticipated 'before'....

Does that even make any sense at all? 😊
 
Japanese is full of interesting sayings... two more include

窶ーナス窶堙?窶禿倪?堋ゥ窶堙ァ窶版ス窶堋ソ窶堙ゥツ。
saru mo ki kara ochiru.
Literally: even monkeys fall from trees.
Meaning: Nobody's perfect.

窶冕窶堙個ステ榲偲榲昶?堙古個ァツステ?ー窶堙最ステ絶?ーテッ窶堙娯?倪?ケツ。
Otoko no zubon no fasuna- wa shakai no mado.
Literally: Men's zippers are the windows of society.
Meaning: Your fly is open.
 
I know only two Japanese idiomatic expressions:
ONAJI KAMA NO MESHI O KUTTA
(EATING THE RICE FROM THE SAME POT)
This expression means the sharing of the same experiences. Eating together creates a sort of bond of friendship and loyalty between those who literally ツ"eat from the same potツ".

SAJI WO NAGERU
(THROW THE SPOON)
It has the same meaning of ツ"give upツ", ツ"surrenderツ".
 
I have a whole book of them

Japanese Idioms, Nobuo Akiyama, Barrons 1996

It has about 400 pages but I can still fit it in my purse
 
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