Travels with Friends: Engrish Edition

A few days after the earthquake catastrophe, our friend Nik (featured on this blog in many previous posts) came to visit.  He escaped the rolling blackouts and possible heightened radiation of Yokohama by visiting first Osaka and then Gifu.  The next few posts will be dedicated to our many travels, but first, here are just a few Engrish signs we happened upon.

On 3/17 we headed to Inuyama.  On the way to the train, we saw "Bakery Cannon."  Nik and Matt decided to go in and get lots of bread-centered brunch food.  It was unbelievable food, very French in style.  Matt had a small baguette with salami, then a foccacia pizza, then a melon pan.  Nik had a bacon and cheese croissant sandwich and a apple fritter-esque croissant-based pastry.  The name did indeed reference cannons, and purposely: the baker's name is Taihou, which can mean cannon in Japanese.

In a few blocks from Bakery Cannon, we happened upon SPIC salon.  I may have mentioned this in a blog when we first arrived, but the sign is funny enough to post.  I love the fact that it is "international."  Perhaps they got it from "spic 'n span."  All we can think of when we look at it is the horrible racial slur.

When we arrived in Inuyama, we stepped off the train and this sign for "Monkey Pharmacy" greeted us.  I really don't have anything to say about this.  It's just funny.  There's not any particularly bad English on the sign and it's not using what to us is an obvious racial slur (in today's lingo, anyway).  It does make me pause and think, "why monkey?"  Perhaps I should be thinking with every other pharmacy, "why not monkey?"  In any case, Inuyama was probably the least Engrish-filled place I've been to in Japan to date.

On 3/18 we went to Nagoya for a few reasons, most related to working out for ourselves some of what was going on with Japan in the aftermath of the earthquake, and the ongoing nuclear situation.  We didn't get many answers, but we did see two incredibly funny Engrish things.  First, to the right, you have jeans bearing the stamp "Male Lolita."  There is a fashion style in Japan called "Goth Loli," where girls dress in semi-Victorian era fashions that are often but not always dark in color, extremely ruffly, short, doll-like, and cover themselves in makeup.  For more on this trend you can check this site.  However, there's not usually any male Lolitas.  I think that defeats the point of being a Lolita.  Also, I think those jeans are for girls.

Last but not least, here's a sign for Homo Milk.  We're pretty sure it means "homogenized," but it doesn't come across that way.  Morinaga Homo Gyuunyuu is the top line of kanji, and the bottom line is Inukai Hanbaiten.  It's all about a store that sells milk.