December in Japan

 

Like many countries, Japan uses a 12-month calendar. The names used are very simple. January is literally "Month one" 一月, February is "Month two" 二月, and so on. However, before the Meiji Restoration (mid-1800s), an older 12-month system was common. These months’ names referenced the weather and the seasons, similar to how we name the Full Moons.

December is 師走. The kanji (I think that is the correct term for an ideogram) 師 can refer to a teacher, or a mentor, often in a religious sense. In this context, it means a monk. The second ideogram is 走 which means "running." So, this December literally means "monks running."   

But why? 

In December, monks are very busy preparing for the New Year's festival, so this last month of the year is "the month of running monks."

Head Honcho

"Head honcho" is a casual or unofficial reference to a person in charge of a community or an organization.

I would have guessed that the word had a Spanish origin but it actually comes from a Japanese term. The word would be spelled the same if you translate using the English alphabet. It is a geographic region near Tokyo, but roughly translated, a honchō  referring to a person in Japan is a leader or squad leader.

I have been told that you might easily see signs in Japan that would mean honchō  and that they would probably indicate a place name with this translation meaning "main town."

The "head honcho" in your office is likely to not officially be a boss but bosses everyone else around. This informal use of honcho seems to have been brought into American English slang in the 1940s to mean "officer in charge," and was popular with U.S. soldiers during the Korean War.

In the early 1950s, Gerald Ford declined offers to run for either the Senate or the Michigan governorship, instead aiming for Speaker of the House, which he called "the ultimate achievement. To sit up there and be the head honcho of 434 other people and have the responsibility, aside from the achievement, of trying to run the greatest legislative body in the history of mankind."

Karaoke

Karaoke (and karaoke bars) are a method (and a place) of singing songs by way of a special tape/CD,digital file player that eliminates the vocals from a song and leaves the music. The singer supplies her own vocal rendition of the song, usually with the lyrics appearing synchronized on a screen, much like a teleprompter.

VocoPro CLUB 9009G Professional Club Karaoke System

This is a loan word from Japan, where the activity first gained popularity. Karaoke is a combination of two Japanese words kara meaning empty and the shortened form of the word okesutora  orchestra.

The usage came to prominence outside Japan rapidly in the 1970's as karaoke bars (alcohol being useful to drop stage fright inhibitions, no doubt) and karaoke machines (including those for home use, in case even alcohol won't get you on stage to be Beyonce) became popular around the world.

There are even karaoke systems made for an iPad (below), so you can sing in privacy in the bright acoustics of your home bathroom.



The Late Late Show with James Corden has taken "Carpool Karaoke" - which people have been doing in their cars since cars got radios - to a high professional level. One of my favorites is when James went to Liverpool with Paul McCartney and did a singing tour of the city of Paul's youth. They go to his childhood home where he wrote music with John Lennon. He even performs a few songs in a local pub to an amazed crowd.

With the YouTube closedc aptioning, you can do some karaoke along with James and Paul.

Tsunami

The word tsunami unfortunately turns up in the news regularly as this devastating effect of earthquakes is not uncommon. It is particularly common particularly in the Pacific Islands and coasts. An earthquake far out in the ocean is capable of creating enough vibration to displace massive amounts of seawater and send deadly waves at islands and coastlines.

It should not be surprising that the term comes from the Pacific islands of Japanese. Two words are combined:  TSU  (pronounced sue) which means "harbor" and NAMI (nah me) which means "wave." The word distinguishes other words to describe waves as a very large one that enter a normally safe harbor.

Katsushika Hokusai: The Great Wave off Kanagawa (Kanagawa oki nami ura) 
The waves in this work are sometimes mistakenly referred to as tsunami (津波),
but they are more accurately called okinami (沖波), great off-shore waves.