In Japanese, green is the new blue

In ancient Japanese, the four primary colors were black, white, red and blue, and even today the language possesses compound terms for “completely black” (真っ黒 – makkuro), “completely white” (真っ白 – masshiro), “completely red” (真っ赤 – makka), and “completely blue” (真っ青 – massao), but there are no comparable terms for any other colors. The result of this four-color paradigm is a handful of inconsistencies with English and other European languages, particularly involving the colors blue and green.

“blue juice”

Historically, Japanese made no clear distinction between blue and green (green could be considered a shade of blue), and the tendency to call green things blue persists in a number of cases today, such as that stoplights are said to turn blue, not green (青になる – ao ni naru).

Similarly, 青林檎 (aoringo – “blue apples”) and 青野菜 (aoyasai – “blue vegetables”) are certainly not blue, nor is 青汁 (aojiru – “blue juice”). The expression 青臭い (aokusai) means unripe, naive or inexperienced (in English we might call such a person a “greenhorn”).

The Japanese word for “green” (緑 : midori) originally referred to youthful vitality or freshness, and by extension came to refer to  “greenery” or trees and plants in general, which—it should be noted—are said to have “blue” leaves (青葉 : aoba).

It’s not like Japanese speakers can’t see the difference; when the specific color of a thing is important, all of them can distinguish between blue and green. But generations-old habits are hard to break; so if your Japanese boss hastily instructs you to go fetch “the blue folder” from somewhere and you can only find a green one, don’t be surprised.

Problematic colors

Color exists on a spectrum and color terms in any language are inherently vague; everything other than pure black and white is always an approximation. Therefore, when dealing with terms across two languages, there are inevitably a number of cases where the descriptors just don’t line up like we expect them to, possibly leading to miscommunication.

For example, Japanese “wisteria” (藤色 – fuji-iro) is less purple and more blue than what we would normally call “wisteria” in English, so if we’re translating the color and not the word, we should call it “periwinkle”. If you don’t feel like being quite so specific then just say “lavender“, which could refer to either color.

“Pink” is usually equated to Japanese’s 桃色 (momo-iro), which is literally “peach-colored”. If you’re good with colors, you probably just raised an eyebrow; yes, “peach” in English is a light shade of orange, not pink. The confusion here is that our English peach color refers to the peach fruit, whereas in Japanese they’re thinking about the flowers of a peach tree.

緋色 (hiiro) is commonly translated as “scarlet” but it actually refers to a color close to vermilion. What English speakers would call “scarlet” would usually be just plain “red” in Japanese (赤 – aka) or alternatively we could use the katakana term スカーレット. If you really just had to come up with a fancy Japanese word you could call it 猩々緋 (shoujouhi), the color of the blood of a fictional red-faced, red-haired sea monster, but this particular term is unfamiliar to most native speakers.

All the pretty colors

The bulk of Japanese’s advanced color lexicon is drawn from nature. 菫 (sumire) is violet the flower and 菫色 (sumire-iro) is violet the color. 桜 (sakura) is the Japanese cherry blossom tree, and 桜色 (sakura-iro) refers to the light pink shade of its blossoms. Although the katakana word オレンジ is more common today, there’s also 橙色 (daidai-iro), 橙 refers to a kind of orange.

Some shades of green tend to mirror very well to English counterparts. 苔 (koke) is moss, so 苔色 is moss green. 千歳緑 (chitose midori – “thousand-years green”) or 常盤色 (tokiwa-iro) is equivalent to English’s “evergreen”. 萌黄色 (moegi-iro) refers to freshly sprouted grass and trees, hence “spring green”. But not all hues are so straightforward; 柳色 (yanagi-iro), literally “willow color” corresponds to our fern or pea green.

There are also colors based on precious stones and materials; 琥珀色 (kohaku-iro) is amber and 翡翠色 (hisui-iro) is jade. There’s also 瑠璃色 (ruri-iro) for lapis lazuli (which isn’t commonly used as a color in English). 真珠色 (shinju-iro – pearl) and 象牙色 (zouge-iro – ivory) are beautiful names for a yellowish off-white color. Sadly, there’s no native Japanese term for turquoise—a mineral not found in Japan—so for that color we’ll have to make due with katakana: ターコイズブルー (“turquoise blue”).

Japanese also draws some color names from birds. What English speakers would call “olive green” is likened to a Japanese bush warbler, 鶯色 (uguisu-iro). 鳶色 (tobi-iro) refers to the reddish-brown feathers of a black kite. And “teal” comes out as 鴨の羽色 (kamo no ha-iro) or “duck feather color”.

One notable oddball is 納戸色 (nando-iro, sometimes preceded with a beautifying お), which literally means “closet color” (umm… come again?). In English we would call the color “aquamarine”.

A couple others that are nice to know are 浅葱色 (asagi-iro), which is the dark cyan color famously used on the shinsengumi‘s haori, and 葡萄色 (ebi-iro), which uses the kanji for “grape” with the reading for “shrimp” to simultaneously refer to the color of grapes and the shell of an (uncooked) lobster.

What Japanese colors do you like?

If you think I missed something (I’m sure I did), leave a comment and I’ll try to keep updating this section.

Note: 朱色 may also refer to cinnabar (a shade of orange)

Conclusion and Further Reading

Having an advanced repertoire of colors in your vocabulary isn’t absolutely necessary, but it does make life more… well… colorful. I expanded and corrected my own knowledge of color (in both Japanese and English) in the course of researching and writing this article, and can proudly claim to be a little bit more sophisticated for it.

If you’d like to see even more named Japanese colors, here’s a couple great links to get you started.

• Japanese Industrial Standards (JIS) defined colors (Wikipedia JP)
• Database of Japanese traditional named colors: 和の色

Of course, Japanese also has onomatopoeia (which they call 擬態語 : ぎたいご). They have LOTS of it, and not just silly comic book sounds either. If you’ve been studying Japanese for more than a couple weeks, you probably already know a couple: ちょっと (a little) is an onomatopoeia, and so is ちゃんと (correctly, obediently) and ゆっくり (slowly). Sometimes we don’t even think of those words as onomatopoeia, but they are.

Even a certain lightning-wielding, yellow mouse character’s name turns out to be a simple fusion of sounds which means “sparkle-squeak” (actually, I think I like the English name better…). Anyway, my point is there’s so much onomatopoeia in Japanese that it will make your head spin (the sound for dizziness would be くらくら, by the way).

In fact, Japanese has so much onomatopoeia that they use them to describe all sorts of things, many of which (like dizziness) don’t actually make a sound. Maybe that seems strange, but we have some very similar words in English too, for example “dilly-dally” or “wishy-washy”. Just try to imagine if there were literally hundreds of words like that, and that on a given day you’d probably hear, read or use at least 50 of them.

Yet despite how common onomatopoeia are and how important they are for things such as casual conversation or reading fiction, they seem to be regarded as irrelevant by a lot of teachers and teaching materials. Common ones are taught as adverbs and that’s about it. The common perception among native Japanese speakers is that these words are “easy” because all they do is convey a sound. No kanji = easy.

Well I’ve got news for the native speakers: these words are NOT easy and they DO require special attention. It’s exactly because these words are not tied to kanji that they take on multiple, sometimes unrelated meanings and develop their own peculiar nuances and usage quirks (I seem to remember Japanese speakers complaining about this aspect of English vocabulary, no?). No kanji = less restrictions on usage = more vagueness and confusion.

In this article, I’m going to attempt to give readers a framework for understanding and using onomatopoeia.

Onomatopoeia Forms

The first thing that you need to know is that there are three basic forms an onomatopoeia can take.

Not all words can take all the forms (the three examples above are actually more flexible than most). Also, sometimes different forms of the same onomatopoeia will have somewhat different meanings, though they are usually either the same or strongly related. The important thing is just to be aware that onomatopoeia in Japanese (when used in a sentence) appear in one of these forms.

The second thing to know is that the particle you should associate with onomatopoeia is と. One of と’s primary functions is to mark quoted speech, such as in:

彼は“こんにちわ”と言った 。
kare wa “konnichiwa” to itta.
He said “hello”.

But と also describes sounds in exactly the same way:

彼はごくごくと飲んだ 。
kare wa gokugoku to nonda.
He drank making a gulping sound.

In fact, the と in the TO-ending words above (にこっと、にやっと、こそっと) is the particle と. The particle is actually built into the form (therefore, don’t add any other particle when you use them).

The Double and RI forms of onomatopoeia are trickier, as each word has its own usage nuances. Some words will almost always come with a と, some will always omit their と. As I’ll explain later, some words are even treated similar to nouns and can be used with particles like の and に, but the basic rule of thumb is: the particle to use with an onomatopoeia is と (even though it is often omitted).

Pseudo-Onomatopoeia

One of the things that complicates the issue of learning onomatopoeia is that in addition to words like ちょっと and ゆっくり, which are so common that we don’t really think of them as onomatopoeia, there are also words that sound like and which may even be used like onomatopoeia, but aren’t.

You probably know a couple of these already too: いろいろ is an example. For all intents and purposes, you could consider this word an onomatopoeia, but its meaning is derived from the kanji (色々) rather than the “sound” of the word. Other examples of this kind of pseudo-onomatopoeia are 段々（だんだん） and 次々（つぎつぎ）.

Since these words aren’t really onomatopoeia, you have to be much more careful about which particle you select (if any). The above-mentioned three can all optionally take と, but others such as まだまだ（未だ未だ）, 別々（べつべつ）, and 元々（もともと） can never take と. Still others such as 堂々（どうどう）、延々（えんえん）、and 朗々（ろうろう） will always appear with と. Don’t worry about remembering all the specifics, just understand that not all words which sound like an onomatopoeia are.

And Japanese has one other another kind of fake onomatopoeia which is made by doubling adjective or verb stems (~I form). The meaning of the resulting word is dependent on the stem, so usually these aren’t too hard to figure out. For example, 熱い (あつい – hot) becomes 熱々（あつあつ） and 浮く(うく – to float/be cheerful) becomes うきうき (in high spirits). These doubled-stem words are kind of a middle-ground between “true” onomatopoeia and the “pseudo-” ones which I mentioned above. Their usage is fundamentally the same as true onomatopoeia, except that you’ll never find them in RI or -TO form.*

*: there is one exception that I know of: のびのび （伸びる） → のんびり

Using Onomatopoeia

Okay, so now that you kind of have an idea what exactly an onomatopoeia is in Japanese, it’s time to look at how to use them.

There’s four basic usage patterns that you will find onomatopoeia in:

The reason onomatopoeia exist and the reason we use them is to describe. But essentially there are two and only two things which onomatopoeia can describe: either an action/process or a condition/state of being.

Which kind of description you are making affects the grammar you will need, hence I have distinguished between “adverb” (describing an action/process) and “adjective” (describing the state/condition of something) functions.

Individual onomatopoeia can be tightly restricted to one certain usage, or they can have multiple meanings each with a different usage, or they can have one core meaning that can be applied both ways. This can be a headache for learners, but only if you take it too seriously. Onomatopoeia are supposed to make sentences more colorful, to add emotion and spice. They’re fun! Without onomatopoeia, Japanese might as well be just one boring newspaper article about stock prices and exchange rates. But anyway, back to the topic…

The ADVERB usage (describing an action) is the default function of an onomatopoeia and also the simplest. It’s simple because you just stick it in front of the verb you’re describing, and decide whether or not to use と. Some words will require it, but in most cases it’s optional.

In cases where it’s optional, adding the と helps bring out the aural aspect of the word, so it’s less common in everyday speech and more common in creative writing. Including と also helps prevent word-order confusion if there’s something between your onomatopoeia and your verb.

The ADJECTIVE usage (describing an object/condition) is actually a specialized application of an adverb. Grammatically speaking, the onomatopoeia wants to be an adverb, so we need to do some linguistic acrobatics to make it modify a noun.

How do we turn an adverb into an adjective? We “format” it with either とした or している. Don’t concern yourself with the meaning of とした／している here because there really isn’t one, we’re just using the formless verb する as an intermediary between our onomatopoeia and our noun.

とした is kind of the “correct” way to make an adjective usage, and している (usually abbreviated to してる) is the “casual” way, but they’re both doing the same thing: taking a sound and “formatting” it so that it can modify a noun.

Because constantly “formatting” onomatopoeia is kind of inconvenient, a lot Adjective-natured onomatopoeia have developed a different usage. An Onomatopoeia with a N-ADJECTIVE usage can be used similarly to a noun. “N” is the perfect letter to represent these words, not only because they have some similarities to nouns, but because by happy coincidence they are mostly used with the particles の and に (and sometimes even な, like a NA-Adjective).

Note that although these words have some grammatical similarities to nouns, it usually doesn’t make any sense to use them as objects (を). And if you find them with で , it’s probably actually the TE-form of だ／です, not the particle で.

The SURU usage is very handy. You simply pair the onomatopoeia with the “formless” verb する, and the resulting verb means “to act/feel/occur/be” in whatever way is described by the onomatopoeia. So for example, くらくら which I mentioned at the beginning of the article describes dizziness and is used with する. The typical usage of this is:

頭がくらくらしてる。
atama ga kurakura shiteru.
My head is spinning.

One important thing to note about the SURU usage of onomatopoeia is it usually only makes intransitive verbs (verbs which don’t take objects). To make these verbs transitive, you need to use the causative form: させる. Therefore:

トムの頭をくらくらさせた。
Tom no atama o kurakura saseta.
I made Tom’s head spin.

Sure, you could consider these to be adverbs. But if an adverb (such as どきどき) is used almost exclusively to describe one particular verb (する), and that verb is basically meaningless, wouldn’t it be more helpful just to think of it as a verb unit?

Common Double-form Onomatopoeia

Common RI- and TO-form Onomatopoeia

Onomatopoeia Cheat Sheet

If you are interested in improving your onomatopoeia, check out Nihonshock’s digital “Onomatopoeia” cheat sheet. It contains 340 onomatopoeia and pseudo-onomatopoeia, complete with usage notes, alternate forms, synonyms, and more.

Get it for $2.50, about the price of a cup of coffee.

Since information on twitter is quickly buried, I’ll leave a record here for the sake of data permanence (and also for the sake of anyone who doesn’t use twitter).

In no particular order…

• 逆ギレ – (gyakugire) – getting angry in response to someone else’s anger
• 方向音痴 – (houkou onchi) – “directionally tonedeaf” = having a terrible sense of direction
• 死亡フラグ – (shibou furagu) – “death flag” a statement/action that hints at or frequently precedes a character’s death (in fiction)
• 鵜呑み （にする） – (unomi ni suru) – to accept someone’s idea/opinion without thinking. Literally: to swallow (whole) like a cormorant.
• ダメ元（で） – (damemoto de) – attempting something even though one expects it to be unsuccessful.
• 悪乗り – (warunori) – getting carried away and saying/doing more than one should (also written: 悪ノリ)
• 文字化け (mojibake) – when digital text is turned into incomprehensible gibberish due to an error (eg. 縺ｫ繧医▲縺ｦ縲∬｡ｨ遉ｺ蜿)
• 乙 (otsu) – “thanks” (internet slang, derived from お疲れ様/otsukaresama)
• 鉢合わせ (hachiawase) – an unexpected meeting/encounter, running/bumping into someone
• 思い出し笑い (omoidashi warai) – Laughing when recalling something funny.
• ググる (guguru) – to search on Google (RU-Verb)
• 絶対領域 (zettai ryouiki) – the area of a woman’s thigh which is exposed between her over-knee socks and short pants/skirt
• 金輪際 (konrinzai) – definitely (not) / never / under no circumstances (adverb, used to make a strong refusal or denial)
• 腹癒せ (haraise) – something done in order to vent one’s anger or get revenge (eg. punching a wall after an argument)
• 腹ごなし (haragonashi) – light excercise such as taking a walk, done after a meal in order to help digest food
• 腹ごしらえ (haragoshirae) – having a meal in advance of some activity (ie. before going somewhere, working, shopping, etc.)
• 似た者同士 (nita mono doushi) – two people with similar personalities/traits, “birds of a feather”
• 八重歯 (yaeba) – maligned teeth, especially when the top canines appear to be pushed/crowded outward
• 験担ぎ (genkatsugi) – a personal superstition or good-luck ritual (eg. a sports player eating a certain food before a game)
• 念力 (nenriki) – telekenesis. Also: 念動力 (nendouryoku)
• 十八番 (ohako) – one’s regularly-used trick/technique, their “specialty”, (someone up to their) old tricks
• 打開策 (dakaisaku) – a plan for overcoming a difficult situation
• 天才肌 (tensaihada) – not necessarily a genius, but showing genius-like eccentricity (lit. “genius skin”)
• 手持ち無沙汰 (temochibusata) – fidgety/antsy because one has nothing to do
• 踏ん反り返る (funzorikaeru) – to lean back comfortably with one’s legs sticking out in front
• 当たり屋 (atariya) – a person who intentionally gets hit by a car, scheming to get money from the driver. Also: a big hitter (baseball), or someone who often wins at lotteries, raffles and so on.
• ガリ勉 (gariben) – a person so focused on studying as to preclude social activities. Typically this word criticizes someone for having no social life.
• 野次馬 (yajiuma) – onlookers (unrelated people watching the scene of an accident/crime/fire)
• 送り狼 (okuriookami) – a man who accompanies a woman to their home, seeking an opportunity to assault them.
• 芋蔓式 (imozurushiki) – related things/people becoming apparent in succession, “like a vine of sweet potatoes”
• 狸寝入り – (tanukineiri) – pretending to be asleep
• デコピン – (dekopin) – flicking one’s finger on someone’s forehead (a “playful” form of punishment)
• 土下座 – (dogeza) – bowing/begging on your hands and knees and with your forehead to the ground
• とんぼ返り – (tonbogaeri) – “a dragonfly spin”, going somewhere for a short time, then coming back promptly and directly
• チャラ – (chara) – when two opposing things cancel each other out, such as person A paying for gas, person B paying a similar amount for dinner.
• ドン引き – (donbiki) having the atmosphere/mood ruined by someone’s unreasonable or out-of-place comment or action

I’m still preparing the next round of #WOTD words, which won’t be as obscure as these. I’ll be focusing on more useful words, which are often under-used by learners. So make sure you follow me on twitter if you haven’t already!

Saying “you” in Japanese is much trickier business than in English. In English, we have just the one word, and we use it all the time. Japanese has a much broader vocabulary, but also a strong tendency to avoid using it.

Rule Number 1: Don’t say Anata (too much)

The first rule of saying “you” in Japanese is you don’t say “you” in Japanese! (Fight Club joke abbreviated). Well, that’s an exaggeration, but it’s true that Japanese people more often than not will omit the “you” information from their sentences. Similar to omitting “I”, this information is mostly derived from the context or other grammar clues.

So in English, we might say “Are you going to the bank today?”, but the literal equivalent in Japanese: あなたは今日銀行に行きますか (anata wa kyou ginkou ni ikimasu ka?) sounds very robotic and unnatural. The most common place where Japanese people actually use anata is when they don’t know anything about the person they’re talking to. It is also the word used when not talking to a specific person (for example, saying “you” in TV commercials).

So why do textbooks use the word anata so often? For the most part, this is just so that learners can understand the sentence better. Since the information would be there in English, beginners automatically expect it in Japanese, and get confused if it’s not there. Think of it as a training wheel.

Rule Number 2: Use suffixes first

When Japanese DO explicitly state “you” information in their sentences, it’s proper to use the person’s (family) name and attach a suffix. You’re probably already familiar with ～さん (san), which is a safe fall-back suffix for learners. There are others too, however. Most commonly…

• ～様　（sama）: a very polite version of さん
• ～君　（kun）: a suffix used toward men of inferior status/position
• ～ちゃん　（chan）: a suffix indicating a high degree of familiarity and/or affection

And you may also have heard:

• ～殿　（dono）: an older-sounding suffix which is usually attached to peoples’ titles (not their names).
• ～氏　（shi）: this suffix (which you’re most likely to see after the names of artists) is primarily for 3rd person references, rather than for the person you’re addressing.
• ～卿　（きょう）: the “Lord” suffix. I think the only place I’ve ever heard it is in Japanese Star Wars, where Darth Vader is addressed as: ベイダー卿

(Note: I say “usually” and “primarily” because there’s a bit of gray area here, especially if you read manga and the like)

In official-like situations, it’s commonplace to use a person’s title as a suffix after their name. Hence: オバマ大統領 (= obama daitouryou: Obama President).

As long as it’s clear who you’re referring to, you can even drop the name entirely and just go with the title. People in high organizational positions (for example: 社長 （shachou： CEO） or 部長 （buchou：department chief） are particularly susceptible to being addressed by their titles alone. 先生 （sensei） or “teacher” is the same way, but be aware that this title is very often also bestowed upon non-teachers as a way to express respect for someone’s professional expertise (common with lawyers, doctors, business consultants).

Conversely, calling someone by just their name without any title/suffix is referred to as yobisute (呼び捨て) in Japanese and you should not do it unless you’re on very familiar terms, and even then it’s extremely rare to yobisute your superiors.

Note that the name+suffix/title method of referring to people is okay both for directly addressing someone and making 3rd person references.

Rule Number 3: “you” words are dangerous

Sorry to keep you all waiting, now that I’ve laid the necessary groundwork I’ll give you the cool words. It’s important to remember that in Japanese, to politely address someone you should use their name with a suffix or their title. The broad catch-all “you” words range mostly between overtly familiar and offensive, and require caution when used.

Informal “you”:

• 君　（kimi）: used by men toward people of lower status. Typically not rude. (not inherently formal/informal, but makes the status hierarchy explicit, and is therefore better suited to formal situations)
• お前　（omae）: used in very informal situations or toward people of lower status. This word feels very “blunt” and can easily come off as rude.
• あんた （anta）： a shortened version of anata, highly informal and generally rude or admonishing in nature.

Derogatory “you”:

• kisama – きさま　（貴様)
• temee – てめえ　（手前）
• onore – 己

These three words all indicate anger and/or disapproval of whoever you’re talking to. Needless to say, don’t use them unless you’re trying to pick a fight.

Interestingly, as some of you might be able to discern from the kanji, kisama was actually a term of respect in old Japan.

A couple more:

• お主 　（onushi）: This is an old “you” word, not impolite but never used toward superiors.
• お宅　（otaku） : Somewhat older “you” expression, but still used sometimes. This word is respectful in nature and shouldn’t ruffle many feathers. Note that this word not the same as that which refers to anime-loving オタク.

Final notes

I should mention that anata is also used by adult women when speaking to their husbands.

君 (kimi) is commonly employed by boyfriends when talking to their girlfriends, and as such risks giving people the wrong idea. Remember Rule #2 (use suffixes first).

(Note for Advanced Learners:) The notion of anata no (“your ~”) is conveyed by default when adding an お or ご in front of a noun to make it honorific (Keigo). Thus we don’t need to say あなたのお名前 because  お名前 is never MY name, it’s always YOUR name. Similarly, we can reword あなたの住所 as ご住所 and あなたの注文 as ご注文.

If you found this post interesting or useful, please check out Nihonshock’s Japanese Cheat Sheet pack! The information in this post is summarized in sections on both the Spoken Japanese sheet (“you” words) and the Keigo sheet (suffixes).

チンピラ

[chinpira] – A small time gangster or a thug.

たかり

[takari] – A shake-down, where a group of people threaten some vulnerable person into giving up their wallet/money/etc. The (infrequently used) kanji is 集り, meaning to “gather.”

かつあげ

[katsuage] – A shake-down. This word is basically the same as たかり, but with more of a slangy nuance. One of my friends reports this word is associated with ヤンキー types and isn’t used much any more. (kanji: 喝上げ)

スリ

[suri] – Pickpocketing. (kanji: 掏摸)
Note: a “pickpocket” (the person who engages in pickpocketing) is also called a スリ, but the kanji is different (掏児).

といち

[toichi] – This is a loan that compounds interest at a rate of ten percent (一割 / ichiwari) every ten days (十日間 / toukakan).

車上荒らし

[shajou arashi] – Stealing things (like navi systems or CD players) from cars.

口止め料

[kuchidomeryou] – Hush money. This word has been on TV a lot with the Sumo gambling story.

ノミ行為

[nomi koui] – Speaking of gambling (賭博/tobaku), ノミ行為 is another related word you should know. It refers to bookkeeping bookmaking (taking bets), or in the context of stock markets it can mean bucketing (taking purchase orders from people without actually making the transaction).

Note: The person who takes the bets (the bookie) is called a 胴元 (doumoto).

空巣

[akisu] – Literally: empty (空) nest (巣). This crime is when a person breaks into houses when no one is at home to steal things. (shortened from: 空巣狙い / akisu nerai)

ポイ捨て

[poi sute] – “poi” is the onomatopoeic sound of tossing something casually on the ground. Hence, this word means littering.

ひったくり

"Watch out for purse snatchers"

[hittakuri] – 引っ手繰る [hittakuru] means to snatch something away from someone. So hittakuri usually refers to the crime of purse snatching. (Ladies, avoid carrying your purses on your road-side shoulder!)

シノギ

[shinogi] – This word refers to any of the many ways illicit groups like yakuza make their money, typically things like bodyguarding, drug dealing, high rate loans, scams, etc. It probably comes from phrase 糊口を凌ぐ [kokou o shinogu] which means “to eke out a living”.

オレオレ詐欺

[ore ore sagi] – This is a kind of telephone scam that has been happening a lot in Japan in recent years. A scammer calls someone and poses as a relative (usually a son), then explains some terrible predicament they are in and how they need the target to send transfer a large sum of money to their bank account. “ore ore” means “it’s me, it’s me” and is a phrase the caller uses to gain the targets trust.

極道 vs. 堅気

This is an interesting pair of words that you would certainly want to know to be able to play 龍が如く. 極道 [gokudou] or the extreme (極) path (道) is the word that refers to people who live illegitimately as gangsters/bookies/etc. 堅気 [katagi] or sturdy (堅) spirit (気) refers to regular people who live honest lives.

But this simple pleasure reveals a problem for us Japanese learners. The reason it happens is because of how insultingly low expectations are in Japan for foreigners to gain true mastery of the language. Japanese are by and large very congenial toward foreigners, but getting people to take you seriously in this country is a high, high hurdle.

So what should we do? I say let’s take the fight to them! I’ve selected 7 polite/advanced Japanese expressions for this article that native speakers won’t see coming. Use these babies to let Japanese know you’re more than just another kawaii gaijin! You are super-gaijin!

1. 恐縮ですが

[kyoushuku desu ga…] Getting what you want through humility? Yes, it’s possible in Japanese. The idea is to be so polite and endearing that people won’t be able to refuse you.

恐縮, taken literally, means something like “to shrink in fear of causing any unpleasant feelings”. It comes in handy when making requests for assistance or information.

つまらない質問で恐縮ですが・・・
I’m terribly sorry to trouble you with such a silly question, but…

2. 光栄に存じます

[kouei ni zonjimasu] Literally “to think of something as an honor”, this is a real whopper of a way to say thanks when you’ve received gifts, praise, or gratitude from a Japanese person.

お役に立てておりましたら光栄に存じます。
I’m honored that I was able to be of assistance.

3. お言葉に甘えます

[o-kotoba ni amaemasu] Take this one to the izakaya with you! In a country where offers and suggestions are almost expected to be refused, this splendid phrase gives you a free ticket to make a Japanese person walk their talk. So if they tell you to order whatever you like, pop them a それでは、お言葉に甘えます and get the most expensive thing on the menu! (but remember it’ll probably still be 割り勘 when you’re done)

お言葉 means “your words” and 甘え means something like “expressing your affinity for someone by letting them spoil you”.

(Note: the concept of 甘え is something very non-western and deserves a better explanation, fortunately there’s already an English-language wikipedia article about it)

4. お見知りおきを

[o-mishiri oki o] Meaning: “please remember me”. We don’t really have an equivalent phrase in English, but this is a very polite line sometimes heard in personal introductions. The ください that would logically come at the end is usually omitted.

〇〇と申します。以降お見知りおきを。
My name is  〇〇. I’m looking forward to getting to know you.

5. ご無沙汰しておりました

[go-busata shite orimashita] 無沙汰 means “going a long time without visiting or corresponding with someone”. The ご makes this phrase more polite, as does the おりました instead of いました. This is a useful phrase for getting back together with someone you haven’t written to or spoken to in a long time.

長らくご無沙汰しておりました。
I’m sorry that I haven’t contacted you in such a long time.

6. 御機嫌よう

[go-kigen you] Probably the easiest phrase on this list to actually use, 御機嫌よう is a sophisticated and polite greeting and parting phrase (that means it can be either “hello” or “goodbye”, similar to aloha). It literally means “may you be in a good mood”. (Note: よう here is a form of 良い)

If you read manga or watch anime, you’ll notice that this is the greeting word of choice for rich and high-class characters.

7. 冥利に尽きる

[myouri ni tsukiru] 冥利 is a kind of divine providence or fortune, a blessing of happiness that comes from having some role or position in life. 尽きる (in this case, at least) means “to be at the highest point”. Put it together, and you get a phrase that expresses attaining the highest level of happiness that can be derived from a role/position, probably because something good just happened to you.

外国人冥利に尽きます！
It’s so awesome being a foreigner!

Now, whenever you view the Nihonshock homepage, below the most recent post you will see:

These are basically short posts (just a paragraph or so) about a specific Japanese word that I thought was either interesting or worth talking about. The words included will (for the most part) be quite high level, or will otherwise offer unique trivia for lower level words, but I’ll do my best to make the explanations accessible to learners of all levels. I will, however, stay away from words that aren’t known even to native Japanese.

Note that on the top page, just an excerpt is given, so be sure to click the words to go to the page with the full explanation.

I haven’t gotten around to making a dedicated page where you can easily browse through all of the vocabulary (there’s only 2 words right now, anyway), but it’s on my “to do” list.

I’ll try to add words at a frequency of every day or every other day, but no guarantees.

There’s 4 ways you can keep up with Nihonshock’s new vocabulary section.

1. Bookmark Nihonshock’s home page and come back every day.
2. Follow me on Twitter (I’ll let everyone know when a new word goes up)
3. Subscribe to the Vocabulary RSS Feed
   • Vocabulary will not appear in the regular RSS feed.
4. Join the Nihonshock vocab goal on smart.fm (I’ll try to keep it as up to date as possible)

As always, I’m interested to hear everyone’s opinions and suggestions.

UPDATE: April 24, 2010

I made a dedicated category page that makes it possible to quickly access past vocabulary. If I can keep up the whole word-a-day thing, this section is going to get pretty big pretty fast.

Check it out: Nihonshock Vocabulary Bank.

The only one you absolutely must use

20 years old : 二十歳 （はたち）

In Japanese, you don’t say にじゅっさい, you say はたち.

Okay, if you’re just learning Japanese to communicate or for travel, you can stop here and you won’t be missing any vital information. The rest of these words are obscure at best and archaic at worst even for native Japanese (seriously, we’re talking post-JLPT-1級 level, here).

But if you’re like me and the thought of “archaic Japanese” gives you a jolt of excitement, or if you’re just curious, read on…

Words based on the calendar or life events

We’ll start with a collection of age words that are based on perceived or actual life events.

• 10 : 辻髪　（つじかみ） – This is the name of a Japanese children’s hair style.
• 15 : 笄年 　（けいねん） – Girls only. 15 is the age when they could start using hairpins in their hair.
• 20 : 丁年　（ていねん） – Men only. Under the Ritsuryo law system, this was the age when a man became subject to official assignments  (丁) (e.g. to X days of labor or taxes).
• 40 : 初老　（しょろう） – This is when you start (初) becoming old (老). In English, we would say “over the hill.”
• 50 : 中老　（ちゅうろう） – You’re in the middle (中) of becoming old.
• 50 : 艾年　（がいねん） – The age when your hair begins to turn white like a mugwort plant (艾：よもぎ）
• ６0 : 丁年　（ていねん） -The word for the year a person entered the official assignments system was also used for the year when one left it.
• 60: 還暦 （かんれき) - Literally meaning “revolving the calendar”, because the 10 calendar signs　（十干/じっかん） and the 12 astrological signs （十二支/じゅうにし） realign every 60 years.
  • Note: 還暦 is 61 years old under the “counting age” system. (See Below)
• 120 : 大還暦　（だいかんれき） – The “big calendar revolution”, this means you made it twice around the 60 year cycle. Congratulations!

One from a Chinese poem

• 70 : 古希 (こき）

This age word is from a famous poem by Tang Dynasty Chinese poet Du Fu (Japanese： 杜甫／とほ）. In Japanese translation, the relevant lines are:

酒債は尋常行く処に有り 人生七十古来稀なり

There is an English translation of this poem (曲江: Winding River) available, if you’re interested.

One for Shogi players

• 

  将棋　（しょうぎ） : a chess-like Japanese board game

  81 : 盤寿　（ばんじゅ） - Because the 9×9 Shogi board has 81 places.

Kanji play

When your language has thousands of highly complex characters, and you’re bored in the winter with nothing but a bottle of sake, word games are just a natural occurrence. Hundreds of years of Japanese ingenuity brings us these linguistic gems:

• 48 : 桑年　（そうねん） – The old form for 桑 is 桒, which can be broken down as four 十 characters and one 八 character, adding up to 48.
• 61 : 華寿　（かじゅ） – Because 華 can be seen as 6 十 characters and a 一.
• 66 : 緑寿　（ろくじゅ） – Because 緑 can be read as ろく, the same as 六 (6).
• 77 : 喜寿　（きじゅ） – The grass script form for 喜 is 㐂, which is actually 3 sevens, but if you pretend one of them is a 10 it becomes 七十七 = 77.
• 80 : 傘寿　（さんじゅ） – The abbreviated form of 傘 is 仐, which is 八十= 80.
• 81 : 半寿　（はんじゅ） – Because 半 can be broken down as 八 + 十 + 一 = 八十一 = 81.
• 88 : 米寿　（べいじゅ） – Because the kanji can be broken down as 八＋十＋八 = 八十八 = 88.
• 90 : 卒寿　（そつじゅ） – Because the abbreviated form of 卒 is 卆, which is 九＋十 = 九十 = 90.
• 95 : 珍寿　（ちんじゅ） – Because the left side of the kanji can be 十二 and the right 八三 (83 + 12 = 95)
• 99 : 白寿　（はくじゅ） – Because if you take one (一) away from the kanji for 100 (百), it becomes 白
• 100 : 百寿　（ももじゅ） – This one’s obvious… (百 = 100)
• 108 : 茶寿　（ちゃじゅ） – Because the kanji can be broken down as 十十 (20) plus 八十八 (88)
• 111 : 皇寿　（こうじゅ） – Because 白 is understood to be 99 (detailed above), and 王 is 一+十+一 = 12. 99 + 12 = 111
• 111 : 川寿　（せんじゅ） – Because 川 looks like 111.
• 119 : 頑寿　（がんじゅ） - Because 二 + 八 (元） = 10 and 百 + 一 + 八 = 109. 109 + 10 = 119.
• 120 : 昔寿　（せきじゅ） – Because 廿 (= 十十 = 20) + 百 (100) = 120.

And just to make sure that we never, ever run out of words…

• 1001 : 王寿　（おうじゅ） – Because 王 can be broken down as 千 + 一.
• 1007 : 毛寿　（もうじゅ） – Because 毛 can be broken down as 千 + 七.
• 1082 : 科寿　（かじゅ） – Because 科 can be broken down as 千 +八 + 十 + 二

These words (that include 寿), are collectively known as 賀寿　（がじゅ）.

Chouju

In Japanese, longevity (長寿/ちょうじゅ) is broken down into 3 stages, but there’s differences of opinion over which specific ages they indicate, so you might want to think of these words just as general estimates.

• 下寿　（かじゅ） :　60… or 80
• 中寿　（ちゅうじゅ） :　80… or 100
• 上寿　（じょうじゅ） : 100 or higher

Haka: a word with two ages?

破瓜　（はか） is another kanji/wordplay term for age, but is unusual because it means a different age when referring to different genders. The kanji 破 means to split or tear something, and apparently 瓜 (the kanji) can be split into two 八　八 characters (personally, I don’t see it). Hence:

• 瓜 = 八 + 八 = 16 (women)
• 瓜 = 八 ｘ 八 = 64 (men)

Soji

Japan also has a whole class of words ending in 十路　（そじ） to count age in tens.  In really old Japanese, (until about the Heian period) these words were also also used in counting regular objects.

• 20 : 二十路　（ふたそじ）
• 30 : 三十路　（みそじ）
• 40 : 四十路　（よそじ）
• 50 : 五十路　（いそじ）
• 60 : 六十路　（むそじ）
• 70 : 七十路　（ななそじ）
• 80 : 八十路　（やそじ）
• 90 : 九十路　（ここのそじ）

Confucius says

The Confucian text The Classic of Rites also specifies a collection of words for specific ages. Sorry ladies, you’re only allowed to use the ones from 50 on.

• 10 : 幼学　（ようがく）
• 20 : 弱冠　（じゃっかん）
• 30 : 年壮　（ねんそう）
• 30 : 壮室　（そうしつ） (if you have a wife)
• 40 : 強仕　（きょうし）
• 50 : 杖家　（じょうか）
• 60 : 杖卿　（じょうきょう）
• 70 : 杖国　（じょうこく）
• 80 : 杖朝　（じょうちょう）
• 81 : 漆寿　（しつじゅ）

The stages of life

You may have heard the words 少年 (しょうねん) or 青年 (せいねん) before, but did you know that these words point to different, generally understood stages of life? Exactly what ages these words refer to is not set in stone, but some documents from the Japanese Ministry of Health use the following groups:

• 0 to 4 : 幼年期
• 5 to 14 : 少年期
• 15 to 24 : 青年期
• 25 to 44 : 壮年期
• 45 to 64 : 中年期
• 65 onward : 高年期

Note about 壮年 (そうねん): 壮 here means to prosper or be active. 壮年 can refer either to age 30 specifically, or to all of a person’s active and productive years (generally starting at age 30).

Confucian age words

More? Yes, Japan also offers another selection of age words based one passage from the Confucian analects, in which he writes:

At fifteen my heart was set on learning; at thirty I stood firm; at forty I had no more doubts; at fifty I knew the mandate of heaven; at sixty my ear was obedient; at seventy I could follow my heart’s desire without transgressing the norm.

Source: Electronic Library: The Analects of Confucius (look for passage 2:4)

• 15 : 志学 (しがく）
• 30 : 而立 (じりつ）
• 40 : 不惑 (ふわく)
• 50 : 知命　（ちめい）
• 60 : 耳順　（じじゅん）
• 70 : 従心 (じゅうしん）

Note: these words are only for men.

Counting age the Asian way

The traditional way to count your age in East Asian countries is to start at one, not zero like we do in the west, and to increment by one at the end of every calendar year instead of on the individual’s birthday. The system is known in Japanese as 数え年　（かぞえどし） but Japan and most other Asian countries nowadays have very thoroughly adopted the western counting method (満年齢・：まんねんれい）, with the exception of Korea where the old counting method is still the de facto system.

One relic of the old counting system in Japan is the Coming of Age celebration, where boys and girls who turned 20 during the previous year all get to celebrate their passage into adulthood. Read the wikipedia article on Asian age counting if you’re interested.

Two kanji for “sai”

While we’re talking about age, I figured it would be good to include a short word about 歳 and 才. Both of these characters are read さい, both mean age. What’s the difference? 才 was originally an abbreviated form of 歳, so you can think of it as less “official” than 歳. People often use 才 because it’s easier to read and write, but on government documents and official application forms, you will always see 歳 used.

Interestingly, if you’re talking about the age of an animal, you should write 才. Using 歳 with an animal apparently makes the animal seem more human, so depending on your point of view, you could use it with monkeys and such.

Credit where credit is due

Here I’ve compiled a list of the links I referred to when I was locating and organizing all this information. Although I’m sure you’ll never need to know any more than I’ve covered here, there are a couple alternate forms and other super-obscure words out there (particularly on the Wikipedia page) if you’re for some reason totally crazy about this topic.

• 年齢 on Wikipedia (JP)
• チョット雑学：数を表す文字
• 「寿」模擬授業指導案
• 年齢の名称・異称
• 年齢を表す言葉 (the difference between 歳 and 才)

For this article, I’m going to introduce to you my personal collection of “I” words that I’ve encountered here in Japan (even if I’ve only seen them once or twice in obscure contexts). Hopefully, this list will help to prepare you for your own Japanese adventures.

Common forms

Of the many ways to say “I” in Japanese, these are the ones that are actually used by real, living people who are being serious.

Watashi

Watashi (私) is the standard, gender-free way to say “I” and is the first one learners are introduced to. If you don’t know which I-word to use, this is your best bet.

The only trap I know of is that in Japanese saying “watashi mo” (meaning: “me too”) can come off as very effeminate if you use it in an informal situation. Men should take care to say “boku mo” or use some other I-word instead.

Watakushi

Yes, the kanji is the same as for watashi (私) (watashi is actually just a shortened form of watakushi).

This word is a highly formal “I.” You might hear politicians, CEOs, or other public-relations figures use it when making official announcements, but generally you should avoid this word as it can come across as arrogant or condescending.

If you watch anime or read manga, you’ll notice that this is the I-word of choice for rich characters.

Boku

Boku (僕) is what you could think of as the “soft-masculine” I-word. It literally means “manservant” so when you use it there is a sense that you are humbling yourself before the speaker.

It has a more informal feeling than watashi, however, so you may want to be careful when using it with strangers, authority figures and colleagues.

Boku is used primarily by men, but very young and/or boyish girls sometimes use it too. I’ve also heard women use boku in song lyrics.

Light says boku (friendly/humble). L says watashi (polite/formal).

Ore

If boku is the “soft-masculine” I-word then ore (俺) is the “hard-masculine.” This is the word tough guys use, and as such you would almost never hear it used with a polite verb form.

It’s not polite by any stretch of the imagination, but to say it’s a “rude” word would be a mistake as well. Ore can actually convey a sense of intimacy (we’re close friends, so I don’t need to worry about being polite with you). This is probably the most common I-word among groups of men (except in business or other formal settings).

Eikichi Onizuka, a character perfectly suited to saying ore.

Atashi

This is an informal effeminate form of watashi. It has a kind of “cute” nuance to it. Because kanji are generally seen as masculine, this word has no kanji form. It is written in either hiragana or katakana. (Well, the word does come from watashi so you might see it listed with 私 in a dictionary)

Uchi

Uchi (内) is one word for “I” that I didn’t learn until well after I came to Japan, but once I did I was surprised at how commonly used it was. It literally means “inside.”

Saying uchi for “I” is informal and has no gender connotation. This is a good word for women to use if they want to be informal, but avoid the cuteness of atashi.

Kochira/Kocchi

This is another popular and versatile way to say “I.” It literally means “this way.”

While kochira and kocchi are the same word (kocchi is an abbreviated version), they differ pretty dramatically in how formal they are. Kochira is highly polite and is often used in business situations, especially one the phone. Because of it’s root meaning of “this way” it is ambiguous in number, it can be used to mean “we” without any changes to the word.

Kocchi is much more informal and frequently used among friends. It’s also handy for its neutrality, meaning that when you use it you’re not making a statement about your social position relative to the listener (you are–however–still making a statement about social distance).

Note: similarly, you can use sochira/socchi to mean “you.”

Ware

Used more commonly in it’s “we” form (我々/wareware), ware (我) by itself and meaning just “I” is pretty uncommon, but not unheard of.

It’s also probably the the most difficult I-word in this post because depending on how you use it it can come out not only as “I” but either as “one’s self” (not necessarily the speaker),  or even “you” (although usage as “you” is very dated).

My impression of this word is it has a kind of wise, sage-like feeling to it. It’s almost always used in a short, declarative statement of some kind.

Washi

This is yet a further shortening of the word watashi. It is reserved for use by old men or men who for some reason have acquired a very slurred speech style. Perhaps they dropped the ta to keep themselves from spitting on people when they talked.

In the Kansai region, this I-word can be further shortened to just wai.

Personal name

While we don’t do this in English, in Japanese it’s possible to use your own personal name when saying “I.” Basically, you can speak in third person perspective. This manner of speaking is somewhat frowned upon as being childish, however, so be careful should you decide to use it. (it’s probably best if you simply don’t use this method altogether, just know that you might hear somebody else talking like this someday)

Special forms

Be careful, because this second group of I-words are no longer used in modern Japanese (though Japanese know them through media and literature), and as such they will definitely alert your listener that you are consciously selecting your I word, usually either as a joke or to imitate some character. While they’re fun to know, don’t use these under regular circumstances.

Wagahai

Bowser (or as he is known in Japanese, クッパ/kuppa) says wagahai.

Wagahai (吾輩) is a classical way to say “I” that was used by older men of high social stature. You will find this in the title of Natsume Soseki’s famous work, 吾輩は猫である (wagahai wa neko de aru / I am a cat).

Oira

Oira (おいら) is an alternate form of ore which was more widely used back in the Edo period. It was apparently used even by some women in the late-Edo period.

Today, this word has a youthful and male feeling to it (because of it’s youthful nature, it is rarely written in it’s kanji form: 己等), and is the I-word of choice for… housepets! (as spoken through their owners, of course…) Try a quick google image search for this word, it will bring up many pictures of Japanese peoples’ pets.

Sessha

Sessha (拙者) is another classical way to a say “I” which literally means “clumsy person.” Samurai used this word, because being humble about their abilities was the samurai thing to do.

Atai

The word atai is a girls-only “I” word that is a shortened version of atashi. It originated with the courtesans, prostitutes and young girls from Tokyo’s pleasure quarters, but it seems that most people are unfamiliar with this history.

I believe there are some dialects and regions in Japan where this word can still be heard but I’m not sure exactly where… One of my Japanese friends that I asked said it sounded like a Kyuushuu dialect.

Yo

Yo (余) is yet another rarely used classical way to say “I.” It was used by men of extremely high stature. I’ve really only come across it being employed by “heartless-overlord”-type characters in some anime and manga.

Warawa

Warawa (妾) is how a samurai’s wife would say “I.” It’s a classical female form, used by women to humble themselves before others. The kanji itself refers to a man’s non-primary wife or his mistress.

Conclusion

It’s both an intriguing and challenging aspect of Japanese to have so many options where in English we have only one. By learning to pay close attention to these words, we can pick up on valuable clues about a person’s social status and personality. And by learning to use the right I-words for each situation and partner, we can communicate with people and manage relationships more effectively.

(Unlike video game and anime characters) most people switch between a few different words as their situation demands. Personally, most of the time I stick to boku and watashi (I’ve been trying to use ore more with my guy friends lately, but old habits die hard). Sometimes I mix things up with a little uchi and kocchi, too.

This list is complete to the best of my knowledge (assuming I haven’t forgotten anything…), but I’m sure there’s probably a few more I-words floating around out there that I haven’t come across yet. I’ll be sure to update this list if I find any new ones.

While heavy reliance on a select few power-words may be sufficient for travelers, for anyone who wants to understand everyday Japanese as it is spoken by native speakers, or perhaps someday even sound intelligent speaking Japanese, these words can be almost like an invisible barrier to more advanced vocabulary. Of these words, totemo is easily one of the most overused. So to help Japanese learners cure their addiction to this intoxicatingly easy word, I’ve collected 7 alternatives to help you lay off the totemo juice and expand your linguistic horizons.

1. Say かなり (kanari) instead

Kanari is a fabulous word, I can’t recommend it enough. It’s meaning and usage is exactly the same as totemo so you can start using it like a pro right away, there are no hidden nuance traps waiting to bite your leg off and your Japanese will instantly sound much more confident and natural. The only catch is you have to make the Japanese “r” sound to say it, which can be a little tricky for beginners.

And actually this word is a little more flexible than totemo. Kanari can also be used with nouns if you glue them together with the ‘no‘ particle, although you should note that using it that way comes off as kanari casual.

2. Say 特に (toku ni) when you mean 特に

toku ni has a different meaning from totemo: it means “especially” or “particularly.” Many people are in the habit of saying totemo all the time for everything because it’s just so easy: stop. Totemo is overworked and tired. Let it rest and use toku ni when you mean “especially.”

3. Use 非常に (hijou ni) for stronger emphasis

Totemo is a good worker but struggles to adequately convey the stronger meanings, so if you really want to emphasize something, hijou ni is your go-to word. For example…

Hijou ni‘s kanji literally mean not (非) and everyday (常), so you could translate it as “unusually” or “abnormally.” But in reality the meaning has been blurred quite a bit; so suffice it to say that this word is just a stronger way to say “very.”

4. Say 本当に (hontou ni) when you mean 本当に

Hontou ni means “really”, as in… “in reality.” This is yet another word whose job all too often gets pushed onto poor old totemo. Balance out your vocabulary a little by using this word to show surprise or exceeded expectations, the same way we would do with “really” in English.

5. Try casual Japanese equivalents

I almost decided against listing these words because foreigners often overuse these just as much as totemo, and I can almost guarantee that your Japanese professors/bosses would prefer you don’t use them. But hey, it’s the internet!

• すごく (sugoku) : “Extremely” (kanji: 凄く)
• チョー (cho-) : “Super-” (kanji: 超)
• めっちゃ (meccha) : “ridiculously” (this word comes from from 滅茶苦茶/mechakucha)

6. Try more advanced words

I wrote this article primarily with beginner to intermediate Japanese learners in mind, but if you’re looking for even more options or if you’re just an ambitious learner, here are some more words that you can jot down and try using instead of totemo. I’m not going to get into detailed explanations for them though as this simple blog post has gone on long enough already.

• 結構 (kekkou)
• 相当 (soutou)
• 随分 (zuibun)
• 極めて (kiwamete)
• とんでもない (tondemonai)
• 余計に (yokei ni)
• 余程 (yohodo/yoppodo)
• 前代未聞 (zendaimimon)

7. And if you’re in Nagoya…

…try out saying totemo in the local dialect, it’s “でら” (dera). Your Nagoyan friends will love love you for it.

Just for the kanji lovers out there…

Totemo and kanari are always written using just plain old hiragana so if you’ve got kanji-phobia like many learners do, you don’t have to be afraid of these words.

But if you’ve got a kanji fetish (like me), or if you’re poring over some Edo-period literature, or if you’re going to be appearing on a Japanese kanji quiz show, you might be interested to know that totemo can be written as “迚も” and kanari as “可也.”