When I was still in Canada working for the esteemed PROMAT Engineering Sales Inc. My good buddy and former associate, (not to mention president of the company), Dave Lewis (the head honcho, the big cheese, the shachyo as it were) asked me if oki doki was Japanese. I had to confess I didn't know. Since then I have been searching, diligently studying the culture and the language in search of the answer.
Thus far in my quest I have not been able to discover the meaning of oki doki, however, in my studies of the Japanese language this past semester, I have discovered that the words ooki tokei could be construed to mean "large clock". But after further examination I have also concluded that they are not related in any way to oki doki.
Further, one of my classmates this past semester bore the moniker Toki. Toki-san is sixteen, was born in China, went to an English speaking highschool, but his mother is Korean and currently Toki is living in Japan. As a result Toki speaks Madarin and English, can understand a bit of Korean, and now is the most fluent of all the people in our Japanese Class. Toki however bears no resemblance to either a large clock or an oki doki, (although I cannot yet be sure of that last statement). On the other hand, at the commencement of our semester yesterday, the departing students all received a "parting gift" (to quote Bob Barker) and since Toki is off to high school, he too received said parting gift. It turned out to be an ooki tokei which understandably made Toki mad. Of course everyone knows that in Chinese culture, giving a clock as a gift implies that you want to see the person die. I have not yet finished processing the ramifications of these recent developments in my quest but I shall not rest until I can intelligently unravel this particular oriental mystery.
12 comments:
Here Comes Toki With Ooki Tokei, haha...
Oki Doki, welcome Toki, and thanks for stopping by.
It's very interesting that your Canadian friend asked if "Oki Doki" was Japanese for me. I had never heard "Oki Doki" until I started listening to a radio English language lecture program about 12 years ago. In its introduction its teacher said "Are you ready? Oki Doki, let's get started. Here we go.". Oki Doki means okay, right?
Yup, Oki Doki is OK.
I've spent the last week working with Korean students who all fell about laughing at the verbal use of the term "okie dokie", due to it meaning something rather more rude in korean.
as an english man who has been studying japanese for a while, I would say yes "OKI DOKI" the restaraunt is just a pun to others while still sounding at least a bit japanese...
untill the owner says yes or no who really know?
I like the fact that the japanese text says something along the lines of asian style food dining. CHances are its a pan asian place with a japanese slant.
Ive not been, if the food is tasty i dont mind too much
Wait, so oki doki is not a real japanease word? I always thought it was and that it meant ok. Lol!
I just heard a girl say 'koki doki' or something similar, on animeseason. It's Ep 7 of "da-capo", around stop 3:00 min.
http://www.animeseason.com/da-capo-episode-7
And what about someone else telling 'oki-doki' may mean a fast heart beat (like, excitement) ?
I've heard this (or thought I'd heard it) a lot in anime recently. I've just heard this on "Whisper of the Heart", known in Japan as "Mimi o Sumaseba (耳をすませば)".
One of the words in the subtitles said "sometimes" so I looked up sometimes and it means Tokidoki in Japanese 時々
There is also ドキドキ doki-doki which means a fast heartbeat.
Funny how we often hear what we want to hear!
Ha! This is great. I had imagined, when I was taking Japanese, that the word Tokidokie was something that a G.I. heard, in aftermath of WWII's occupation of Japan and of course G.I.'s love to change things for their own purpose. At any rate, I did a little digging to find out the following facts on Wikipedia.
It would seem the earliest quotes of the word is from the Choctaw language. Here are a collection of notable dates and times the word Oki first appeared and then later doki added to it.
Wyman presented his account of O.K. in The Magazine of American History in 1885.[123] He explained that Choctaw oke sounded exactly like English O.K., and its
meaning approximated "That is true" or "That is all so". He goes on to say
Popularly known at least by the 1930s in "Our Gang" kids shows . The phrase can be extended further, e.g. "Okie dokie (ala) pokie / smokie / artichokie,"
oakie-doke (1934), okay-doke (1934), okee-doke (1964), okey-dok (rare, 1964), okey-doke (1935), okie-doke[189] Also means: trick, con; nonsense[198]
okey-dokey (1932), okie-dokie[189] [199] Used in a popular song of World War II: "Okie Dokie, I'm a Pale Face Okie"
ok'l dok'l, okle-dokle (1947) [200] Used in a song from The Big City in 1947: "Ok'l Baby Dok'l I kelikel baby you"
The last one is a stretch. But we used to say, when I was a kid, Oki Doki Artichoki all the time.
Okie dokie guys, just wanted you to know my cats were okie and dokie. The sisters hated each other, so we got rid of the meanest one (the one who would strike at our faces when she was done being a lap cat after 4 minute sesssions.)
I stopped calling dokie by that name because I missed okie too much. Too bad our household was run on democracy, but that is fair anyhow. Well now, today I started to call dokie by the name okidoki since it has been around five years and I want to bring her sister's name back out of respect.
Not that I'm condoning that sort of behavior, but I've forgiven her in my heart and I do not want to call dokie by her given name dokie, because it sounds too empty. That's like making peanut butter sandwiches and telling yourself that it is just fine without the jelly or jam.
Okie dokie guys, just wanted you to know my cats were okie and dokie. The sisters hated each other, so we got rid of the meanest one (the one who would strike at our faces when she was done being a lap cat after 4 minute sesssions.)
I stopped calling dokie by that name because I missed okie too much. Too bad our household was run on democracy, but that is fair anyhow. Well now, today I started to call dokie by the name okidoki since it has been around five years and I want to bring her sister's name back out of respect.
Not that I'm condoning that sort of behavior, but I've forgiven her in my heart and I do not want to call dokie by her given name dokie, because it sounds too empty. That's like making peanut butter sandwiches and telling yourself that it is just fine without the jelly or jam.
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