Please, Just Let Me Gripe!!!!
I know, I know. Why have an article about some person sitting in Japan complaining? We can just go on most social media and find it there too… Sometimes you just need to gripe.
Japan is like the anime, right?
Well, yes, you could. But I’m not complaining. I’m griping. There is a difference, and that’s also something to gripe about. So, what can a person living “the dream” in Japan possibly have to gripe about? Well, that, for instance. This whole idealised image that many of you have about Japan just because you watched some anime.
Just like America isn’t full of super powered people, even though there are many shows about them, Japan isn’t like all the animes you’ve watched. Sure, some slice of life animes show parts of the real Japan, but even that’s often exaggerated to keep your attention.
Mind your manners!
Which brings me to my second gripe, bad manners. Please, oh please, leave your entitled self back home whenever you visit another country. I feel like this shouldn’t have to be said, so I’m griping about people still doing it. Why would you come to a country you’ve wanted to visit, spent good money to get to, only to do something stupid like climbing onto a world renowned landmark to get a photo with it.
Let me guess, you did it because you love it soooooo much? Well, that’s no excuse; you say you love Japan, but you do minimum research to see if what you think is right is. Then you come here and think that you’ll easily be understood because you “speak Japanese”… meanwhile you walk straight into my 3rd and 4th gripes, bad translations and bad pronunciations of basic words.
Do you know Japaneezy?
Oh, you saw a clip of a music video showing how easy Japanese is? You mean the one with words spoken that sounds like almost a mix between Japanese and English? Great, now watch the full video and see that the song is a satirical song about you coming to Japan and using those words thinking you can speak Japanese… yeah, they got you good.
But wait, where is the mispronunciation? Oh, that comes from when people try using Japanese (correctly) but they never thought that they are not actually saying the things they are trying to. Now I’m not saying you can’t make mistakes, I’m saying there’s a difference between being aware that you are not fluent in Japanese, and confidently speaking as if you are.
Please, I don’t want to have to guess if you said かわいい (cute) or 怖い (scary) because you pronounced if “kouwaii” こうわいい.
The AI, the travesty
Thank you for letting me gripe, but before I go, let me gripingly suggest one more thing. All AI generated works should be clearly labels as such with the part done by AI clearly stated, be it the main art or the frames between the human drawn ones, be it the translation for a video, or the voice-over.
Label them clearly and let the people decide if it’s worth their time. Recently, my biggest pet peeve has been those AI generated “reviews” or “retellings” masquerading as if they are not AI. At least if it’s labelled as AI, then I’d be less likely to feel cheated when the pronunciation or cadence goes wonky.
Well, that truly concludes my gripe for the day. Good luck out there.
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