Japanese clue words in 3DS, eclipses, Subrahmanyan Chandrasekhar, and สุพรหมัณยศาสตรีแห่งราชบัณฑิตยสภา

Anonymous

Jul 19, 2015 20:13

> 母親：息子は小さい頃から【青】い色が好きなの。

Anonymous

("Ever since my son was young, he's liked blue.")

Damkerng T.

(GT: "Mother: Son [blue] gastric color is like from a young age.") :-)

Anonymous

I thought that was typographically interesting. See, 青い is a single word.

Anonymous

But, y'see.

Anonymous

They wrote 【青】い

Anonymous

Jul 19, 2015 20:15

Now, to a Japanese speaker, this is braindead obvious. It's still the word 青い 'blue'

Anonymous

But to Google Translate, it became '[blue] gastric'

Damkerng T.

Perhaps it's like English scare quotes.

Anonymous

Because it thought い was the separate word 'stomach' (written 胃 in kanji)

Anonymous

But it's actually the present tense inflectional ending for adjectives.

Anonymous

@DamkerngT. It's not exactly that.

Anonymous

Jul 19, 2015 20:16

Quotes in Japanese can be used more freely than in English, including for things like emphasis.

Damkerng T.

(GT after 【】 removed: "Mother: son likes the color blue since I was small.")

Anonymous

I mean, people use quotes for emphasis in English, but those people are "derided" as "illiterate"

Damkerng T.

Ahh

Anonymous

@DamkerngT. See? Much better. Google Translate doesn't know about this convention of 【】 emphasizing a single character in a word.

Anonymous

Now, if I gave you more of the context...

Anonymous

Jul 19, 2015 20:17

父親：妻の好きな色は【赤】、私が好きな色は【白】だ。
　　　息子はいつも【海】の酒が好んで飲んでいる。
母親：息子は小さい頃から【青】い色が好きなの。
　　　夫は【島】のお酒が、私は【惑星】のお酒がタイプ。
息子：ぼくとお母さんは【月】のお酒が好みだよ。
　　　で、お父さんは【緑】っぽい色が大好きなんだ。

Damkerng T.

Oh, lots of 【...】!

Anonymous

Each of those brackets surrounds the name of one of the puzzle items in that part of the game.

Damkerng T.

@snailboat A-ha!

> GT:
Father: [red] favorite color of the wife, I like color's [white].
Son are drinking prefer sake of always [sea].
Mother: Son [blue] gastric color is like from a young age.
Husband liquor of [island], I type the sake of the [planet].
Son: I and mom's favorite drink of [month].
In, Dad I love the [green] ish color.

Anonymous

The bartender left a note describing which sorts of drinks each person wanted and where each person sat (father in the center, mother to the left, son to the right).

Anonymous

He noted that one of the three was lying, and that he made each one the drinks they liked.

Anonymous

Jul 19, 2015 20:19

So you grab the ten bottles (five labeled with colors, five labeled with 'planet', 'ocean', 'moon', 'sun', ...)

Anonymous

And you mix the drinks each one likes. And then place them in reverse order (because the bartender's perspective is opposite yours)

Anonymous

And that solves the puzzle.

Damkerng T.

Oh!

Will it become a name of something or someone?

Anonymous

Oh, if you place them correctly, it unlocks the next part of the puzzle.

Damkerng T.

A-ha! Sounds a lot like Conan. :D

Anonymous

Jul 19, 2015 20:20

In the end, you have to make six drinks total, and they end up making a total eclipse.

Anonymous

They end up with a sun on the left, planet in the middle, and moon on the right.

Anonymous

But they're not yellow sun, blue planet, red moon―the sun is green!

Anonymous

You have to put together a bunch of hints to figure that out :-) It's fun.

Damkerng T.

A green sun?! :-)

Anonymous

It alternates between puzzle segments like that, and then story segments (it calls them "novel part").

Anonymous

Jul 19, 2015 20:22

@DamkerngT. I think they put that in so you couldn't just guess that you were supposed to make a total lunar eclipse.

Anonymous

Which, by the way, has an interesting word for 'total' in Japanese, 皆既.

Damkerng T.

Oh, that's a very short word for total eclipse!

Anonymous

Well.

Anonymous

皆既食 is the full word for 'total eclipse' (with 食 = 'eclipse', simplified from 蝕)

Damkerng T.

In Thai, it's a very long word: สุริยุปราคาเต็มดวง

Anonymous

Jul 19, 2015 20:26

If you look up 食 you might notice it's used mainly for stuff like eating. The character 蝕 was rewritten 食 to simplify, and now 食 means both eclipse and food/eat

Anonymous

皆既月食 = total lunar eclipse
皆既日食 = total solar eclipse

Anonymous

皆既 = total? Not exactly...

Damkerng T.

Interesting!

Anonymous

皆 by itself is a morpheme meaning 'total', though it's not used as an independent word in Japanese, generally.

Anonymous

既 here means 尽きる 'be used up/consumed'

Anonymous

Jul 19, 2015 20:29

I wonder how to best express this...

Damkerng T.

"totally consumed" works quite well, imho.

Anonymous

Yeah.

Anonymous

But there's one more connection to make.

Anonymous

It's not a coincidence that the original kanji for 'eclipse', 蝕, contains the kanji for 'eat' 食

Anonymous

There's a verb 蝕む 'be eaten away at', which literally refers to being 食 eaten away at by worms (or other 虫)

Damkerng T.

Jul 19, 2015 20:32

Does it mean something "swallow" like?

Anonymous

Which can refer to being consumed bit-by-bit, if that makes sense

Anonymous

Which is, in a way, what's happening in an eclipse!

Anonymous

And when it's entirely consumed (皆既), you have a total eclipse!

Damkerng T.

nods -- Sort of like nibbling. :D

Anonymous

@DamkerngT. Kanji are pretty compact! 皆既月食 is かいきげっしょく in kana or kaiki gesshoku if you write it out in rōmaji.

Anonymous

Jul 19, 2015 20:34

It looks longer in both rōmaji and kana!

Anonymous

That's total lunar eclipse. What was the Thai word?

Damkerng T.

สุริยุปราคา-เต็ม-ดวง = [solarElipse-full-*]

จันทรุปราคา-เต็ม-ดวง = [lunarElipse-full-*]

Anonymous

Ooh, what's the asterisk?

Damkerng T.

@snailboat Something I don't know how to translate!

Anonymous

Lately, I often find that I can come up with a general translation for Japanese pretty quickly, but if I want to be precise, it can be pretty hard to come up with the right words...

Damkerng T.

Jul 19, 2015 20:37

It's like if we had 3 suns, we'd say พระอาทิตย์ 3 ดวง

It's the unit of celestial body, but it's not only that. It's used for anything that looks piecewise, usually rounded.

Anonymous

So it's a classifier?

Damkerng T.

Ah, yes!

It's the classifier for stamp too!

Anonymous

Were stamps historically rounded?

Damkerng T.

สแตมป์ 1 ดวง, สแตมป์ 2 ดวง, สแตมป์ 3 ดวง.

Anonymous

A-ha!

Damkerng T.

Jul 19, 2015 20:39

I don't think so. That's why I don't know how to translate this word!

Anonymous

[stamp-1-CLS, stamp-2-CLS, stamp-3-CLS]

Damkerng T.

Yes!

So, in จันทรุปราคาเต็มดวง, it's จันทรุปราคา-เต็ม-ดวง = [lunarElipse-full-CLS].

Anonymous

When glossing Japanese in English, a lot of particles can't really be given English equivalents.

Damkerng T.

I used lunarElipse because it (จันทรุปราคา) is a word made from Sanskrit morphemes.

จันทร์ = the Moon

Anonymous

Sometimes people leave them in Japanese in the glosses, like 走っている 'run.TE-IRU'

Damkerng T.

Jul 19, 2015 20:41

I guess you must've heard this word. In English, จันทร์ or จันทรา = Chandra.

Anonymous

or だからってば "DA-KARA.TTE-BA'

Anonymous

(which is truly giving up on glossing in English, I guess :-)

Damkerng T.

@snailboat I guess that glossing wouldn't help an absolute beginner much!

Anonymous

@DamkerngT. It's okay. Linguists are usually writing for other linguists when they write glosses :-)

Damkerng T.

BTW, I guessed that you might've heard Chandra because something like this exists: en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Chandra_X-ray_Observatory.

Anonymous

Jul 19, 2015 20:43

It does, but

Anonymous

Subrahmanyan Chandrasekhar

Subrahmanyan Chandrasekhar, FRS (/ˌtʃʌndrəˈʃeɪkər/; October 19, 1910 – August 21, 1995), was an Indian American astrophysicist born in Lahore, Punjab. Chandrasekhar was awarded, along with William A. Fowler, the 1983 Nobel Prize for Physics, with Chandrasekhar cited for his mathematical theory of the physical processes of importance to the structure and evolution of the stars. This work led to the currently accepted theory on the later evolutionary stages of massive stars, including black holes. The Chandrasekhar limit is named after him. Chandrasekhar - in distinct periods - worked in various...

Anonymous

S'named after him.

Damkerng T.

สุพรหมัณยัน จันทรเศขร (in Thai)

Anonymous

I think English speakers in general are familiar with the Chandrasekhar limit, even if they can't remember how to define it.

Anonymous

Or how to spell it.

Damkerng T.

Jul 19, 2015 20:44

Ahh

Anonymous

Maybe I should stick a qualifier in there like "educated" or "who read science fiction" or something. :-)

Damkerng T.

I'm not sure what "sekhar" mean. Maybe "beautiful".

Anonymous

Crown

Damkerng T.

Oh!

According to Thai folklore, จันทรเศขร (Chandrasekhar) is Shiva's hairpin.

Perhaps beliefs is a better word than folklore.

Anonymous

rudraksha-ratna.com/why-shiva-wears-a-crescent-moon_462.html5

Damkerng T.

Jul 19, 2015 20:48

'Cause obviously, we borrowed this set of beliefs from India.

Anonymous

> Crescent Moon: Shiva bears on his head the crescent of the moon. The epithet Chandra sekhara ('Having the moon as his crest' - chandra = Moon, sekhara = crest, crown) refers to this feature.

Damkerng T.

A-ha!

And that word was translated over here as "hairpin". :-)

Anonymous

Damkerng T.

Looking at the illus., it's clear why Chandra is part of the word.

Anonymous

I don't know if 'crown' is the first word that would come to mind for that moon!

Anonymous

Jul 19, 2015 20:49

I love moon-related stuff, by the way. :-)

Anonymous

I'm going to go check on Luna!

Damkerng T.

:D

I just realized that สุพรหมัณยัน is a good example of Thai words that a speaker may or may not be able to deduce the pronunciation of the word.

Anonymous

The 3DS has a built-in pedometer! They designed to unlock little bonuses the more you walk around. They're hoping it helps motivate kids to go move around outside, not just sit inside and play games :-)

Anonymous

It just gave me a little coin thingy!

Anonymous

@DamkerngT. Oh really?

Anonymous

Jul 19, 2015 21:00

That should be a relative clause, by the way:

Damkerng T.

Yes. I'm not sure if I read it right, even!

Anonymous

> Thai words [ which/that/∅ a speaker may or may not be able to deduce the pronunciation of ＿＿ ]

Damkerng T.

Oh, yes!

Anonymous

I learned how to pronounce quinoa yesterday!

Anonymous

The way I always pronounced it in my head was wrong.

Damkerng T.

Jul 19, 2015 21:01

"kwin-now"?

LOL

My guess was just a mile away. :P

Anonymous

In English, everyone learns lots of words from speech, just like with any language. But since English spelling is somewhat opaque, people who learn words from writing tend to pronounce lots of things 'wrong' until they finally encounter it in speech :-)

Anonymous

So I, being someone who didn't talk much at a young age but read a lot, had this problem in spades―and occasionally, I still do! :-)

Damkerng T.

สุพรหมัณยัน is problematic in Thai. I think maybe สุพราหมัณยัน would be a little easier to read, and both would be the same word (i.e. having the same meaning).

Anonymous

I didn't guess anything like /kɪnˈwɑː/

Damkerng T.

สุพราหมัณยัน would be unambiguous (that it reads Subrahmanyan).

Anonymous

Jul 19, 2015 21:04

Oh!

Damkerng T.

พรหม (Brahm) is a tricky word. It has no vowel in its spelling. :D

I just found another rare word in Thai: สุพรหมัณยศาสตรี (in the context of กามนิต-วาสิฏฐี, which mentioned สุพรหมัณยศาสตรีแห่งราชบัณฑิตยสภา).

Oh, what's the English name of กามนิต-วาสิฏฐี?

It's Der Pilger Kamanita.

Anonymous

The Pilgrim Kāmanīta

Damkerng T.

Ahh

Thanks!

If a Thai says that Thai spelling is always unambiguous, you can throw this word at them: สุพรหมัณยศาสตรีแห่งราชบัณฑิตยสภา. :-)

Anonymous

Haha!

Anonymous

I'll write that down... :-)

Anonymous

Jul 19, 2015 21:09

Also, that looks rather long for a Thai word!

Damkerng T.

It could be counted in several ways!

Anonymous

Could it be analyzed as a phrase?

Damkerng T.

Rough division: สุพรหมัณยศาสตรี-แห่ง-ราชบัณฑิตยสภา

= สุพรหมัณยศาสตรี-of-officeOfTheRoyalSociety

ศาสตร์ = science, ศาสตรี = ? (the feminine word for "science"?)

สุพรหมัณย = Subrahmanya (i.e. Subrahmanyan without the last n)

Anonymous

Oh, what's the relationship between the feminine word for 'science' and the other word(s) for 'science'?

Damkerng T.

@snailboat Frankly, I don't know! :-)

I mean, Thai has no such concept for non-living things.

So, I guess, they did that to preserve the word in the original.

There are some words in Thai that come in masculine-faminine pairs. All of them are foreign or borrowed words, afaict.

Japanese clue words in 3DS, eclipses, Subrahmanyan Chandrasekhar, and สุพรหมัณยศาสตรีแห่งราชบัณฑิตยสภา

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