Leo, a scientIst in Tucson, Arizona, used to live in Japan, where he often heard Japanese speakers using English that wasn’t quite correct. For example, one Japanese friend described someone “full of worry” as scareful. Another used paper driver to refer to “a person who has a driver’s license but doesn’t drive.” Wasei-eigo is “Japanese-made English,” in which hai bijon (ハイビジョン) literally “high vision” can mean “modern,” and amerikan doggu (アメリカンドッグ) means “corn dog.” English and Japanese have long borrowed from each other. The English word skosh, for example, comes from Japanese sukoshi (少し), a “little bit.” This is part of a complete episode.
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