Domo Obrigado, Rio. Image: Reuters/Yahoo www.rappler.com/technology/social-media/143810-viral-rio-2016-closing-shinzo-abe-super-marioThe 2016 Olympics wrapped last weekend, and of course, the show couldn’t be over without first shooting off a whole hell of a lot of fireworks and getting a lot of mileage out of that massive video display that had been installed on the floor of the Maracaná Stadium.
As is tradition at the Olympics, the closing also paid a hefty tribute to the next host city, Tokyo. Tokyo’s new mayor (technically a governor) Yuriko Koike, the city’s first female leader, was on stage along with Rio’s mayor Eduardo Paes. But Koike wasn’t the highest ranking Japanese politician to attend the event – that honor went to prime minister Shinzo Abe, who made his entrance out of a giant green pipe in the center of the stadium, dressed as Mario from the Super Mario Brothers. But instead of bursting in with a chipper “It’s-a-me, Shinzo!”, Abe looked remarkably underwhelmed as he entered, almost saddened, with a look on his face that seemed to say that the only reason he had bothered with the pipe and Mario getup was to rack up shares on social media (by the way, mission accomplished). Perhaps he would have felt a bit peppier if he had grabbed a giant red mushroom before taking the stage. But for language nerds like myself, the highlight of the whole ordeal was right before Abe’s Mario moment, when the massive Maracaná display lit up with a message thanking its attendees. But in honor of both Rio and Tokyo, that message was put into both Portuguese and Japanese: “Obrigado”, “Arigato”. And in doing so, it perhaps prompted viewers to ask a question that has long perplexed many Japano-Brazilian polyglots: does the word “arigato” derive from “obrigado”? The short answer is that no, it doesn't. Though this theory has been bandied about by many would-be linguistic historians, it has been dismissed pretty decisively: see this link, or this link if you’re not yet convinced. Nevertheless, the idea that “arigato” is some distant cousin of “obrigado” is not as far fetched as you might think. The connection between Portuguese and Japanese actually goes way back, long before Japan had become the land of Mario and Murakami, to the time when Portuguese explorers dropped anchor off the shores of Shogun-dominated Japan. Wikipedia has a long list of Japanese words stemming from Portuguese; particularly notable are words like “irmao”, which means simply “brother” in Portuguese, but thanks to an influx of missionaries from Portugal, became “iruman” in Japanese, referring to a “missionary next in line to become a priest”. Presumably, Portuguese missionaries in Japan would call each other “irmao”; curious Japanese onlookers, who already had a word for “brother” but lacked a good word for a missionary in that very specific situation, eagerly adopted it into their own mother tongue. This is also good news for English speakers, since several of the words the Japanese adopted from Portuguese are directly related to their English equivalents. The word “alcohol”, for instance, is “alcool” in Portuguese and “arukoru” in Japanese. Nice to know for anyone looking to take in a swig of sake. The Olympics may be coming to a close, but anyone around the world curious about the origins of “arigato” and “obrigado” can be thankful to the event for shining a light on this frequently misunderstood linguistic coincidence. That's it for our special on language-related Olympics goings-on, but you can check out our earlier pieces, Part 1 on the history of "The Girl From Ipanema", and Part 2 on how bad behavior at the Olympics knows no language barrier. Check them out! "I wish this medal was a brain". Okay, Lochte didn't say that here. But he should have. Image: Getty Ryan Lochte is one of the greatest swimmers in the world. And it's a good thing too, because he has virtually no other talent. Thinking clearly isn't his thing; a compilation of interviews he's given shows he's not a particularly thoughtful person, nor does he come off particularly well off the cuff. One clip shows him telling an interviewer: "What I was always good at was letting things go through, like, through one ear, out the other.” Math isn’t exactly his strong suit either. In another interview in the same clip, the interviewer asks him what seven times four is equal to. His response: “21”. He may have the muscle mass to win 12 Olympic medals, but he barely has the brain matter to count to 12.
If all this sounds like I’m being too hard on the guy, it won’t after you hear about his destructive antics in Rio. Far from being a kind, considerate soul during those moments when all his neurons are firing correctly, Lochte all too often becomes a pompous, vandalism-prone jerk. The episode in question took place about mid-way through the Olympics. After a night of partying on Saturday the 13th, Lochte and his merry band of fellow dude-bros from the US swim team stopped at a gas station on their way back to the Olympic village. Presumably intoxicated, they proceeded to urinate on some of the walls, destroy the door of a bathroom, a soap dispenser, and a sign at the gas station. Understandably unhappy with the situation, private security demanded repayment for the damage done, at one point threatening Lochte and the other athletes with a gun. But after the episode played out, Lochte filed a police report in which he neglected to list the acts of vandalism he himself committed, categorizing the incident not as a rightful, if jarring, request for payback for those actions, but instead as armed robbery. Though initially inclined to believe Lochte’s account, after video surfaced of the event, authorities decided instead to go after the four men who had caused the trouble and then lied about it to authorities. Two of these four were intercepted while they were about to leave the country on a flight back to the states. But Lochte himself was long gone, brushing the incident aside with a brief apology on Instagram. The incident blew up into an international scandal, with negative reactions in both the Brazilian and US media. The New York Post (of all places) labeled Lochte as “the ugly American”, others cited the incident as proof positive of his white privilege. But there’s another lesson that can be gleaned from this, too: being a jerk is something that carries through all language barriers. It’s interesting to try to picture the scene at the gas station. Though there is video of the event, there’s no audio – presumably a great deal of shouting in Portuguese was involved. But beyond this, the whole episode begs the question of just how much the two parties: the boozed up swimmers and the security guards, actually understood of one another. The vandalism element, presumably, is an action that requires no translation. But is it reasonable to then assume that the swimmers, despite their lack of Portuguese skills, could then infer what exactly was going on? Specifically, if you destroy a gas station bathroom, people will probably want you to pay for it? The answer will probably have less to do with any high-minded linguistic calculations and more to do with the blood-alcohol levels of the gentlemen involved with the vandalizing. But, despite this factor, and Lochte’s reasonable assertion that the language barrier played a role, it still would be reasonable to assume that, even if you don’t speak a word of Portuguese, vandalizing a bathroom is seen as a bad thing by its owners. And if they ask you for money after you do it, that doesn’t exactly qualify as robbery. In this case, Lochte’s thick skull might work in his favor. If he ever faces any legal consequences for this, his demonstrable denseness can be put forward as evidence that he really had no idea that “fake police” waving guns at him had nothing to do with his bathroom rampage. Of course, this ploy would require him to have a team of much more mentally adept lawyers at his disposal (and as a 12 time gold medalist, he probably does). But for regular people, less likely to be equipped with gold medals, a smaller than average brain, and a general lack of empathy, there’s a lesson to be learned here too. Even the best intentioned American tourist will probably not be able to learn Portuguese in a matter of days or even weeks before visiting Brazil, or any other language that might be necessary for other travel plans. But that doesn’t mean that you have an excuse to throw common decency out the window. Though customs can vary from country to country, it’s a safe bet that ravaging gas station facilities is viewed in an extremely negative light, no matter where you are on the planet. But, to a certain extent, the opposite holds true too. Go out of your way to be understanding of locals, even if you don’t speak their language, and your time spent in foreign countries is much more likely to be a pleasant, enjoyable experience.
Astrud Gilberto and Stan Getz perform "The Girl From Ipanema, 1964. Source: FabTV/Youtube
Tall and tan and young and lovely, “The Girl From Ipanema” is an undisputed musical classic. Released in the mid 60s, it was one of the few singles that succeeded in dethroning the massive hits cranked out by the Beatles on the American charts, if only for a short while. Today, more than 50 years later, it has been remixed and reinterpreted more times than it’s possible to count.
It also holds a special place in the hearts of Brazilians. And with Brazil at the center of the world stage thanks to the Rio Olympics, it was only natural for the song to be featured in the opening ceremony of the games. Organizers even picked out famous Brazilian model Gisele Bundchen to represent the girl from Ipanema, proudly strutting out on the catwalk assembled in the middle of the Maracaná stadium.
Gisele Bundchen as the girl from Ipanema at Rio's 2016 Olympics. Photo: New York Times
But English speaking listners familiar with the standard English translation of the lyrics would be surprised to find that they have almost nothing to do with the literal meaning of the original Portuguese lyrics. How different? We’ve put together a handy, 3 column comparison of the original lyrics in Portuguese, the literal translation of them in English, and the standard version of the song most English speakers usually hear:
What a difference! First of all, it’s clear why the official translation is always used. It flows much better with the melody of the original, and brings in a rhyming scheme that would be hard to add to a more literal version of the lyrics.
But it’s amazing to see how, despite mixing in some of the original words (“tan”, “sway”, etc.), the official translation flips the narrative of the original song around. In the original, listeners can perhaps picture a guy laying out on the beaches of Rio, watching a pretty girl go by, knowing he doesn’t have a chance and finding it to be a bit of a downer, but nonetheless finding a positive spin to put on it: that the “smiling world fills with grace, and becomes prettier because of love.” On the other hand, the official translation has a much sadder tone, that of a hopeless lover, desperate for the admiration of a beach beauty, but completely shot down, and without any consolation from a smiling world as the song wraps up to a few gentle toots from a tenor sax. Is there any explanation for such a difference? Looking at how the song was composed, and later translated, might give us a clue. The original music for the song was composed by Antonio Carlos “Tom” Jobim (the namesake of Rio de Janeiro’s airport), with lyrics by Vinicius de Moraes. The pair composed the song in 1962, during a get-together near (where else?) Rio’s Ipanema beach, in admiration of one of the prettier girls walking by. Though the song was recorded in Portuguese immediately after it was written, the authors had no intention of translating it into English. Little did they know that, as they were relaxing on the beach, ogling hot girls, the well-known American sax player Stan Getz was getting ready to introduce their musical style, samba, to a US audience. Getz got the idea from guitarist Charlie Byrd, who toured Brazil the year before. Together, they released “Jazz Samba” in 1962, including a song written by Jobim. It was an immediate success in the States, leaving Americans eager for more. In response to this, Getz brought in Brazilian guitarist João Gilberto to record a new album, "Getz/Gilberto" on which Gilberto was to sing a few Brazilian classics in Portuguese. But since Gilberto didn’t feel comfortable singing in English (his English skills only extended to a few sentences), his English-speaking wife Astrud was brought in to sing in English. Though Astrud Gilberto didn’t do the translating herself (that was done by Norman Gimbel) and it wasn’t her husband doing the ogling, it’s hard not for her to imagine getting a bit of pleasure singing out the story of a man, possibly an unfaithful husband, getting shot down as he goes after pretty young things on the beach when he should be at work. But, despite the comparatively less upbeat tone of the song, it went on to be a huge hit. And there were even versions of the song made in other languages too: Spanish, French, and even Japanese! |
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