Japanese must be wondering why Americans have such weird names

**Maciamo** · May 23, 2004, 17:19

Imagine a Japanese learnin English who would like to check the following nick names in a dictionary thinking they are just common nouns. What would they find ? Sometimes it is necessary to think about the meaning in British English (BrE).

Art : oh, I like arts too
Bill : bill of rights, electricity bill ?
Kit : tookit, Kit-kat ?
Kitty : Kitty-chan !!
Cliff : cliffhanger, definitely
Kris : dictionary says "Malay/Indonesian dagger with wavy edged blade", sounds dangerous.
Gene : DNA ?
Ginger : the gingerbread man !
Sue : probably a lawyer
Stew : I love beef stew !
Chuck : Don't chuck that at me !
Dick : no comment
Fanny (vagina in BrE)
Randy : Let me introduce you to my randy friend.. erh, I mean my friend Randy.
Nick (means "prison" in BrE)
Mat : table or door mat ?
Rod : must belong to a fisherman (I wouldn't want to be named Rod Fisher

)
Ray : the rays of the sun warm my heart
Barby : like the doll or the adj. of barber ?
Herb : ok you can smoke, but don't abuse.
Pat (offensive term for an "Irishman" in BrE)

Now imagine our Japanese learning English is just hearing these names. What will it sound to his/her ears ?

Doug => dog ?
Brad => blood ? (Brad Pitt > blood pit, eurk !)
Rick => lick ?

With a bit a (superfluous) logic, the same Japanese person will try to imagine the possible inflexion of the word not found in his/her dictionary.

Hatty => must be the adjective of hat
Dolly => same for "doll" (my friend Barby is so dolly !).
Connie => adjecive of con artist ?
Sadie => I feel so sadie today...
Carrie => must be the singular of caries
Bab => must be short for baboon, babylon or baba
Hal => halal ?

**Keiichi** · May 23, 2004, 17:30

Oh man, that's hilarious.

**Belle** · May 24, 2004, 04:37

Thsi one i gt from FRIENDS.

Joey-- Baby Kangaroo

**Maciamo** · May 24, 2004, 09:33

Originally Posted by Belle

Thsi one i gt from FRIENDS.

Joey-- Baby Kangaroo

You must be Australian then !

**Uncle Frank** · May 24, 2004, 10:01

a side of beef! FLANK !

Frank

**Belle** · May 28, 2004, 06:17

Originally Posted by Maciamo

You must be Australian then !

No not Australian atall

**duff_o_josh** · May 30, 2004, 02:48

glad my name isnt in that list of wierdness

**Glenn** · May 30, 2004, 05:59

Mine could be. It means "valley," so I guess my Japanese name could be tani.

**Maciamo** · May 30, 2004, 09:23

Originally Posted by Glenn

Mine could be. It means "valley," so I guess my Japanese name could be tani.

Yes, in Scottish, but don't expect any Japanese to know that.

**Glenn** · May 30, 2004, 09:34

I suppose not, because most Americans don't know it.

**Sakura** · Jun 3, 2004, 05:25

some of your spellings of the names, and "British English" translations I didn't agree with, but I can't be bothered to quibble. lol.
By the way, it intrests me that the Americans call "British English" when English is English. (From England) lol (^_~)
So now when I'm speaking to my friends I refer to American English as "Amerikago" lol

Anyway, some names are universal too, here are just a small few I could think of which are both Japanese & Western names:

Ken
Mari / Marie
Naomi
Hana (Hannah)
Risa / Lisa (Ok, I know there is no "L" in Japanese, but my friend spells her name "lisa" in romaji.)
Kai (Also German name)
Ben
Mika (like Finnish F1 Racing Driver - Mika Hakkinen) Also his replacement - Kimi Raikkonen - sounds Japanese name
I have a friend Maiko too, her name's pronounciation sounds abit like Michael.
I think there could be lots more examples, I can't think of at moment, but if anyone can think of anymore, it would be interesting.