Category: Japanese

Take Two: What Is the Nembutsu?

For months, I’ve had on my to-do list to go and fix up the Wikipedia article about the nembutsu (or nian-fo in Chinese). I had started contributing to that article way back in 2006 shortly after I first got interested in Pure Land Buddhism, and occasionally update or add details. The article was flagged for some quality control issues recently, and I decided to help clean it up.

Some of my early contributions in Wikipedia way back in the day… can’t believe it’s been 18 years.

As I began to write some updates to the article, though, and trying to distill what the nembutsu is within the Pure Land tradition, I realized that this is a really tough question. There’s centuries of interpretations, layers of culture, and divergent viewpoints. I tried to summarize this in an older article, but after reading over that article, I realized that I didn’t quite hit the mark there either.

So, let’s try this again.

Pure Land Buddhism is a large, broad, organic tradition within Mahayana Buddhism (an even bigger tradition). It is not centrally-organized, but follows many trends and traditions across many places and time periods. However, these traditions all have a couple things in common:

  1. Reverence toward the Buddha of Infinite Light (a.k.a. Amitabha Buddha, Amida, Emituofo, etc.). The nature of who or what Amitabha Buddha is is open to interpretation though.
  2. Aspiration to be reborn (as in one’s next life) in the Pure Land of Amitabha Buddha. There have been many ways to interpret what exactly this means, but I am sticking to the most simple, literal interpretation for now.

In any case, these two things are what make the “Cult of Amitabha” what it is. By “cult” I mean the more traditional, academic definition, not the modern, negative definition. Amitabha is to Mahayana Buddhism, what the Virgin Mary is to Catholicism.

Every Pure Land tradition across Buddhist history is mostly focused on #2: how to get to the Pure Land. The early Pure Land Sutras spend much time describing how great Amitabha Buddha is, and how getting to the Pure Land is so beneficial towards one’s practice, but differ somewhat on how get reborn there.

One early sutra, the Pratyutpanna Sutra is one of the first to mention Amitabha and the Pure Land at all, but it very strongly emphasizes a meditative approach, in order to achieve a kind of samadhi. According to Charles B Jones, being reborn in the Pure Land wasn’t even mentioned in this sutra, nor Amitabha’s origin story. It was a purely meditate text. Nonetheless, this sutra was highly favored by the early Chinese Pure Land Buddhists, namely the White Lotus Society started in the 5th century by Lushan Huiyuan.

The main textual source for being reborn in the Pure Land is from the Immeasurable Life Sutra, also called the Larger [Sukhavati Vyuha] Sutra. This is where we see the famous 48 vows of the Buddha, including the most important, the 18th vow (highlights added):

設我得佛。十方衆生至心信樂。欲生我國乃至十念。若不生者不取正覺。唯除五逆誹謗正法

(18) If, when I attain Buddhahood, sentient beings in the lands of the ten quarters who sincerely and joyfully entrust themselves to me, desire to be born in my land, and call my Name, even ten times, should not be born there, may I not attain perfect Enlightenment. Excluded, however, are those who commit the five gravest offences and abuse the right Dharma.

translation by Rev. Hisao Inagaki

This is where things get interesting, in my opinion.

The Chinese character 念 (niàn) was used to translate the Buddhist-Sanskrit term Buddhānusmṛti or “recollection of the Buddha”. But, according to Jones, the Chinese character 念 had multiple nuances in Chinese:

  • To mentally focus on something.
  • A moment in time.
  • Reciting the Confucian Classics aloud.

And in fact each one of these interpretations can be applied to the nembutsu (Chinese niànfó) because it means niàn (念) of the Buddha (fó, 佛).

But which is it: concentration, a moment of recollection, or verbal recitation?

Most of the early Chinese Buddhist teachers like Tanluan, Daochuo and Shandao all promoted a mix: usually visualization was the superior method, but verbal recitation was a fallback for people who couldn’t dedicate themselves to visualization-meditation and ritual. The earliest Buddhist teachers mostly emphasized the visualization-meditation approach, but by Shandao’s time (7th century) the verbal recitation was deemed the most effective method.

Later, in Japan, the monk Genshin (not to be confused with the game…) summarizes these various methods in his 10th century work, the Ojoyoshu. It was a high quality work and even praised by Chinese monks when it was sent over as part of Japan’s diplomatic missions. But Genshin came to the same basic conclusion: the nembutsu can be any one of the three.

Finally we get to Buddhist teachers like Honen (12th century), who taught that the verbal recitation was the only viable choice. Honen praised past methods, but his target audience was a mostly illiterate population, as well as monks whose monastic institutions had largely declined into corruption and empty ritual. So, for such people, better to rely on Amitabha Buddha’s compassion and recite the verbal nembutsu wholeheartedly.

Multi-lingual sign at the temple of Chion-in in Kyoto, Japan where Honen’s mausoleum rests.

This approach isn’t that different from the Chinese approach which varied by teacher or patriarch but through Shandao’s influence had a parallel development. Some teachers emphasized the efficacy of simply reciting the nembutsu (much like Honen), others added the importance of concentration while reciting the nembutsu.

However, turning back to the Larger Sutra, let’s go back to the 48 vows. The 19th and 20th vows state:

(19) If, when I attain Buddhahood, sentient beings in the lands of the ten quarters, who awaken aspiration for Enlightenment, do various meritorious deeds and sincerely desire to be born in my land, should not, at their death, see me appear before them surrounded by a multitude of sages, may I not attain perfect Enlightenment.

(20) If, when I attain Buddhahood, sentient beings in the lands of the ten quarters who, having heard my Name, concentrate their thoughts on my land, plant roots of virtue, and sincerely transfer their merits towards my land with a desire to be born there, should not eventually fulfill their aspiration, may I not attain perfect Enlightenment.

So, taken together, the 18-20th vows cover the various interpretations of 念 we discussed above. All of them are included in Amitabha’s vows to bring across anyone who desires to be reborn there. The common theme is sincerity (至心 zhì xīn). If you look at the original Chinese text, all three include “sincerity”.

Further, when asked about how many times one should recite the nembutsu, Honen replied:1

“….believe that you can attain ojo [往生, rebirth in the Pure Land] by one repetition [of the nembutsu], and yet go on practicing it your whole life long.”

So, let’s get down to business: what is the nembutsu / niànfó ?

Based on the evidence above, I believe that the nembutsu is any of these Buddhist practices described above, taken under a sincere aspiration to be reborn in the Pure Land. It’s about bending one’s efforts and aspirations toward the Pure Land.

If you are calculating how to be reborn, or if your heart’s not 100% into it, then it may be a waste of effort.

Instead, if you feel unsure, study the Buddhist doctrines, get to know the Pure Land sutras, read about past teachers and if you feel fired up about, recite the nembutsu, or do whatever moves you. You will just know when. The more you put into it, the more you get out of it too.

Amitabha’s light shines upon all beings, like moonlight, and if you feel inspired by it, just know that you’re already halfway to the Pure Land.

Namu Amida Butsu

1 The site is long gone, sadly, but the Wayback Machine has an archive of the site. The updated Japanese-only site is here.

Chinese versus Japanese Character Readings

Way back in high school, like most American kids, I had to study things like Spanish, French, etc. I took German for two years in high school, but I didn’t find it very interesting, and I didn’t like my teacher very much. So, I never put in much effort. Later, one of my friends told me that we offered Mandarin Chinese at my high school, and I was just beginning my “teenage weeb phase”, so I was definitely curious.1

Our teacher, Mrs. Wu, was a very nice elderly teacher, even though she was in over her head dealing with a bunch of teenagers. Still, exploring something exotic like Chinese language really interested 16-year old me, and I was a pretty motivated student. I tried to learn both Traditional Chinese characters (used in Taiwan) and Simplified characters (Chinese mainland). My best friend at the time was Taiwanese-American, and I used to practice with his immigrant parents.

Anyhow, long story short, once I got into college, I focused on other priorities, and gradually, I forgot my Chinese studies.

Lately, I have been dabbling in Duolingo and learning Chinese again. I forget why, but I guess it’s partly fueled by nostalgia, but also because I already know how to read many Chinese characters through my studies of Japanese.

It’s been fascinating to see how Japanese kanji (Japanese-imported Chinese characters), and modern Chinese characters overlap and yet differ. The important thing to bear in mind is that Japan (like other neighboring countries), imported Chinese characters at an earlier stage in history, and over centuries the usage, pronuncaition and such have all diverged.

Take this easy sentence in Chinese:

All of these Chinese characters are used in Japanese, and without any prompts, I can read this and get the gist of what its saying, but there’s some notable divergences.

These Chinese sentence above is:

日本菜和中国菜
rì běn caì hé zhōng guó caì

A Japanese equivalent might be:

日本料理と中国料理
nihon ryōri to chūgoku ryōri

A few interesting things to note.

  • The character 菜 is used in modern Chinese to mean food in general, but in Japanese it means vegetables. So the usage has diverged. I noticed that Chinese
  • The country names, 中国 and 日本 are used by both languages, but the pronunciation has also diverged considerably. 中国 is pronounced zhōng guó in Chinese, and chūgoku in Japanese. You can kind of hear the similarities, but also the pronunciation has diverged for centuries.
  • The character 和 (hé) is used in Chinese to mean “and”, but in Japanese a system of particles is used instead. Interestingly, 和 is used in Japanese, for example the old name of Japan was Yamato (大和) or modern words like heiwa (平和, “peace”). The pronunciation is wa, so it has diverged as well.

On thing I haven’t really delved into is the native Japanese readings for Chinese characters. Chinese characters are a foreign, imported writing system to Japan, so native words sound completely different even when written with Chinese characters. The word for 中国 (chūgoku) derives from Chinese, but 中 by itself is pronounced as naka (“middle”) which is a native Japanese word (not imported).

Anyhow, this is just a quick overview of how two entirely different languages both adopted the same writing system, but have diverged over time. If you add in languages like Vietnamese and Korean that also adopted Chinese characters, the picture is even more fascinating.

P.S. Through Duolingo, I learned that the Chinese word for hamburger is hàn-bǎo-bāo.

Chinese has to import foreign words using Chinese characters that at least kind of sound like the original. Japanese uses a second syllabary system, katakana, to approximate the same thing, although in the past Chinese characters were used as well. Hence, America is usually written as amerika アメリカ, but in more formal settings it is called beikoku 米国 (compare the pronunciation with Chinese měi guó).

1 The fact that my high school even offered Chinese language at that time (1990’s America) is pretty unusual, but I am grateful for the option. Also, thank you Mrs Wu if you ever happen to read this.

Basic Japanese Particles, Part 2

In our last episode, we talked about some basic, fundamental particles used in the Japanese language. Today, we’ll cover some other, essential particles: “ni” に, “de” で, “yo” よ, and “ne” ね. The first two are often required for parts of speech, but the second two are often used to provide “flavor” or “nuance” to conversation. All of them are frequently used, and necessary to speak Japanese well.

As with the previous post, this post assumes you know how to read hiragana script. If not, now would be a good time to review. Kanji will be kept to a minimum for now.

The targeting particle: に

The particle に (ni) is used in many ways in Japanese, but it’s best to think of it as a particle that provides a target for a verb. Credit goes to Tae Kim for coming up with this explanation.

The に particle is not used for direct objects. As we saw in the last post, the を (wo) particle fulfills that role.

たなかさんにCDをあげた。

I gave Mr Takana the CD

Instead, the に (ni) particle is used when a verb relates to something, but not as a direct objection. A couple examples:

へやにはいる。

To go into a room

also:

でんしゃにおりる。

To get off a train

In both cases, a verb relates to a noun, but it’s not directly doing something to the noun. The に particle simply specifies the targets of the verb. A lot of verbs in Japanese are intransitive verbs, more so than English, so they won’t take direct objects anyway, and in such cases, に is often used.

You can also target time with a verb:

くじにでる。

I will leave at 9 o’clock

One other important note: に is also used in passive speech to designate the agent of the passive action (e.g. “it was done by who”). I still consider this a target, but that’s just me.

たなかさんにすしをたべられた。

The sushi was eaten by Mr Tanaka

The context particle: で

This is another very useful particle. The で (de) particle is used to explain context for things. This includes:

  • Where something took place.
  • Something was done with something.
  • Something will take place within a time frame.

It’s hard to explain, but pretty easy to use once you get the hang of it.

がっこうでごはんをたべた。

I ate lunch (lit. meal) at school

Or:

フライパンでつくった。

[I] cooked with a frypan

Another often overlooked example is:

レゴであそんだ。

[We] played with legos.

And finally for time:

ごふんでつく。

[we will] arrive in five minutes.

The assertive particle: よ

The よ (yo) and ね (ne) particle below are both “nuance” particles. They are not used for parts of speech like many of the particles we’ve seen so far. Instead, these particles are put at the end of sentences to provide nuance to a sentence.

The よ (yo) particle is used to assert something. This is often done to either:

  • Present new information, or
  • Make a point

As with any culture, if you are too assertive, this can annoy other people, but there are many times this is used in Japanese without sounding rude or overly assertive.

Let’s compare these two sentences:

きょうはさむい。

Today is cold.

with:

きょうはさむいよ。

Today is cold.

When translating to English, the meaning is the same. However, the nuance is different. The first sentence is matter of fact, with no nuance. The second sentence assumes that the listener either didn’t know it was cold, or that you are trying to remind the listener that it is cold (therefore you should dress warm).

The soliciting particle: ね

As with the よ (yo) particle, the ね (ne) particle expresses nuance only, but tends to convey something different. Where よ (yo) asserts something, the ね (ne) particle solicits feedback from the listener. This is often used in Japanese language to either solicit agreement from others, but also to downplay one’s opinion (e.g. soften it), thereby making it a bit more polite.

Using the example sentence above, let’s change the nuance a bit:

きょうはさむいね。

Today is cold [don’t you think?].

Here, the speaker is making a point, but doing it in a more solicitous way, hoping to garner agreement with the listener. This is obviously less assertive, and more conciliatory to the listener.

It’s very common to also combine the two to both assert something, but not too strongly:

きょうはさむいよね。

Today is cold [don’t you think?].

You’re still asserting something information, but also pulling back a bit too, so it’s often a happy medium in conversation.

Conclusion

There are a lot more particles in Japanese language, and we haven’t covered all use-cases of these particles either, but even knowing this much gives you a solid foundation, once the usage sinks in. The best way to learn particle usage isn’t memorizing grammar, but instead learning sentence patterns, preferably from real Japanese media (books, TV, etc). Once you’ve seen a sentence pattern 50 times, you can generally get the gist of it. If you’ve seen it 500 times, you probably are pretty familiar with it. 😙

Concentration, or Lack Thereof

This is me, most of the time.

I am the sort of person who is bad with names. I recently met some new neighbors, and they told me their names, and I made a point of remembering those names, but 5 minutes later, I had already forgotten one of them.

In the early Buddhist sutras, the Buddha described the mind as a monkey flitting from branch to branch:

Just as a monkey, swinging through a forest wilderness, grabs a branch. Letting go of it, it grabs another branch. Letting go of that, it grabs another one. Letting go of that, it grabs another one. In the same way, what’s called ‘mind,’ ‘intellect,’ or ‘consciousness’ by day and by night arises as one thing and ceases as another.

Assutavā Sutta (SN 12.61), translation by Ven. Thanissaro Bhikkhu

This inability to focus the mind prevents us from gaining any insight, being easily swayed by sensual lust, anger, or ignorance, unable to see the bigger picture. Centuries later, in the Parable of the Burning House of the Lotus Sutra, the kids in the burning house are so distracted by their toys, that they do not notice their father calling them to get out.

This notion of the unstable mind unable to see its own peril is found in every Buddhist tradition, and what drives much of the Buddhist practice. Recognizing one’s own mental patterns is the first step, an important one too, but another important step is to counteract this. One cannot stop the thoughts themselves, it’s just the way the mind of Homo sapiens works. Instead, one should look into Buddhist training to either withstand such thoughts, counteract them, or look past them. This isn’t a simple thing either. It’s quite difficult, and requires long-term training. But it is essential to one’s well-being.

When I catch myself brooding angry thoughts, or thinking something stupid and selfish, I often think about something Honen said in a famous catechism called the 145 Questions and Answers (ippyaku-shijūgo-kajō-mond, 百四十五箇条問答), namely question #69:

一。心に妄念のいかにも思はれ候は、いかがし候べき。

Q) When bad thoughts keep arising within my mind, what ought one to do?

答。ただよくよく念仏を申させ給へ。

A) The only thing to do is to repeat Nembutsu.

Quoted from Honen the Buddhist Saint page 56, with Japanese from http://kyokusho.g.dgdg.jp/benkyo/c145.htm

Because the Pure Land tradition of Buddhism is so large, there’s a lot of ways to interpret this. I don’t know the right answer. You should do your own research and decide for yourself. For some, this is using the nembutsu as a form of mindfulness practice (withstanding evil thoughts), while for others, this is acknowledging the grace of Amida Buddha, and that one is still destined to be reborn in the Pure Land (looking past evil thoughts).

This is not to replace the tradition of mindfulness meditation, either. It’s just not always possible to be sitting on a cushion meditating, so remembering Honen’s advice is a handy thing to do when you are going through life, and feeling your mind looping the same negative or unwholesome thoughts over and over.

Namu Amida Butsu

Basic Japanese Particles, Part 1

Japanese, as a language, isn’t really all that hard to learn, especially if you know the Golden Rules, but compared to English, it’s quite different. This means that you have to unlearn English ways of expressing things, and start from the ground-up. A good place to start is to learn the common particles used in Japanese.

I’ve touched on particles before, but in the following two posts, we’ll cover the most common particles in more detail. This post assumes you know how to read hiragana script. If not, now would be a good time to review. I will try to keep kanji to a minimum for now.

Particles in Japanese are small, 1 to 2 syllable markers. There is no direct, one-to-one translation to English, but they’re important for marking parts of speech. This means that you can’t make sense of a sentence in Japanese without knowing particles. Further, you cannot communicate clearly to native speakers without using the correct particles.

For today we’ll focus on “ga” が, “no” の, “wo” を and “desu” です.

When to Use What Particle

Japanese is known for being a “pithy” language, and this is true. Japanese only uses the parts of speech that need to be explicitly mentioned, while the rest is implied by context. English does this too, but not as much. Thus, English speakers of Japanese often sound wordy, and this gets tiring to a native Japanese speaker.

For example if introducing yourself, a common mistake English speakers make is something like this:

わたしのなまえはまつだです。

“Hello, my name is Matsuda”

This isn’t grammatically wrong, just needlessly wordy. Oftentimes, Japanese speakers might simply say:

まつだです。

“[I am] Matsuda.”

Therefore, we’ll try to focus on the most essential, basic particles first. This will be enough to complete basic sentences in most cases.

The noun-linking particle: の

The の “no” particle has several uses, but at its heart, it’s meant to link two nouns together. This can have different nuances depending on context. A common example to just mark possession of something:

まつだのほん

Matsuda’s book

You can pretty much link any two nouns this way:

にほんのじょせい

Japanese women

This also lets you do something called apposition, which means using one noun introduce another:

せんせいのたけださん

Mr (or Miss) Takeda, the teacher

Or time, using なんじ (“what time”?)

なんじのでんしゃ？

What time is the train?

and answer:

さんじのでんしゃ

The 3 O’Clock Train

It has other uses as well, but this covers plenty. The の is super useful, but takes a bit of time to get used to the different nuances.

The subject particle: が

The particle が is one of the most basic and most useful to learn first. Its job is to answer the questions “who”, “what”, “which” or “where”: who does something, which thing is which, where is something?

For example, if the word だれ means “who”, you can ask:

だれがせんせい？

Who’s the teacher?

Which you can answer:

たけだがせんせい。

Takeda is the teacher.

Notice that が is used both to ask “who”, but also answer “who”.

Another example using なに (“what”?)

なにがたべたい？

What do you want to eat?

and the answer:

すしがたべたい

I want to eat sushi

Particle を

The を “wo” particle is interesting because it represents a hiragana letter that no longer is used, and really has only one usage left: marking the direct object of a sentence.

すしをたべる。

I eat sushi

Note that this only works for transitive verbs, verbs that take direct objects. Which verbs are transitive vs intransitive is not always the same as English. You just have to know, and often they come in pairs in Japanese.

The polite particle: です

The particle です is somewhat hard to explain, but in essence, it just makes sentences more polite. You can use it in one of two ways.

One way is to simply append to last noun or adjective, and make it polite:

さむいです。

“It’s cold”

Another way to use it is to replace the last particle + verb, while keeping it polite.

なにがたべたい？

すしがたべたい。
=
すしです。

Conclusion

Particles in Japanese are used in a variety of ways, and nuances, that are hard to translate 1:1 into English, but once you get used to the patterns, it’s not difficult to grasp. The key is to unlearn habits in your home language, and just get used to the basic patterns on their own merits until it becomes second nature.

In part two, we’ll explore more particles and see where we go from there.

My JLPT N1 Test Results for 2023

I finally got my results back from the JPLT N1 exam I took in December 2023, and the results were not surprising.

I failed, as expected.

However, the results were not what I expected:

CategoryResults
Vocab / grammar28 / 60 (pass)
Reading7 / 60 (not pass)
Listening26 / 60 (pass)
Total Score61 / 180 (100 needed to pass)

I had expected to fail listening more so than reading, the listening section was very stressful, and yet the reading section felt somewhat easy. Clearly, I underestimated things. After reading about people online who passed or failed the JLPT N1, it’s clear that the N1 assumes full adult literacy. If you can’t read a novel or two in Japanese, you will not pass the reading section. I haven’t reached that level yet, and the results aren’t that surprising then.

That said, the total score to pass has to be 100 out of 180, so even if I passed the reading section, my overall score was still pretty low, and probably not enough to pass.

Needless to say, it was a good effort, but my preparations all around were insufficient.

Will I take it again? This took considerable time, effort and willingness to go the distance, and so I have to think about whether I want to try again. Since I don’t need the JLPT N1 for work, it’s more of a personal project, and may or may not be worth the cost.

Going to think about this for a while. 🤔

Happy 2024: Year of the Dragon

Hello dear readers, and happy new year, or as they say in Japan akemashite omedetou gozaimasu!

My family and I took time off for Winter Break and are probably more exhausted now than when the break began.

After enjoying New Year’s Eve with friends, we woke up this morning to eat Osechi (お節), which are traditional foods eaten in Japan for New Year for good luck. This is just one of many traditions found in Japanese New Year, also called oshougatsu (お正月).

I won’t list each one, but you can read here. These are foods thought to have auspicious meanings, and include things like shrimp, black beans, candied fish, chestnuts and so on. I like some more than others, but I try to have a bite of at least one of each. I like the pink and white kamaboko in particular. This year, we bought a brand that has the Chinese character 寿 (kotobuki) in it, meaning “felicitations” and such. The featured photo shows the Chinese character in reverse.

Also, in the photo above, our little ceremonial dishes feature the Seven Luck Gods too, and in the ozouni soup shown the naruto fish cakes feature Mount Fuji in front of a sunrise.

Later today, I will probably play some Karuta and then head for the local Japanese Buddhist temple for the first visit of the year, hatsumoude, and post on that soon.

Happy 2024 to everyone!

P.S. For us Star Trek fans, another thing to may be look forward to this year:

Failing the JLPT

So, I took the JLPT N1 exam last weekend, and unless I got lucky, I am fairly certain I failed the test.

Wait, you might be thinking, didn’t I give up on the test this year?

Well, yes and no.

I did become discouraged and stopped studying for a few months. But after spending the summer in Japan, I realized how much I enjoyed studying Japanese, and I felt that if I put off the test for another year, I’d just keep procrastinating my test preparation. It made sense to press the issue by registering to take the exam. This was kind of a last minute decision, and with all the personal chaos happening in fall, I neglected to mention it in the blog.

The problem is that even though I work better with a deadline than without, the reality of parenting, work, and Fire Emblem got in the way, and I made less progress in my preparation than I would have liked. I spent a lot of time reading, and did some mock tests for the reading section, and that did help.1 However, it was clear that my vocabulary and listening skills were still insufficient. I banked too much on just reading essays.

When you look at online discussions, it’s clear that by the time you get to the N1, you need to have a general adult-level literacy in Japanese, including listening. People who read and watch Japanese media in general tend to fare a lot better. I have done some of this over the last two years, but clearly not enough.

That said, it wasn’t a complete failure. I definitely could see that my study and reading skills had helped, and there were questions I could answer comfortably without much effort. So, it’s not a question of study method, so much as time put in. I need to do more of the same, and probably on a more frequent basis. Listening, as always, is the hardest skill, but now I have a fresh baseline in my mind, so I know what level of conversation or content I should focus on. As with reading, I have plenty of books at home to finish, but I will try to broaden my subjects to more than just the 2-3 things I like to read (Buddhism and the Hyakunin Isshu). I can assure you that neither subject appeared on the test. 😉

Amen, Mercedes. Amen.

Assuming I don’t pass this time, which is likely, I feel positive enough about my progress that I will likely try again next year. I will not commit to anything just yet, at least until I’ve had a chance to see my test score next month or so.

Until then, I’m just taking a much needed break, focusing on playing karuta and of course more Fire Emblem: Three Houses.

1 I was able to manage my time pretty well during the reading section, pacing myself, and even had a bit of time to go back, review, and fix a couple questions. The last time I took the exam, I was definitely rushed, and did poorly in the reading section.

Kyoto and Nara Dialects

A pair of Nara Deer hanging around near Kasuga Grand Shrine in Nara. Taken in July 2023.

While visiting Kyoto and Nara recently, I started to pick up on some differences in Japanese language that took me a bit off-guard. I am not fluent in Japanese, but I consider myself functional (i.e. “good enough”), and since my wife is from the Kanto region around Tokyo, I’ve gotten used to Tokyo-style Japanese.

I know about Kansai-dialect since it’s often used on TV and comedy, but what I didn’t know is that places like Kyoto and Nara have their own sub-dialects, too within the Kansai dialect.

Kyoto Dialect

At Kyoto Station I often saw signs read おこしやす (okoshiyasu) which is the Kyoto way of saying welcome!

Other phrases often used include:

  • Okini – a Kansai-dialect way of saying arigato! (Thanks!)
  • Oideyasu – similar to the Tokyo-area phrase irasshaimasé this is how shops welcome customers when they first step in.
  • Dosu – this is another famous Kyoto-ism that replaces the standard Japanese desu.
  • Agaru / Sagaru – the verbs for “going up” (agaru) and “going down” (sagaru) can also mean going north and south respectively in Kyoto dialect.
  • Verb + よし – similar to standard Japanese command -なさい, this is an informal way of telling someone to do something.
  • Omaku – a colloquialism for a pillow (compare with standard makura).
  • Ohana ni iku – a phrase used when someone is heading for a tea party, a banquet, or other similar social functions.
  • Aisa ni – similar to standard Japanese phrase tokidoki (“sometimes”, “occasionally”).
  • Yasukenai – something unrefined or in poor taste. Similar to standard Japanese shina ga nai.
  • Yayako – a Kyoto word for “baby”.
  • Hona – a phrase for “goodbye”.
  • Kibaru – same as Japanese ganbaru, which is a key phrase to learn in Japanese.

Nara Dialect

I found, as a foreigner, Nara dialect a little hard to pick up in my experience. While Nara was once the capital of Japan a long, long time ago it is a pretty rural part of Japan now. Japanese spoken there differed somewhat from the “standard” Kansai dialect most people know. It is often described by other native Japanese speakers as a “cuter version” of Kansai-dialect.

One interesting aspect of Nara dialect is that “z” sounds are replaced with “d” sounds. For example the word for elephant, zōsan, becomes dōsan.

Another example is the colloquial ending yayo which replaces Tokyo-style dayo. Endings like yasu and mi are also used too, in place of standard ending ne.

Information in English about the Nara dialect is pretty slim, so I don’t have a good list of specific phrases, unlike Kyoto dialect.

Revisiting Ryoanji

A while back, I talked about a famous Rinzai-sect Zen temple named Ryoanji that my wife and I had visited in 2005, shortly after we got married. During our latest trip to Kyoto (mentioned here and here), we got to see Ryoanji again, and this time, armed with a better camera, better weather, and more background knowledge, I was able to better appreciate the visit.

The temple was founded shortly before the disastrous Onin War, a grinding, destructive urban war that ravaged the city of Kyoto over a succession dispute, and ironically the founder of the temple was one of the major combatants, Hosokawa Katsumoto. The temple of Ryoanji was an active monastery for a long time, a second-tier temple in the Five Mountains system in the 14th century, a hierarchy of Rinzai-Zen temples patronized by the Shogunate at the time, but tourism has pushed out the original monastic training to other temples, or other parts of the complex.

Historically, like many Zen temples of the Five Mountains System, Ryoanji got tangled in politics and urban life at the time, for better or for worse,1 but even so, it was clear that over the generations, the temple community there cared about Zen and tried their best to put things into practice and that love and care showed even now.

Today, Ryoanji is best-known for its “Zen garden” or karé-sansui (枯山水) in Japanese. You might have seen pictures of it before, but seeing the real thing is pretty interesting. On the one hand, it’s surprisingly small, but on the other, there’s an ineffable feeling when you are there. There are plenty of theories about who designed the famous “garden”, but there’s no clear evidence one way or another. So, it’s design and history remain a mystery.

The temple itself is fairly small, but is part of a large, secluded area north of Kyoto. You can see a map of the complex here:

It was hot and muggy that day, and my gout, which thankfully only flares up rarely,2 was in full swing, so walking was quite painful. Nevertheless, we had already booked the tour, so we soldiered on. Ryoanji, after the chaos and traffic of other places, was a welcome respite. This is the main gate, which is shown on the map above at the bottom-right.

Ryoanji has a large garden area before you get to the temple itself:

From here, you come to the temple complex itself:

I vaguely recall that this was the “kitchen god”, a minor deity venerated to prevent fires in the kitchen. The first room of the temple, before you get to the garden, was formerly the kitchen, if I recall correctly.

And finally, the temple opens up to the famous sand garden:

More pictures here:

It seemed to be a fairly quiet day at Ryoanji, so we had a chance to sit down on the veranda and admire the view for a bit. The last time I came in 2005, the garden was snow-covered, so I didn’t really get to see much (but still a great experience in its own way):

Me, February 2005 at Ryoanji, with no idea what I was doing. 😅

Much has been discussed about the garden, the symbolism of the particular rocks, the use of the Golden Ratio in its proportions, etc., but for me, it was just neat to see in person. As I said earlier, there’s an ineffable feeling when you’re there. Amidst the chatter and people shuffling around, you

Just behind the veranda are also some black-ink murals:

From there you see the famous tsukubai, though since I didn’t have a photo this trip, here is the same thing from 2005:

The tsukubai has a square opening in the middle, and Chinese characters (kanji) on each side. The square, combined with each Chinese character form different Chinese characters, forming the sentence: 吾唯足知 or waré tada taru (wo) shiru, meaning something like “I only know contentment”, or rather more loosely, “Just as I am, I am sufficient”.

From there, visitors loop around through the garden again on the other side, which is very peaceful:

Here’s me and my teenage daughter being silly, imitating a funny Japanese comedy duo named EXIT (ポンポン！):

From here, we went to the gift shop near the exit, where I picked up a nice little incense holder,2 and of course some incense.

Ryoanji isn’t as big a tourist draw in Kyoto as some other temples, but to be honest it was a really nice experience. The quieter atmosphere, the slower pace, and the amazing art really made an impression on me more than the whirlwind experiences we had at other temples that day. Even as it hurt to walk constantly, I still felt a sense of calm and peace I hadn’t enjoyed in a while.

It reminded me of a similar experience I had back in Victoria BC, where I felt a sense of calm and clarity and a healthier perspective on things that stuck with me upon my return to the US. This might sound silly or New Age-y, but as a Buddhist for almost 20 years now, amidst the constant distractions of life and struggles with practice, the chance to stop and gain a different perspective for even a couple of hours, every so often is really valuable. Ryoanji was an unexpected highlight of the trip for me, and someday I hope to go there again.

P.S. I’ve been really heads down working on the other blog lately, plus also dealing with plenty of parental and work issues, so I am somewhat behind on blogging.

1 The famous monk, Ikkyu, grumbled about this quite a bit. Then again, Ikkyu wasn’t a saint himself. 😉 Like the Buddhist temples of the earlier Heian Period, the Zen temples of the Ashikaga Shogunate tended to be lax in monastic discipline, host parties with nobility, and get into all sorts of disreputable behavior. Besides Ikkyu, I am sure there were more serious-minded monks, but then again with any religion anywhere across history, given a sufficiently large community, you get a spectrum of saints and scallywags. Such is Humanity.

2 Rarely enough that I can avoid taking prescription medication, and focus on eating a healthier diet, plus lots of water daily. Weight loss has also helped.

3 I have some incense from Japan from previous trips, but my Western incense holders do not properly fit, so the incense tends to lean or fall over. Different holders for differently-sized incense.