I seem to have offended someone

Japanese
#21

I’ll say this much, though other people have touched on it…

Japanese people are VERY careful with their personal information online. If someone’s name is really unique, the kanji + reading can be used to find them. I believe that asking for her kanji could be equal to outright asking for her full name - alright in person, but definitely weird to tell someone you only know online. If you already know her full (hiragana) name, then asking for her kanji can be like asking her for her full legal name. A little sus, at the very least.

I know some adults who only use their true kanji when it’s absolutely required. They’ll use a nickname, or katakana, hiragana or even fake kanji on all SNS.

Also, sorry to be another bearer of bad news, but continuing the same conversation after knowing that it was creepy (“それ、ちょっと気持ち悪いと思う。(笑)”) could have seemed very pushy/KY, from a cultural position.

I hope you guys were able to make up though! Overcoming miscommunications like this is an important part of learning Japanese!

Good luck!

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#22

I am not sure if I understood the timing here. The statement 2 above occurred before or after " I recently decided to ask what kanji they use." ?

#23

This is not about language learning, but I experienced something similar recently. I work with this old polish man and we’ve been talking for a couple weeks now before our shifts start. Recently, he asked me what my last name was and when I told him, he asked, “how do you spell that?” I don’t know why that question creeped me out, but it did. Couldn’t help but think, “why do you want to know? Does he want to steal my identity?”

Idk why. He didn’t say it creepily, or bring it up since, but there was just something about being asked how my name is spelt that creeped me out. Maybe because that’s just something I’m never asked. Again, idk why. But like your language partner, just being asked creeped me out.

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#24

Hmm, to bring it back to language learning (:nerd_face::sweat_smile:), I can actually understand why he would. Just hearing a name may not necessarily make it clear what the proper pronunciation of the name is, especially if it’s your first time hearing it, or if English isn’t your first language.

As a completely made-up example, suppose your last name was Jefferson. Due to his first language being not-English (set aside Poland for the sake of this example), maybe he heard it as ‘Chevarssin’. Like, maybe that’s more ‘resonant’ to his ears based on the qualities of his native language. But he doesn’t want to accidentally say your name wrong in the future, so he asks for the spelling. Hearing the spelling as ‘Jefferson’, he can now interpret that spelling based on the sounds he heard, and thus ‘re-hear’ them in his mind in the correct way: ‘Je’ instead of ‘Che’, ‘ff’ instead of ‘v’, etc.

Simply by learning the spelling of your name, he’s much more likely to be able to pronounce it correctly.

And, since we learn language based on being able to interpret sounds correctly, he is also much more likely to remember your name, as well. (As opposed to trying to remember a faulty-English version ‘Chevarssin’, which doesn’t really ‘fit’ with English names in general, so would be harder to remember.)

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#25

Adding onto this point (although it doesn’t relate so much to a kanji/hiragana situation) - I recently moved to a country where many people have names of different linguistic origins, and I can’t always “see” their name in my head because I have no previous context for that name - and until I know how it is spelled, I often seriously struggle to remember it, because I have a very visual memory/brain. As soon as I know how to spell it, I can remember it much much better. If I’m not able to ask how to spell it, or see it written down, I make a best guess in my head, but sometimes it’s miles off :sweat_smile:

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#26

Maybe think of it like this: (i dont know either of your genders so its probably quite different depending on them) but if a stranger asks for your full name online, if your name is rare, its unlikely that you will want to tell them (especially for woman), because then its easy to stalk them, find out where they live and can be really dangerous. If your name is John Smith, perhaps it would be fine because of how common the name is, but for me(as a woman), both my names are quite rare, and if you searched them up you could probably find my social medias, and then where abouts I live, my school, work, etc. I don’t share my full name with my online friends, I use a nickname, then maybe after a while my first name. It’s dangerous and scary what people can do. It will probably be the same with your friend. You already know at least what country they live in, which isn’t a very big one, and maybe even a prefecture or city. They are probably just being cautious.

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#27

I am in total agreement with the idea that the issue her is likely one of privacy. I have a last name that is very uncommon in any of the countries I’ve lived in and the only time that I will tell someone my last name (in a non-administrative context) is if they need to send me something or we are exchanging phone numbers. While I might not be especially creeped out if someone in person was randomly asking for my last name (though I might find it odd), I would find it off putting if someone that I only know via the internet/an app asked.

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