"KAWAII" vs. "KOWAI"

"KAWAII" vs. "KOWAI"

I just wanna share the lessons I learned today.

"Kawaii" may be one of the most popular Japanese word lately due to the activities by BABYMETAL.
However, I noticed this evening that there is one thing to note for non-Japanese guys when using this word ...

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Today, my Aussie friend, John, came to Tokyo from Melbourne.

He, Hayato (my friend), Chika (Hayato's GF), and I went out for a dinner at a local pub.

While drinking and eating, John said in Japanese to Chika "Kawaii ne !" (which means “you're cute” in a friendly/ casual manner).
Hayato laughed, and Chika smiled, but her smile looked to be flat, and it even appeared to me that she frowned slightly.
I thought Chika felt uncomfortable with John as he praised her in front of Hayato.

While John was at bathroom, I told her not to take John's words so seriously because they were simply the polite things to say sometimes to a girl whom western guy meets for the first time.

Actually, Chika does not speak English and I felt she did not get used to communicate with foreign people.

Against my advice, Chika reacted a little bit emotionally saying "Polite things ? I don't think so !"
I didn't understand why she was angry.
Neither did Hayato.

"Ken, I'm sorry for saying this, but your friend is rude”
While Hayato was trying to stop her, I replied.
“Rude ? Ah, excuse me, Chika, can you elaborate a bit ?”
“Hey, he said he was scared by me !"

Then she turned to Hayato and asked "Do I look terrible today ? Anything wrong with me ?"
Both Hayato and I lost word, but he just squeezed out "No ..."

After a while, we recognized that there had been total misunderstanding.

The thing was that John pronounced "kawaii" in a different way, something like "kwai", i.e. he skipped vowel "a" between letters "k" and "w" and also shortened "ii" as "i".

As a result, his "kawaii" was altered as “kwai” which sounded like "kowai" to Chika.

The word "kowai" means "scary" or "I'm scared".

Chika thought that John told her a black joke teasing her make-up or outfits or attitude or behavior or something like that.

Well, when she got mad, it was really scary for me, but okay, she got the whole thing right in the end, and laughed very hard.

As a native speaker, I have NEVER paid attention to the similarity of pronunciation between "kawaii" and "kowai", but, okay, now I have noticed it.

• • • • • • • • • -

Just FYI to whom it may concern when talking to a Japanese girl ^^v

Seeeee yooouuu …