Linguistics believe that the Japanese language is one of the most complex languages in the world.
I recently came across the Japanese term Yoko-Meshi, and after some research, I found this is one such word that holds many meanings, depending on the context.
I fell in love with one particular meaning, so I decided to share it with you today.
Meshi literally means ‘boiled rice’ and Yoko, ‘horizontal’. These two words combined create the concept of ‘A meal eaten sideways’.
I like it, Yoko-Meshi looks like a word with a great sense of humour. ‘A meal eaten sideways’, refers to the fact that the Japanese language is normally written vertically, whereas most languages are written horizontally. So speaking a foreign language would be like eating in an awkward position.
What an untranslatable gem!
Japanese people have found a beautiful way of describing the peculiar stress caused by speaking a foreign language, and I found a word to describe my everyday life!
Yugen 