Japanぼっち (botchi)
noun · Informal · BOT-chee
On your own, with the implication that you would rather not be. ぼっち飯 is eating lunch alone at school or work, a small social dread in Japan.
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Japan
Japanese Slang for People
15 Japanese slang terms for people, each with its meaning, how it is pronounced and an example of it in use.
Labels for social types: the show-off, the country cousin, the city sophisticate, the freeloader. These words tell you what a culture notices about its own members.
ブサイク (busaiku)
noun, adjective · Informal · boo-SAI-koo
Ugly; badly put together. Used of faces above all, and cruelly frank by the standards of English public speech.
Use with care
チャラい (charai)
adjective · Informal · cha-RAI
Flashy and insubstantial; a bit of a player. Of a man whose clothes, patter and dating history all suggest he should not be relied upon.
イケメン (ikemen)
noun · Colloquial · EE-keh-men
A good-looking man. Neutral, extremely common, and usable in print — magazines and television use it without irony.
陰キャ (inkya)
noun · Informal · IN-kya
A shadow type: quiet, indoorsy, not part of the loud group. Its opposite, 陽キャ (yōkya), is the sunny, sociable kind.
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Use with care
空気読めない (kūki yomenai)
phrase, adjective · Colloquial · KOO-kee yo-meh-nai
Unable to sense the mood of a room — the person who keeps arguing after everyone has moved on, or raises a question at the exact wrong moment.
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元カノ (motokano)
noun · Colloquial · moh-toh-KA-noh
An ex-girlfriend. 元カレ is the male equivalent, and the two are used symmetrically.
推し (oshi)
noun · Informal · OH-shee
Your favourite — the member of a group, the character or the performer you personally back and promote.
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おっさん (ossan)
noun · Informal · OS-san
A middle-aged bloke. Rude to his face — the neutral word is おじさん — but ordinary in the third person and very common self-deprecatingly.
Use with care
オタク (otaku)
noun · Colloquial · oh-TA-koo
Someone with an all-consuming hobby — anime and games canonically, but also railways, idols or military history. The English borrowing has narrowed to anime alone; the Japanese word has not.
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リア充 (riajū)
noun · Informal · REE-a-joo
Someone whose offline life is going well — partner, friends, plans at the weekend. Said with envy by people who consider themselves the opposite.
社畜 (shachiku)
noun · Informal · SHA-chee-koo
A corporate drone: someone whose life has been wholly absorbed by their employer. Almost always self-applied, with dark humour.
塩対応 (shio taiō)
noun · Informal · SHEE-oh tai-OH
A cold reception: technically polite, emotionally flat. Of an idol who signs an autograph without looking up, or a colleague answering in monosyllables.
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ツンデレ (tsundere)
noun, adjective · Informal · TSOON-deh-reh
Someone prickly on the surface and soft underneath, who shows affection by insulting you and then quietly doing you a favour.
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ヤンキー (yankī)
noun · Colloquial · YAN-kee
A delinquent teenager of a very specific Japanese kind: dyed hair, modified school uniform, squatting outside a convenience store, quite possibly a scooter.
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