I saw this on another forum I frequent, thought some people here might enjoy:

Quote:The Grass is always greener on the other side... An interesting proverb, the implication of which certainly started a mass debate on this web site.

But can the problem be identified within the Japanese of this very proverb?
隣の芝生は青く見える. (tonari no shibafu wa aoku mieru)
Lit. Next door's lawn looks bluer.

So there you have it, the proverb just doesn't work quite as well when you are concerned about the neighbour's lawn being a slightly nicer shade of blue.

Now I know many of you are saying "Ah, but the Japanese commonly use the word for blue when they mean green‚ even though there is a perfectly respectful word for green too (midori 「緑」). But the plot thickens, the Japanese word for "brown" is "chairo" 「茶色」 which literally means "tea coloured". Now we also know that Japanese tea is actually green (or blue?) which in my opinion would also make brown = green = blue.

So does this mean that the grass is actually BROWNER on the other side, which means it isn't quite as nice as my lawn. Of course it could still mean that the lawn is greener, or is in fact a rather nice shade of blue which just doesn't seem to make much sense at all.

Hmmmmmm... all this confusion may also explain why not many houses is Japan actually have lawns to start with.

Hope this clears things up a bit.

It's not like all Japanese tea is green. In fact, 麦茶 is definitely my personal favorite since I don't like green tea all that much (抹茶 is horrible, at least in Ice cream).

The point of that post is funny though.

That seems like a fun forum. Can you post a link or name for us?

My favorite green tea is 玉露. I went to a tea tasting party and it was yummy.

One of my Japanese coworkers taught me that phrase, but I already forgot it again, so thanks for posting it here ^-^

As for Japanese green tea I like 玄米茶、ほうじ茶、番茶、煎茶 the best, I guess.
Not a big fan of 麦茶.

welldone101, actually it's martial arts forum specific to the school I study in, so this post was pretty unusual (and old, it's from 2006). it came out of a sub forum that was meant to be about the Japanese language.. but of course 95% of the posts are about translation requests or clarifications of kanji for technique names. so unfortunately probably not the community you're looking for :\ but copy and paste some of the text into google and you'll find it.

The Japanese equivalent to this phrase is 隣の花は赤い just so you know.

Interestingly, 青 actually means "green" in Chinese.
And most (if not all) Chinese tea are of dark brown colour, so 茶色 definitely means brown in Chinese without ambiguities.

EDIT: after reading, i found that 青 also means blue. But nowaday, it usually means green.

We use the tealeaves to define the color of the tea.
green tea -> green leaves
the black tea -> black leaves (after the fermentation)

The japanese People don't look at the leaves, they look at the color of the end product:
green tea -> brown tea
black tea -> red tea

rrrrrray Wrote:Interestingly, 青 actually means "green" in Chinese.
And most (if not all) Chinese tea are of dark brown colour, so 茶色 definitely means brown in Chinese without ambiguities.

Is that the reason why for Japanese people so many things that are actually green are 青 for them? (e.g. traffic light, apples etc.)?

@Teskal: Woah, thanks! I NEVER realized!! (゜ロ゜')

Tobberoth Wrote:(抹茶 is horrible, at least in Ice cream).

Man, I love 抹茶.

Wikipedia actually has an article on this subject:

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Distinguish...n_language

(And how can you not love Macha?)

Also very interesting:

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Traditional...s_of_Japan

chochajin Wrote:

rrrrrray Wrote:Interestingly, 青 actually means "green" in Chinese.
And most (if not all) Chinese tea are of dark brown colour, so 茶色 definitely means brown in Chinese without ambiguities.

Is that the reason why for Japanese people so many things that are actually green are 青 for them? (e.g. traffic light, apples etc.)?

@Teskal: Woah, thanks! I NEVER realized!! (゜ロ゜')

I've never understood the 'blue = unripe' bit, but the traffic lights in Japan are almost universally blue, in fact -- not green.

Tobberoth Wrote:It's not like all Japanese tea is green. In fact, 麦茶 is definitely my personal favorite since I don't like green tea all that much (抹茶 is horrible, at least in Ice cream).

The point of that post is funny though.

抹茶アイスクリームはおいしいだよ。

Teskal Wrote:The japanese People don't look at the leaves, they look at the color of the end product:
green tea -> brown tea
black tea -> red tea

緑茶 = brown tea??? :|

JimmySeal Wrote:

Teskal Wrote:The japanese People don't look at the leaves, they look at the color of the end product:
green tea -> brown tea
black tea -> red tea

緑茶 = brown tea??? :|

No, green tea is still 御茶 (おちゃ).

Japanese don't use 緑 for green tea.

That is the reason why 茶色 means brown.

Black Tea is 紅茶 (こうちゃ).

and don't forget グリーンティー!

Teskal Wrote:Japanese don't use 緑 for green tea.

That is the reason why 茶色 means brown.

Are you making this up in your head? Japanese people do use the word 緑茶 to distinguish it from other types of tea and though the generic word お茶 usually refers to green tea, it doesn't always. In any case, they don't refer to green tea as "brown tea," and you're using circular logic to say that they do. As for this,

Quote:The japanese People don't look at the leaves, they look at the color of the end product:
green tea -> brown tea

I still don't know what you're talking about because the end product of green tea is still green.

No, I'm not making it up, I got this information from my Sensei in School, she is Japanese.

I didn't know the vocab. 緑茶. I see it the first time. Every Day there is something new I must learn...

My Sensei explained that the Japanese use the Kanji for (green) tea for the color brown, because green tea is normally brown, not green.

This picture is the first green tea I every saw. All other where always brown.

Which kind of green tea is it?


(Ähm, 抹茶 is lot of greener, because of the green power is part of the drink, or not?)

Teskal is basically right that the English green/black designations are based on the colours of the leaves, while the Japanese 紅茶 and 紅茶 are based on the prepared drink. And of course JimmySeal is right that 緑茶 is used to mean green tea.
According to wikipedia, brown is called 茶色 because that's the colour things turn when dyed with tea (it doesn't say whether such dying uses green or black tea, though. Maybe people used one kind for drinking and another kind for dying).
I kind of understand Teskal's surprise at how green that tea is. Green tea is reasonably popular in Canada, and I drank a lot of it when I lived there, but the colour of the prepared drink is usually a sort of amber colour with at most a slight green tinge. Only in Japan (and in Japanese restaurants abroad) have I seen really green-coloured "green tea" and I've often wondered if the colour is somehow enhanced in Japanese brands (either artificially, or perhaps by adding a small amount of powdered leaves to the blend).

Canned green tea here have 緑茶 written on it. But I don't know if this can be Chinese.

Teskal Wrote:No, I'm not making it up, I got this information from my Sensei in School, she is Japanese.
...
My Sensei explained that the Japanese use the Kanji for (green) tea for the color brown, because green tea is normally brown, not green.

日本語 teachers have a tendency to oversimplify things or even give wrong information for the sake of simplifying things, or because they themselves don't know any better. Be careful.

Quote:Which kind of green tea is it?

Just ordinary green tea. I found it by just google searching for "green tea." None of the results in the first five pages is brown, though some are a yellowish color.

Matcha is even greener, and frothy, and yes it is made with tea powder:

I teach newcomers in Canada. Many of my students are from China. They didn't know what black tea was. Tea was classified as red (our black) and green.

Regular 緑茶 is both green or brown, it seems to me. Just looking around my house, I have かおりちゃん　緑茶 and the popular iced tea お～お茶. Both are labeled just 緑茶 in the ingredients, whereas the かおりちゃん looks green exactly like the first picture JimmySeal posted, and the お～お茶 is very brown. These are far from the only examples of both colors that I've seen.

This doesn't actually help the discussion here, but then, I'm not really sure what the discussion is supposed to be.

JimmySeal Wrote:

Teskal Wrote:No, I'm not making it up, I got this information from my Sensei in School, she is Japanese.
...
My Sensei explained that the Japanese use the Kanji for (green) tea for the color brown, because green tea is normally brown, not green.

日本語 teachers have a tendency to oversimplify things or even give wrong information for the sake of simplifying things, or because they themselves don't know any better. Be careful.

Quote:Which kind of green tea is it?

Just ordinary green tea. I found it by just google searching for "green tea." None of the results in the first five pages is brown, though some are a yellowish color.

Matcha is even greener, and frothy, and yes it is made with tea powder:
http://www.greenteagourmet.com/imgs/matcha.jpg

Both pictures shows matcha (I looked on the page of the picture) and matcha has many powdered leaves in the tea itself. :-)

My 日本語 teacher is 日本人 so I don't think she will simplifing it.

But some green teas are more green, than others, that I learned today.