At this time of year, there are plenty of reasons to celebrate: 12 days of Christmas, 8 days of Chanukah, 7 days of Kwanzaa, and a partridge in a pear tree. But in all this merrymaking, you may have overlooked one important cause for celebration:

赤道祭（sekidōsai: ceremony to celebrate crossing the equator)
     red + road + festival

The Equator Is the Red Road?! …

As it turns out, an equatorial crossing is exactly what I celebrated this week. Somewhere over the Pacific, as others slept, I hooted and hollered as we crossed from winter into summer en route to New Zealand. I also celebrated the idea of seeing water swirl down the drain in the opposite direction.

OK, I haven’t actually left yet, but in my mind, I’m there! And by the time you read this, I will indeed be Down Under.

Assuming that some of you have also seen fit to travel over the holidays, I think it’s appropriate to continue last week’s discussion of cool compounds by looking at a few words about travel. And in the holiday spirit, I’ll keep this blog really short and easy, so you don’t strain your brain (and neither will I).

Travel

It’s not much good to go on vacation unless you can relax and enjoy it in a leisurely way. This compound lays out the necessary ingredients for that:

休暇 (kyūka: vacation)     to rest + free time

The second kanji, 暇, is hima.

While it may seem that a good trip has everything to do with nice accommodations or beautiful scenery, in the end, it’s all about one’s mind-set. It’s crucial to leave behind whatever you can of your usual stress and to engage fully with the reality of wherever you are. Not so easy to do. The mind wanders most when it’s idle, and … well, we’ve all heard about the devil’s workshop. Anyway, enjoyable travel depends upon this:

旅心 (tabigokoro: one’s mood while traveling, yen to travel)
     travel + heart, mind

Oh, yeah, and good shoes are a plus. When we went to Europe last summer, I brought two pairs of sensible walking shoes. One pair made my back ache, and the other shoes gave me blisters. Every morning, I had to choose the type of pain I wanted to endure for the day. I had a great trip, but to be sure, the shoes affected my 旅心.

More Wonderful Words About Moodiness …

Commerce

At first glance, travel and commerce seem like entirely disparate entities, but they actually go together pretty well. In order to travel, you need to earn and save large quantities of money—possibly through commerce. And when you travel, you boost the local economy in that faraway place.

Let’s look at some commerce-related words that have a certain flair. (That reminds me of a bad travel agent I once consulted. I wanted to know about Montreal. She knew absolutely nothing, but she refused to admit that, so she contented herself with telling me n times that Montreal has a European flair. She annoyed me so much that she made my nostrils flare!)

Sorry, I seem to have drifted. Some cool compounds related ever so loosely to commerce:

町並 (machinami: (look of) stores and houses on street)
     city streets + lined up

I’m not sure if the ingredients are the cooler thing here or the fact that someone (in Old Japan, most likely) thought to coin such a term. I love it! By the way, you probably associate 町 with “town.” In this case, though, Halpern defines it differently.

傘下 (sanka: subsidiary)      umbrella + under

In English, there’s an expression about everyone’s being under the “big tent.” It’s a metaphor for political inclusion. Well, in Japanese, the compound 傘下 is about huddling under the same umbrella. That brings to mind the oldie about sharing your umbrella with someone and falling in love. (I can’t think of the song title, so I just Googled it, using “sharing umbrella love lyrics” as my search terms. Why would that bring up mainly porn and rap in my search results? Am I so out of touch that I don’t even know? It was such an innocent song! What’s happened to the world while I’ve been busy working?) Anyway, in Japanese, huddling under an umbrella has nothing to do with love but rather with subsidiaries!

Talking about subsidiaries reminds me of the only two other economics terms I love (in any language):

親会社 (oyagaisha: parent company)
     parent + company (last 2 chars.)
子会社 (kogaisha: child company)
     child + company (last 2 chars.)

Isn’t that cute?! Makes the whole business of mergers and acquisitions sound like a cozy domestic scene, with happy parents, happy children, and a fire burning in the fireplace. Oh, and of course there’s a dog drowsing by the fire, because that’s a dog’s prerogative, as I understand it.

Let the Games Begin

Well, we’ve talked about travel, and we’ve talked about commerce. (Actually, I’m the one who’s been doing the talking, and you’ve been very kind to listen as long as you have. Thank you for that.) Anyway, I thought you might enjoy a sample sentence about commerce and travel.

Sample Sentence About
Commerce and Travel …

And as if that’s not diverting enough, it’s time for today’s Verbal Logic Quiz!

Happy Holidays! Stay warm and dry, and feast on lots of kanji!

Verbal Logic Quiz …