12/12/2007

‘FAKE’ best describes Japan this year

‘Nise’ (fake) chosen as kanji character of 2007
, Mainichi’s mycom.co.jp, Dec. 12
Seihan Mori, chief priest at Kiyomizu Temple in Kyoto, writes the Chinese character…

Most of the Word-of-the-Year choices made by the public were negative, but the reason that Nise* — fake is Japan’s official keyword for 2007 are rash of frauds that dominated the news all year. Japan had nearly weekly frauds being uncovered—from major processed food manufacturers, scandals in sumo wrestling and boxing, well as the collapse of the NOVA, Japan’s largest English-conversation school chain. Note that Japan has been in sober mood in terms of words for some years now—WhatJapanThinks.com listed the 2006 Words-of-the-Year included “ran” (confusion/disorder), “utsu” (depression/deep funk), and “do” (anger/perturbed).

* 偽 Gi, nise Fraud, fake.

Posted by Taro in Arts/Culture, Education, General |

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1. Taro Says:
   December 13th, 2007 at 2:54 pm

   Over at the website of the sponsor of the 3Yen, Peter Payne, on his J-List side blog [peterpayne.net] he describes the 2007 Word-of-the-Year in detail…

   …. this year’s kanji, and all about “smorking”
   peterpayne.net Wednesday, December 12, 2007

   Every year a single kanji character is designated by the Kanji Examination Association which represents the events of that year, and this year the character is…itsuwari, which translates as falsity, lies or deceit. It was a big year for being lied to in Japan, with many scandals in the headlines.

   First, the problems with missing Social Security payments, which meant that thousands of workers wouldn’t get credit for money they paid into the system decades ago. Learning that the freshness date on the food they order may not be accurate also shook the trust of consumers in Japan — McDonald’s got caught changing the dates on salads so leftovers could be sold the following day, and they’d been doing it for years. The scandal at the Ministry of Defense, in which Deputy Defense Minister Yoko Yamada demanded various perks in exchange for the awarding of lucrative contracts, resulted in a raid on the Japanese version of the Pentagon by prosecutors.

   Today there was an official ceremony at beautiful Kiyomizu Temple in Kyoto in which a famous Buddhist priest wrote the character with a large calligraphy brush while hundreds looked on. The kanji for previous years have included inochi (life) in 2006, during which so many young people committed suicide; ai (love), after the birth of Princess Masako’s daughter Ai in 2005; sai (disaster), in tragedy-laden 2004; and tora (tiger), celebrating the Hanshin Tigers victory in the Japan Series in 2003…more...

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