There’s a lesson in everything, however small. Recent events have resulted in some additions to my Japanese vocabulary.
The word for earthquake – jishin (地震) is in the vocabulary of every resident of Japan. Of late, we have more specifically:
東北大震災 – Tohoku Daishinsai, literally: Tohoku (Northeast) big quake disaster.
This is short for the technical term, which is
東北地方太平洋沖地震 – Tōhoku Chihō Taiheiyō-oki Jishin, literally Northeast region Pacific Ocean offshore earthquake.
For obvious reasons, we have also a heightened interest in words such as
原子炉 – genshiro, nuclear reactor
原子力発電所 – genshiryoku-hatsudensho, nuclear power plant
which is often shortened to
原発 – genpatsu.
Daiichi (第一) btw, means simply “number one”. And since we’re at it, Fukushima (福島) translates as “island of good fortune”, not a case of “nomen est omen”, it seems.
As a consequence of the above, we also learn
節電 – setsuden, electricity saving.
