Proverb

Japanese: 猿も木から落ちる

Japanese Romaji: saru mo ki kara ochiru    

Translates as: even monkeys fall from trees

English: Even if you’re good at something you can still fail

MK

Zoom

11/28/2020

Informant Data: The informant is from Chiba Japan and has lived there her whole life. She is 21 years old and works part-time at a “gyuniku” (lit. cow-meat) restaurant, which is a Japanese style restaurant in which customers cook raw slices of meat on grills built into the tables. She also enjoys going to the beach and shopping.

Contextual Data: While I do not personally know the informant, I know her through my close friend I met in high school who lives in Japan now, and she has been friends with the informant since elementary school.

Social Context: MK heard this phrase a lot when learning to play basketball because she kept hitting the ball in her foot while dribbling. Even though dribbling is very easy in basketball, she kept messing it up and her coaches would tell her this phrase. The idea behind it is that just like climbing trees comes very naturally to monkeys, and just like basketball players can dribble a basketball seemingly effortlessly, everyone makes mistakes and the best course of action after a mistake is to brush it off and keep going. 

Cultural Context: This proverb is primarily used in contexts where someone fails and gets discouraged but needs encouragement to keep going by reassuring them that everyone fails eventually. This represents the Japanese ideal of working hard and overcoming the odds. In Japanese culture achieving one’s goal is something that is very important, so this quote helps people understand that even though it is human to make mistakes what matters is how much you can keep going after mistakes, for example, even monkeys fall off trees.