Doughnuts

Will it be convenient if she has triplets?! I have Internet addiction -- Blog, Google map, Youtube, what's the next toy? By the way, this is the site "Feeladdicted." Check the "product" page, you can see funny items. Beye looks like Medama Oyaji camera!

I returned from Kagoshima yesterday. It was a short trip, though I enjoyed it very much. Of course the shochu was great (now I have 6 bottles of shochu at home) and I was impressed by this street food, "NIKUMAKI ONIGITI" (beef wrapped rice ball)!! I hardly see it in Tokyo but I heard it is a popular street food in the Kyushu area. I think you may cook it at home; wrap a rice ball in thin sliced beef cooked with rich BBQ sauce (sweet taste is better). Try it, it is really great and yummy.

I read an article "Doughnuts War is getting harder." I wrote Mister Doughnuts monopolized the Japanese Doughnuts market, but finally Doughnuts Plant seemed to break it. Unfortunately in the Shiodome area, I don't think Doughnuts Plant is doing well. So I am a little bit worried about them. On the other hand, last December Krispy Kreme had come to Tokyo, and even now I see there is a long line in front of it every time I visit Shinjuku. This Doughnuts boom made a trend of "high class doughnuts." At a new hot spot Midtown Tokyo, the Belberry cafe serves over 1200 yen doughnuts??!! Mister Doughnuts also opened a high class new shop "and on and," their doughnuts cost over 200yen each. Hmm, as an endless dieter, I will go there after I reach 60 years old.

Do you know some Digital slang? In Japan, a lot of slang came from 2channel. Actually, it is impossible to understand some threads without knowing the meaning of each slang word. Some slang came out of 2channel. Recently I can see people using "Nuko" (ぬこ) on their blogs. Originally it was "Neko" (ねこ), which means cat. Maybe "Nuko" came from someone's type miss, we don't know its origin. Some use "Zonu" (ぞぬ)as "Inu" (いぬ) meaning dog, but we know the origin of "Zonu" and it doesn't mean dog. On 2chan someone joked, "Convenience stores sell hotdogs of "*nu"'s meat. Someone else replied, "Ah! I know -- it's the meat of a Zonu." After that, "Zonu" means some new animal maybe close to a dog. Some are suggesting that the Internet caused the corruption of the language. Hmm, I agree, but language has been changed in each generation and I don't think people use Nuko in their real conversations. And always we may check and balance when we go a tad too far. We may say it's cool to talk and write traditonal correct Japanese at some times. But I definitely can say I forget Kanji because of the Internet and the PC's auto conversion. The more I use a PC, the more I forget Kanji characters. We had to check the dictionary when we didn't know the character before. It let us remember each word and character. I wonder if this may happen only for Chinese people and Japanese people (I don't know other languages which need to type a character by converting from it's pronounciation).

Comments

[Mari]

Hi there
Yes Gab, maybe I won't be trouble if I can't write Kanji, but I feel bad I can't write Kanji because of PC, I can't memorize phone number because of cell phone. I feel I am getting stupid everyday.

[Gabriel]

Mari,
I wanna eat nikumaki Onigiri!! Sounds so tasty.
As for digital slang, I think all languages would have some of it. Examples in english are ttyl (talk to you later), or lol (laugh out loud), or the ubiqitous wtf (what the fuck). In english, we also have an automatic spelling correction in Microsoft Word, for example. I dont think the internet is corrupting language, but helping it to evolve quickly. I use sites like dictionary.com to look up words I dont know. Digital is fine, it just saves us time. Also, language is always changing and evolving, plus if Japanese are forgeting Kanji, then I can feel more confident in my language. Hehe. 漢字は難しい！書けなくていいでしょう！ケータイ、パソコン等あるからさ。お互いに頑張ろう！

[Roaf]

I like Krispy Kreme best. But when I eat it I feel like I am going to die of a heart attack or diabetes soon after.

[Chris]

Haha... "zonu"

In English we say "mystery meat" ;-P