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Okay, so ...

inscrutable language joke

... this joke takes a little bit of explanation unless you have a rudimentary understanding of Japanese. Basically, sukiyaki is a dish and daisuki means "to like a lot". So, if you really like sukiyaki and (terrible) puns, you can say "daisuki-yaki" and ...

...

*stares in Yuko's direction* Well, I know someone who feel compelled to say it every time we have sukiyaki at her parents' house.

One of the anecdotes on Wikipedia explains the origins of the word sukiyaki: the kanji in sukiyaki basically mean "plow" and "cook". This is because medieval farmers would heat up their plows and cook the meat right on top of them! I thought that was a neat explanation, whether or not it's true. You can read a whole lot more about it at the wikipedia article up top, or right here.

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Comments

I got to facepalm at the joke without needing the explanation. Go me.

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I thought it was pun-derful! Go Yuko!

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I dunno, it kinda made me want to pun-t a baby.

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Doesn't that make you feel a bit like a punk, though? We may need to get a pundit to do a report on people like you.

OK, I'll stop with the punishment.

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I unfortunately got this right away (Although I always thought Daisuke was Daiski without a u sound..). As with all puns, good or bad, I smiled and shook my head even as no one else got it x___x. Woo, Go Japanese!

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If I recall correctly from my HS Japanese class (...that I failed (...4 years ago)) it's probably pronounced Daiski, even though it's spelled Daisuke.
+10 to silent letters!

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Haha, my first though was "but isn't it pronounced 'daiski'?"

I can't speak Japanese very well and have never taken a class, but I do watch a shitload of shoujo anime... I'm not sure if that makes me a loser.

Anyway, I got the joke, Yuko.

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The 'u' sound is silent, yeah. But don't spell it Daisuke, (ending with a -kay sound rather than a -key sound) that's a boy's name!

I'm so surprised at the number of people who understood the joke immediately! :D

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is that most Bostonian baseball fans would likely recognize that as a boys name what with their Japanese pitcher, Mr. Matsuzaka.

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You must never underestimate the number of people who speak fan-panese.

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Awww Yuko is adorable.

<3

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haha I laughed without reading the explaination. Still only because I love to see bad jokes go unlaughed at. haha Still it was pun-ny.

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Ahahahahahahahaha, I love puns. I especially love Japanese puns.

Amirite, Shota-Con?!

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D:

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Loved the pun. I already knew what it meant without the translation, only cuz i'm a big Japanese nerd (wapanese i guess...)

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As somehow who was born and lived a decent amount of my life in Japan, I immediately got the pun. I laughed so loud I literally woke up my roommate and my next door neighbor. Thank you Yuko! Totally made my day.

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Ahaha, I'm glad you enjoyed it! And blame Ananth, he was the one who wanted to make a comic about it, it's just one of those stupid things I say when I'm at my folks' place. XD

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The best part of Japanese is horrible puns!

(when buying an iPod)
nano nano?

(when eating Indian food)
naan nan da, kore?

(when inquiring about sauce)
sosuka? sosuyo!

(when viewing individuals eating breakfast for dinner)
choushoku?! chou shokku!

Viva bad puns!

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I punched myself when I finally got the joke with Waluigi's name. I was so embarrassed that it took me so long to catch on. XD

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I have face palmed myself bloody for not understanding 90% of the bad jokes or hidden innuendos from 80s and 90s cartoons till the turn of the century. That Scooby Dooby one nearly broke my nose.

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I only just got that because you mentioned it. I had always thought that they were just being really lazy with their naming.

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(at the aquarium)
ikura ikura?

(on new years)
-mochi?
-mochiron!

(when johnny wanderer posts thrice in a week!)
yoku yoko!

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Oh man, when I was a first-year the "ikura ikura" thing totally caught our whole class flat-footed. We were practicing asking "How much does it cost?" and our teacher kept laughing at us. She didn't explain until the end of class why she was doing it. :|

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For some reason the sauce one made me explode in roaring laughter.

I am a nerd. D:

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It seems that even though I haven't tried to read ANYTHING in Japanese for around 6 years, bad puns are some of the few things I remember.

I think I have 'Yakitate!! Japan' to thank for that.

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This. True facts.

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the comic is still hilarious for the panel expressions alone! I needed the foot note and just realized i have made sukiyaki with my roommate once it turned out well but not big-like well!

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Two more until the big five-oh.

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SUSHI-SUKIYAKI-BANZAI!

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Honey, not wishing to bust your bubble, but if you have to explain it..it's not funny!
However..it was cute.

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The comic above was pure awesomeness. Gotta love those bad puns, eh?
Like instead of just saying 'kora-!' (a word one says when scolding or stopping someone), you could say, 'coca kora!'
...heh, I don't know whether I should be ashamed or proud of that one. \-_-;;

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My dad makes sukiyaki. Indeed, it is good.
And Yay! to non-english puns! They kick ace.

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Lol now if you really want to get into the corny puns.... read yakitate japan xD theres the really puns D: Sukiyaki is great D: but i'm starting to bend towards bi bim bop D:

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I feel VERY proud that I got the joke without having to read the explanation. :D Yay, I haven't forgotten ALL my Japanese...I also feel very weird, because this is the joke I made to my host family in Japan...and had to explain it to them. o_O

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LoL totally got the joke, it's awesome.

I appreciate it even more because I have a friend who is a master of bad puns, and it kinda reminds me of him if he was to incorporate japanese into his punning :p

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I laughed! I love bad puns. 8D

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Yay, I got the joke before it was explained! Go two semesters of University Japanese!

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LOL YES. I always think this when I'm eating sukiyaki. Or even when I'm thinking about eating sukiyaki. Or just plain thinking about sukiyaki. BECAUSE sukiyaki is awesome, amirite?

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AHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHA! xD

...and seven years of Japanese language study comes to fruition.

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Coming from a man who loves puns so bad people have no other choice but to hang their heads and cry a bit on the inside, I fully endorse this pun.

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D'oh, this was supposed to be its own post, and not a reply.

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If there's one thing I love most about the Japanese language, it's the immense pun-ability.

The comic sadly only made me smirk, because jokes like that tend to be less funny written out than being thrown at you spontaneously, but if I sat there at the table I'd probably have spewed my drink all over the place.

Mwehehe.

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Its a good pun, used something like it before. Got weird stares as well.

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Oh wow! That had me laughing for a good 2 minutes. I just had to keep reading the first two panels over and over. I love non-english puns mixed into normal everyday activities.

Props to Yuko and Ananth!

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Poor Yuko... I can sympathize.

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I laughed. And then I laughed at Yuko's expression when no one got the joke. And then I re-laughed at how bad the pun was.
=)
I really love the way this comic is going - It's already one of the comics I really look forward to. It's so every-day and relaxed and the art style is awesome.

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I understood it and loved it! I still find it funny though I took Japanese for 4 semesters and still can't read kanji...like at all. There are only a handful of characters I recognize. I love hiragana though...Mmmm, simplicity.

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I'm a fourth-year Japanese student and this afternoon I'm going out to dinner with my whole class, including my (native Japanese) teacher, her American husband, and their five(-ish?)-year-old daughter.

If anybody orders sukiyaki they are totally getting treated to this joke.

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Yeah, the pun was simple enough for most to understand, but what I really liked was the gas burner on the 2nd panel, the knob looks like a shocked face, adding to the hilarity that even the gas burner thinks its a lame pun.

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Hurrah for Yuko.

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