The Most Common Japanese Expressions - atsui and samui
Atsui (hot) and samui (cold)
It’s often said that British people like to talk about the weather unusually often compared to other nationalities, but the same is true of Japanese people.
Whereas the British tend to elaborate on the topic in more detail (‘looks like rain’ or ‘Autumn’s almost here’, for example) however, the Japanese seem content with merely stating the obvious about the temperature – they exclaim ‘atsui’ at every opportunity all summer and ‘samui’ constantly throughout the winter.
This compulsion to comment on the temperature even extends to greetings, so much so that when I ask Japanese people how they are during summertime they almost always say ‘atsui’, while in winter the standard response to my question is invariably ‘samui’.
The introduction to this series of articles can be found here.
Because the intonation used for these comments is that of exclamation, it always sounds like people are half-alarmed and half-incredulous about the temperature. My Japanese friends assure me this is not the case, although I still find it hard to believe they’re merely commenting and not complaining.