Motoko’s weblog

There are many foreign words imported and adopted by Japanese, which are pretty much part of their lives. These foreign words are called “Gairaigo” (words came from foreign countries), and typically written with Katakana and Roma-ji.

Gairaigo or foreign words are in fact everywhere in Japan, especially so in the IT industry. Japanese see these words on TV and Internet, and hear others use them in the meetings. But, that doesn’t mean most of them know what they are. The funny thing is that according to iShare’s recent survey, nearly 80% said that they choose to go on without finding out the meaning of these words! See some of the top ranking “clueless IT words” from the survey below. Continue Reading »

I live and work in US, but I still read, write and speak in Japanese on daily basis. Out of these three skills, the writing skill (”Kanji writing skill” to be precise) has changed most in the past 10-15 years, not because where I live, but because how I write has changed. As said, I write in Japanese everyday, but I rarely hand-write and type everything for both work and personal communications. Continue Reading »