Some places have names that are offensive or humorous in other languages.
A few examples are Rottenegg or Fucking (renamed to Fugging in 2021) in Austria, or Fjuckby in Sweden, since those names are easily associated with the expletive "fuck."
The town of Fucking is benign in German, but in English it's vulgar. Its earliest recorded use in England is within the 14th-century Bristol field name, Fucking Grove, although it is unclear whether the word was considered obscene at that time.
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."
Chrismukkah is a pop-culture portmanteau neologism referring to the merging of the holidays of Christianity's Christmas and Judaism's Hanukkah.
The term was popularized beginning in December 2003 by the TV drama The O.C., in which the character Seth Cohen creates the holiday to signify his upbringing in an interfaith household with a Jewish father and Protestant mother.
The holiday can also be adopted by all-Jewish households that celebrate Christmas as a secular holiday.
The term first arose in the German-speaking countries among middle-class Jews in the 19th century.
After World War II, Chrismukkah became particularly popular in the United States but is also celebrated in other countries.
For a deeper and more personal take on this, see my post today on Weekends in Paradelle.
