Edited by Kim-Chi Do
This morning at my Board of Education I received a fax. Since I teach at twelve different schools, this was nothing unusual; the fax was a handwritten schedule and my teaching plan for a visit to an elementary school. The note on the front of the schedule confused me, however. It looked like this:
2 時間目 6-1 ランチ 6-1
5 ″ 6-2 時間がとびますが
6 ″ 6-3 よろしくおねがいします。
I’m barely past novice stage in Japanese. I came without studying the language, didn’t learn to recognize all of the kana until I’d been here for ten months, and speak like a demented Neanderthal child. Still, I knew all of the words on this page. I could tell that I’d be teaching the 6th grade during 2nd, 5th, and 6th periods. I would eat lunch with class 6-1. And that’s where my comprehension ended.
時間がとびますがよろしくおねがいします。Jikan ga tobimasu ga yoroshiku onegaishimasu.
Okay. I knew the parts of the sentence, so in my head it translated like this:
Time is jumps/flies is please be kind to me.
That couldn’t be right. I asked the ALT seated next to me. She suggested that perhaps they meant my schedule could change, so please be prepared. I Google Chat-ed a CIR. She proposed “Time is going quickly; please be aware,” but wasn’t confident in her translation. Ultimately she suggested I ask a Japanese person. So I did.
“What does this mean?” I asked my supervisor. “I read, ‘Time jump yoroshiku onegaishimasu.’ I don’t understand.”
He laughed, but nodded his head. “It means—” here he made a jumping or go over gesture, “second period, then fifth period.” He pointed to the schedule again. “So, Japanese say ‘jump.’” He gave a little hop to illustrate.
“Ah!” the other ALT and I exclaimed. We understood: Japanese use the verb tobu, or jump, when English speakers might use the nouns “space” or “gap.” Whoever wrote the schedule was acknowledging the gap between classes, adding the caveat yoroshiku. As in We know that you’ll be twiddling your thumbs during 3rd and 4th period. We know you; you’ll find something to do, we’re sure.
So make a note of it, boys and girls. In English, time flies like an arrow, fruit flies like a banana. In Japanese, time is jump is, please be kind to me.
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Laurel is a 4th-year municipal ALT in Kameoka, Kyoto-fu and the current co-editor and "webmaster" (is that a thing?) of the Ganbatte Times. Her leisure activities include taiko, aikido, making jewelry, and general silliness.
Great article, Laurel! It does indeed help to ask Japanese people what on earth something means when it gets all idiomatic up in your grill. . . . I’m too old to say crap like that. Er, too old for “up in your grill,” not “idiomatic.”
Let’s…. do…. the “time jump” again!