2014-04-21

MinikuLOVE

"MinikuLOVE" is a service that will hold on to your old-flame memorabilia for you so that you don't have to worry about your current flame stumbling upon it while you're in the shower. You can also pay an exorbitant fee to have a professional recording made of any love letters that might be in the box.

Is this real? Is anything? I don't even know any more.

Certainly the parent company is real. The whole thing seems to basically be a stunt to promote their API.

Here's the linguistic side. Mini and "love" are from English, of course. Kura is a very old Japanese word for a storehouse, which may have originally derived from a word meaning "place where things go/sit", as seen in old words like takakura "high seat", negura "sleeping place [for birds]", etc. The non-obvious part is that in Japanese "love" traditionally becomes rabu — so "MinikuLOVE" is actually just "Minikura" + bu.

Popularity factor: 5

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leoboiko:

I wonder if 'makura' is related. Or 'kurashi', or 'kurai' (as in extent, or as in position), or 'kuraberu'. Damn. Now my imagination can draw spurious etymologies for almost any word with 'kura' in it. Even 'chakura'.

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HoHoHo:

Couldn't it also be heard as "mini-club"?

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Matt:

Leo: "Kurai" is definitely related! "Kuraberu" and "makura" are often linked to the word; I don't know if anything's been proven. "Kurasu" (as in 暮らす, right?) is supposed to be linked with "kurai", dark: Do all day, until it gets dark.

HoHoHo: I _think_ that would be unlikely because of the accent -- for "kurabu" you would expect either a drop after /ku/, or no drop at all (a more recent pronunciation associated with young people, maybe restricted to clubs-you-dance at), but I hear this with a drop after /ra/, which matches the Japanese pronunciation of "love".

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leoboiko:

Incidentally, what sources are you using? I'm looking to expand my etymological references to "more than just http://gogen-allguide.com/ ".

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dainichi:

My first parsing was something like minikui-love, ugly love.

I'm not going to click your link, since my current flame might stumble upon my browser history :P

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