A Taste of Aji: Part 1
Friday, October 3rd, 2008
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I recently rented the Japanese movie 茶の味 (Cha no Aji, tea + taste), thinking it might actually be about tea. After all, someone translated the title as The Taste of Tea, so I don’t think I was off base in hoping it might be at least partly about Japanese tea. Out of all the uncontrollable passions in my life, tea runs a close second to kanji. If you want to know just how crazy I am about tea, take a look at my tea cabinet.
Green teas fill most of the upper shelf, with teabags to their left.
Black teas are on the lower right. Decaf teas are on the lower left.
There’s more at the office.
But the sad truth is that the movie wasn’t about tea. Not even a little. Well, OK, maybe a minuscule amount. One character poured some tea for another character once or twice, and the filmmakers left the matter at that.
I think they should have called the film A Taste of Tea, rather than The Taste of Tea. That way, they might have sent me a silent but forceful message: “Hey, Eve, this has nothing to do with genmaicha!”
Shades of Difference
In English, as I came to realize, there’s a big difference between “the taste of something” and “a taste of something.” That is, “the taste” has to do with sensations on the tongue. And “a taste” can take you off into more abstract and even metaphorical realms. For example, one might say, “He had a taste of what it’s like to be in love.” In that sense, “taste” has to do with experience. Then there are issues of good taste and bad—aesthetic evaluations.
Turns out, 味 can also convey these shades of difference, and more! For such a graphically simple character with just a few easy yomi (MI, aji, aji(wau)), 味 is rather complicated in terms of semantics.
To see what I mean, consider the way 味 has different meanings (i.e., meaning, interest, and tasty food) in three words you probably know:
意味 (imi: meaning, significance) meaning + meaning
趣味 (shumi: hobby) hobby + interest
味噌 (miso) tasty food + boisterousThis last breakdown makes no sense, because we’re seeing ateji with 噌; the yomi fits, but the meaning doesn’t.
The kun-yomi of 味 can take any of the following forms:
aji: flavor, taste; charm, style
aji(wau): to taste, savor, appreciate, enjoy
aji(na): smart, clever, witty
There are actually more forms, but I’d like to keep things relatively simple. We’ll look at these usages over the next few weeks. Let’s start by being really literal and examining 味 in the original sense—as a taste that the tongue detects.
Taste in the Literal Sense
A long time ago (in a land far, far away … sorry, I just wrote an article about fairytales), we saw 後口 (atokuchi: aftertaste, reminder, after + mouth). At that time, I mentioned the surprising fact that after + mouth = aftermath! If you take each of those kanji and pair it with 味, you form two other words, both of which relate to the sensation of taste:
後味 (atoaji: aftertaste) after + taste
This is a close synonym of 後口. Both 後味 and 後口 can refer to a literal aftertaste. When referring metaphorically to lingering memories, people generally use 後味.
Etymologically, 味 Also Means “Aftertaste” …
口味 (kōmi: taste, flavor, deliciousness) mouth + taste
Ah, this is a whale-fish compound. It’s also an extremely rare word.
Here are two more ways to say the same thing as 口味:
風味 (fūmi: taste, flavor) taste + taste
This applies only to food and to the way you might sense its flavor by smelling or eating it.
味わい (ajiwai: taste)
This word can refer to food, but it can also refer to taste in terms of paintings, poetry, novels, and other arts.
By the way, as you consider your ability to taste food, you might give credit where it’s due:
味蕾 (mirai: taste buds) taste + bud!
The word is obscure, and the second kanji is so uncommon that I can’t find information about it. But it combines grass,
, and lightning, 雷. Perhaps when a bud sprouts, the force of that release is comparable to explosions of thunder and lightning!
味覚 (mikaku: taste, palate, sense of taste) taste + senseWe’ve seen 覚 before in several ways.
Time for your Verbal Logic Quizzes (two short ones today)!
Posted by Eve Kushner in Kanji Curiosity |
October 3rd, 2008 at 6:57 pm
Just wanted to mention that this movie is by far my favourite japanese movie ever- and one of my favourite movies from anywhere. really surprised you could watch this movie and only mention how disappointed you were it’s not about tea. If anyone wants to see a really funny, touching movie- check it out.
October 4th, 2008 at 7:00 am
I wish the movie had been one of my favorites, Japanese or otherwise. It seemed to have all the ingredients that would make me happy in a movie: it’s set in idyllic, rural Japan, and it’s about zany, creative people. I did appreciate the sweetness of the family interactions. And I liked a few scenes. But ultimately it didn’t make much sense to me.
In the past, I’ve loved movies that have deviated from the rational or logical, including “Being John Malkovich,” “I Heart Huckabees,” and “The Eternal Sunshine of the Spotless Mind.” I felt I understood what the filmmakers were saying or doing, so I was happy to go into whatever strange worlds they created. But in the case of “The Taste of Tea,” I definitely wasn’t on the same wavelength with all the surrealism.
To add to the surrealism, my husband and I watched “The Taste of Tea” over 3 consecutive nights on the DVD player in a place we were renting. Every night, we struggled to stay awake as we watched the movie, both because we were really tired and because the pacing is quite leisurely. Since it wasn’t our DVD player, we couldn’t figure out how to bookmark where we’d left off in the movie, and the next night we ended up scanning from the beginning, trying to see what seemed familiar. We kept thinking, “Oh, THIS part is new,” so we’d watch that, only to realize that we recognized the next scene and the third one after that. Seeing the movie that way only heightened the sense of seeing a disjointed, incoherent movie.
I DO recommend the movie from the perspective of Japanese-language study. I felt that in many cases, the Japanese was spoken more clearly and slowly than in other movies or TV shows. On that level, I was definitely entertained.
October 13th, 2008 at 10:53 pm
Current Jpn movies are sometimes hard even for me to appreciate: they don’t have any dramatic turns or twists in the plot but describe warmth and love, etc in a very everyday kind of way. You feel them, you don’t analyze them.
We all (the whole family) liked 茶の味, everyone playing well in each role in the movie. The only problem I had was that the grandfather figure was too silly (he is meant to be a character, but still).
October 14th, 2008 at 1:37 am
Thanks for the comment, Hiroshi-san. Very insightful take on Japanese movies and the way to view and appreciate them. Your words certainly apply to Ozu movies.