The Color of Coffee Brown.

After a brief hiatus (two weeks of tests at my school) I have finally found the time to write another blog post. Firstly I would like to apologize for the overly-academic nature of my previous post. Sometimes my considerable intellect cannot be contained… However upon re-reading the post I have decided to do yet another post about language in Japan. More specifically, the love-hate relationship Japanese culture has with the English Language.

"A terrace in the afternoon, where I am enjoying myself elegantly. To those who love their lives... the gift of fair quality goods. My feeling is fluffy in the color of coffee brown."

Just let that sink in… Someone, somewhere decided that that English sentence best represented their product. This quote came off of a rather delightful box of assorted coffees I received as a gift from a few of my fellow teachers. This particular gift box of coffee comes from a major company and is distributed all over Japan, meaning that literally hundreds of people have read this quote and still opted to drink this coffee. So now allow me to go all Davinci Code in an attempt to solve the riddle that is this muddled sales pitch in what I like to call “Alex`s “ENGRISH” Translation Corner”

Sentence 1- “A terrace in the afternoon, when I am enjoying myself elegantly.”

              The first sentence is rather straight forward and easy to understand. We are to picture ourselves sitting on an elegant terrace enjoying a cup of coffee. This is head and shoulders above my usual habit of enjoying coffee whilst sitting on my bed in my underwear; a situation considerably less suited for a sales pitch. At this point we could be early into an interpretive reading of an American commercial, where people are oh-so-fond of lounging on this in an elegant fashion. Grammatically the sentence is ok, perhaps replacing the word “when” with “where” could improve it slightly but overall this sentence works.     ENGRISH factor- 15%

Sentence 2- “To those who love their lives… the gift of fair quality goods.”

              The guy who wrote the first sentence must have taken a personal pay because in the first few words of the second sentence we find ourselves spiraling into madness. Thus far we have ascertained that we are sitting on a terrace in an elegant fashion (I assume a daybed, marble railings and wispy silk curtains are involved). But now the Coffee Selection folks throw a dire warning at us “To those who love their lives…” WOW… That’s quite the ominous statement, and why the inclusion of the three dots at the end? Are we to wait expectantly with bated breath to find out just what happens to those who love their lives? Is it a warning that this particular coffee causes depression, and those who do not enjoy their lives should avoid it or risk suicide? Before we can even figure out if we do in fact love our lives the coffee box lashes out with a stinging insult. This particular brand of coffee openly admits to their product being of only mediocre quality. Some may argue that by “fair quality” they in fact meant “fair trade” but I think it is far more likely that this is yet another perfect example of “Big Coffee” blatantly ignoring their customers demands for high quality products and instead just telling them “here is some sub-par coffee… You got a problem with that?”. A more direct English translation might read “You seem to be enjoying your day… This bland coffee should fix that.” The whole elegant terrace setup is starting to seem like some sort of ruse… I hope nothing crazy happens in the climactic final act…     ENGRISH factor- 60%

Sentence 3- “My feeling is fluffy in the color of coffee brown.”

              Not content with their previous comments on our mental state and a bold admission of mediocre coffee the Coffee Selection Company opted to go for all out scare tactics for its final assault. How does a person feel fluffy? And what does it mean to be fluffy is the color of coffee brown? Is it like music, as in “Can I feel fluffy in the key of coffee brown?” In the first two sentences I could understand the point the writers were trying to make, the third sentence however is beyond me. The image I can’t get out of my head is that drinking this coffee will transform me into a giant coffee colored sheep. So in summation Coffee Selection box writer guy, way to make the transition from completely sane to Sarah Palin levels of crazy in only three sentences.     ENGRISH factor- 100%.

              This phenomenon is commonly know as “Engrish” and is a source of much amusement for foreigners living in Japan. For the most part English is seen as “hip” and trendy in Japan and is often utilized to help products and services stick out in a market that is flooded with an overabundance of seemingly everything. Often it is simple things, using the English word for things like strawberries or milk as opposed to the Japanese words can make a product more kid friendly and more modern.

              However, the dark side of Engrish comes out when it is used in the form of sentences. The internet is riddled with other examples of shirts, signs and nearly every other semi-flat surface covered with nonsensical (and often wildly inappropriate) English. One of my favorite pictures is of a Japanese elementary school student at school wearing a shirt that says “Too drunk to [inappropriate word for “relations]” (this is a family blog so I will avoid swearing) beaming at the camera completely unaware of how inappropriate his shirt is. 

Prime example of an "Engrish" t-shirt.... No idea what point they were trying to convey in the first place.

The hot water is not impervious to heat so... Be careful?

            Even more mind boggling is that considering the number of native English speakers in Japan and the rate at which Japanese people are learning English that these sorts of mistakes are still made. Most companies seem completely satisfied to just trust an online translator to accurately translate for them and do not bother with any sort of check. While this can at times be both frustrating and entertaining it certainly makes my job here seem more important. If just once I can teach a student enough English that he/she is forced to burn half their wardrobe I will consider my time here a success.