GamerGaeth Posted September 13, 2011 Report Share Posted September 13, 2011 Okay, speaking as a linguistics nerd, I feel like a complete tool for not noticing this the first time that I saw Kirai: Kirai in Japanese means "Hate." Considering her backstory, I find that rather clever. Wow, I feel really slow. How late am I to figuring this one out? Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
edonil Posted September 13, 2011 Report Share Posted September 13, 2011 If I recall correctly, her last name means Shadow. Don't feel too bad...I figured it out because of the forum, lol Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Mr. Bigglesworth Posted September 13, 2011 Report Share Posted September 13, 2011 Hate... http://www.jp41.com/kanji/kirai.html Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Murphy'sLawyer Posted September 13, 2011 Report Share Posted September 13, 2011 Hee.... Everything in this game seems to have these little inside tid bits. It is fun to hear new ones like this. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Orboros Posted September 13, 2011 Report Share Posted September 13, 2011 Nice didnt know that. Thank you Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Kintaro Posted September 14, 2011 Report Share Posted September 14, 2011 If I recall correctly, her last name means Shadow. Don't feel too bad...I figured it out because of the forum, lol Not exactly....it's actually "darkness". And yes, her first name is "Hate". Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Cats Laughing Posted October 6, 2011 Report Share Posted October 6, 2011 Okay, speaking as a linguistics nerd, I feel like a complete tool for not noticing this the first time that I saw Kirai: Kirai in Japanese means "Hate." Considering her backstory, I find that rather clever. Wow, I feel really slow. How late am I to figuring this one out? I found it to be moderately cheesy myself :-0 Though it does entirely depend on what characters are used for her name and, one supposes, whether or not those characters mean the same thing in the Mali-verse. I've always preferred to think of 安国 (peaceful kingdom) as the characters for her last name, as it helps deflate the cheese in my mind via being somewhat ironic compared to her first name and storyline... though I admit "Darkness" make much more sense in keeping with the Kirai=hate meh Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Mydnight Posted October 6, 2011 Report Share Posted October 6, 2011 Not exactly....it's actually "darkness". And yes, her first name is "Hate". Thanks Kintaro, you spared me from grabbing my dictionary to find out the actual meaning of ankoku. @Gamergaeth, kage would be the word for shadow :-) Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Werecat Posted October 6, 2011 Report Share Posted October 6, 2011 Though it does entirely depend on what characters are used for her name and, one supposes, whether or not those characters mean the same thing in the Mali-verse. I'd be willing to be that they mean the same thing. I don't think language would change in any significant fashion in the relatively small amount of time humans have been on the other side of the breach. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Dracomax Posted October 6, 2011 Report Share Posted October 6, 2011 My problem with Kirai meaning hate is that it just...seems so... artificial. By which I mean that presumably her Parents named her(presuming for the moment that they went with western name order, and Kirai is her first name) Hate back on the other side. There is no real mention of dysfunction or tragedy in her past, and while she was poor, there isn't any indication she wasn't wanted, so why would her parents do that? Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Sliver Chocobo Posted October 6, 2011 Report Share Posted October 6, 2011 My problem with Kirai meaning hate is that it just...seems so... artificial. By which I mean that presumably her Parents named her(presuming for the moment that they went with western name order, and Kirai is her first name) Hate back on the other side. There is no real mention of dysfunction or tragedy in her past, and while she was poor, there isn't any indication she wasn't wanted, so why would her parents do that? Exapt it's real name, week as far a I know, I've seen at lest o e other tv show with a character called Kirai in it and how many people pick names for there meanings? Do you know yours Mine just translates into another name, then into stone Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Dracomax Posted October 6, 2011 Report Share Posted October 6, 2011 Exapt it's real name, week as far a I know, I've seen at lest o e other tv show with a character called Kirai in it and how many people pick names for there meanings? Do you know yours Mine just translates into another name, then into stone Mine translates into "twin" And you also have to take into account the culture Kirai comes from (given the flavor and names of her spirits, probably Japan, but definitely asiatic) in which many people do take into account meaning with names. Not only this, but in Japan at least, it's very important to not how a person spells their name--because the symbols can make a name pronounced the same way have an entirely different meaning. This is all aside from the point that she was named hate in her native tongue(whereas most names are seperated from their meaning by a barrier of at least one language, and archaic tranliterations.) I honestly would have been happier if they had named her "despair" from a fluff point of view, because it sounds kind of pretty and if you didn't know what it meant(as a poor family from Japan or china might not have known in the early 1900s) then that's really what you are paying attention too. The fact it would be ironic to the fate of the woman who bore it could then have been co-incidental. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Sliver Chocobo Posted October 6, 2011 Report Share Posted October 6, 2011 Found this wikipedea Karai (辛い) is a Japanese word commonly used to describe the flavor "spicy/hot". However, karai can also mean "extremely severe", "harsh", "strict" or "storm". (The word also shares the same kanji (辛) as the word tsurai which means "difficult", "painful", or "cruel".) Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Cats Laughing Posted October 6, 2011 Report Share Posted October 6, 2011 I'd be willing to be that they mean the same thing. I don't think language would change in any significant fashion in the relatively small amount of time humans have been on the other side of the breach. The reason I mentioned that is that Nerdelemental has mentioned that the Mali-verse is not exactly Earth and the Three Kingdoms that Kirai, Misaki and others have come from is not exactly China, Korea and Japan, despite the many obvious references. Instead it's some melting pot of of those three cultures with whatever changes he felt makes for a good story. You'll note in book 2 that she speaks to Phillip in some mix of Chinese, and that her "Kimono" has some aspects of a Hanbok and perhaps other influences. With that in mind, it seems possible that the characters for her name are something unrelated to "Hate" and/or are the same characters we would recognize as "Hate" but mean something entirely different. I suspect that in the Mali-verse Kirai's name was originally written with characters that have a more beautiful and feminine meaning in the Three Kindgoms, much for the same reason Dracomax commented (Ie: what sane parents name their little girl "Hate"), but perhaps now others(and Kirai herself) in the Mali-verse think of the words "Hate" and "Darkness" when they hear her name. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Dracomax Posted October 6, 2011 Report Share Posted October 6, 2011 I like Cats Laughing's interpretation. barring confirmation elsewhwere, I'm going with that. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Cats Laughing Posted October 6, 2011 Report Share Posted October 6, 2011 Found this wikipedea Karai (辛い) is a Japanese word commonly used to describe the flavor "spicy/hot". However, karai can also mean "extremely severe", "harsh", "strict" or "storm". (The word also shares the same kanji (辛) as the word tsurai which means "difficult", "painful", or "cruel".) Karai and Kirai are very different in pronunciation, as well as meaning. Though I occasionally tell Japanese friends that I "kirai" "karai" foods... :-P People in Japan and Korea do, in modern times, occasionally select names for the sound of the name, rather than the meaning. In these cases, they often skip giving the name characters (which carry meaning) and instead use their respective phonetic* alphabet. Parents can also attempt to find characters that have the sounds necessary to combine for the sounds of the name they have selected. Many characters in Japanese have multiple pronunciations and meanings, which allows for a wide variety. I know several girls named "Yuki" and none share the same set of characters in their name. That said, very few sane parents are going to name their child "Baka" "Sukebe" or any number of other common words with negative meanings, regardless of the combination of characters with nice meanings they could use for those sounds. *I'm not a linguist, I could very well be using the wrong terms. Please forgive me... Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Sliver Chocobo Posted October 6, 2011 Report Share Posted October 6, 2011 Sorry just noticed the slight difference in spelling, now I feel silly :facepalm Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Mako Posted October 6, 2011 Report Share Posted October 6, 2011 If you start letting spelling variations in, isn't kirei an adjective meaning beautiful? From my japanese lessons a few years back I seem to remember Kirei na hana being beautiful flower... But I think Kirai is a pretty name, even if it does mean hate! Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Cats Laughing Posted October 6, 2011 Report Share Posted October 6, 2011 If you start letting spelling variations in, isn't kirei an adjective meaning beautiful? From my japanese lessons a few years back I seem to remember Kirei na hana being beautiful flower... But I think Kirai is a pretty name, even if it does mean hate! I can see it now, Kirai's parents are backwater hicks with no education and a bit of an accent/slur. They give birth at home with the help of a cousin/midwife and the father goes to the county clerk to register his new child. "I want to name her Kirei" he says, but slurs it just a little. The clerk is also mostly uneducated but at least can write. However, he's had a bad day, isn't thinking straight, and writes down Kirai. Kirai's father can't read and marks his X on the official registry... Little Kirai goes to school several years later, gets laughed out of her class, runs away eventually making her way to Malifaux and we know most of the rest of that story. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Kintaro Posted October 13, 2011 Report Share Posted October 13, 2011 LOL! Nice! I think it's just a clever bit of wordsmithing on Wyrd's part, but hey, after what happened to her, she IS seven kinds of $$$$$$$$ed off!! Perhaps she just "assumed" the name since she's in "vengeance mode"? By the way, further back up someone suggested that names are commonly chosen in Japan with little-to-no attention paid to thier meaning - in my experience (and let me quantify this for ya : My wife is Japanese, and I travel there yearly. I deal with homestay kids and their families as a small side-business, I speak/read/write Japanese etc etc), most families DO pay attention to the meaning, but they also choose Kanji for various other reasons....one of the coolest I've heard is the amount of strokes and their order : more = more power! Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
thaehl Posted October 13, 2011 Report Share Posted October 13, 2011 Another fun fact, if you break her name up into its parts Ki, and Rai you get something interesting. Ki means literally spirit or energy, and Rai is lightning. enjoy. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Sliver Chocobo Posted October 13, 2011 Report Share Posted October 13, 2011 So her name means both hate and spirit lightening Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Kintaro Posted October 24, 2011 Report Share Posted October 24, 2011 Well, it would depend on the kanji it's written out with, so the simple answer is "no", since the kanji for "hate" and the kanji for "Spirit'/"lightning" are not the same. BTW, KI does not mean "spirit" as in "ghost", but spirit as in "school spirit" or "lifeforce" (energy etc)....EX : "She's a very SPIRITED young lady!" Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
nerdelemental Posted October 24, 2011 Report Share Posted October 24, 2011 And I don't recall seeing anyone translate the various Kanji symbols I sprinkled around in Book 2. If I remember they spell out the code to unlock DaVinci's final vault where he kept his best secret stuff. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Fading Memory Posted October 24, 2011 Report Share Posted October 24, 2011 And I don't recall seeing anyone translate the various Kanji symbols I sprinkled around in Book 2. If I remember they spell out the code to unlock DaVinci's final vault where he kept his best secret stuff. That's awesome!!! Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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