rabble-rousing and reckless driving
February 10, 2004
A kid just came into the staff-room, came up to me, and said “暴走族”, and nodded at my computer, meaning “look that one up in the dictionary, then”. The definition of this word, quoted word-for-word from my dictionary, is a ‘club of rabble-rousing reckless-driving delinquents‘. The fact that there is a single word for that makes me like Japanese a lot.
Kim tells me that actually 暴走族 just means ‘motorcycle gang’, which is much less interesting, and makes my dictionary seem a bit eccentric.