Ekiden relay race

Ekiden is an abbreviation for “ekiden kyoso,” or relay road race. Many older adults may have seen New Year’s ekiden races or local ekiden events on TV. Watching several long-distance runners pass the sash (tasuki) makes you want to cheer them on, doesn’t it? The origin of ekiden dates back to 1917, when runners went from Sanjo Ohashi in Kyoto Prefecture to Shinobazu Pond in Tokyo. The event was named the “Tokyo Tento Commemorative Tokaido Ekiden Pedestrian Race.”

Commercial message

If you’re an older viewer who watches TV, CM might be a familiar term. CM stands for “commercial message” and refers to the advertisements aired between programs. The term is used not only for television but also for radio. The first CM in Japan was Seikosha’s morning time signal.

air conditioner

An air conditioner is climate control equipment that adjusts things like indoor temperature and humidity. There’s a similar device called a “cooler.” Since a cooler is designed specifically to “cool,” it doesn’t have a heating function. That’s the difference from an air conditioner, which can do both cooling and heating.

convenience store

In English, “convenience” is said to mean “handy” or “useful.” The birthplace of convenience stores is the United States, where people had a custom of buying in bulk. A certain company opened a convenient shop that carried items people often forgot to buy, as well as foods that were difficult to store. It was well received and expanded into a chain. This is said to be the origin of convenience stores.

overwhelmingly on top

Dantotsu can also be written as “断トツ,” and it’s an abbreviation of “断然トップ” (decisively/top by far). “断然” means clearly or by a wide margin, and “トップ” comes from English meaning first or at the front. Lately you also hear expressions like “ダントツ首位” (dantotsu shui). If you translate that strictly, it becomes “the foremost first position,” which is redundant and therefore incorrect.

staple bread

Even when we say “shokupan” (loaf bread), there are many different varieties nowadays. There are several theories about the origin of the name. At the shop considered the pioneer of Japanese shokupan, they changed the yeast used in the dough and succeeded in creating a bread that rose more than the sweet breads that existed until then. Some say it was designated as “bread for staple food” in contrast to sweet bread, while others suggest the name comes from the fact that, overseas before bread spread in Japan, bread was a staple food. It sounds fun to look into it more, doesn’t it?