世論 What Japan Thinks

To the left you can see the Japanese National Anthem, Kimi Ga Yo, as you’ve never seen it before, and probably never want to see it again! I decided to translate in into emoji, using two English translations as the base.

Version 1 is:

May your reign
Continue for a thousand, eight thousand generations,
Until the pebbles
Grow into boulders
Lush with moss

Version 2 is:

May the reign of the Emperor
continue for a thousand, nay, eight thousand generations
and for the eternity that it takes
for small pebbles to grow into a great rock
and become covered with moss.

Note that I cheated slightly by using one standard character, and I used the docomo emoji set, displayed in Gmail. The boulders are a bit naff, and due to the lack of a chrysanthemum I chose Japan’s other national flower, a sakura (cherry) petal.

Why, you may ask. Well, because of the project below that I am in my own small way helping to fund, the translation of Moby Dick into iPhone emoji:

Hurry, there’s only a few days left and still a lot of money to raise to get this project going! Oh, and just in case I get any Japanese people looking for this, 絵文字君が代.

Read more on: emoji dick,kimi ga yo