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| From Engrish & Hanzi Smatter |
Well, I'll tell you what it says, and you can decide whether it is stupid or not.
From what I can tell, the text on the T-shirt appears to have been cut-and-pasted from the warranty information for an IBM Japan (now Lenovo) computer.
I can tell this because the phone number 0120-20-5550 on the shirt is that for the company's Japanese support center.
Also, just to the right of the neck of the shirt, you will see ＢＭサービ, which was obviously cut from ＩＢＭサービス・センター (IBM Service Center).
The Japanese text itself says things like: "In the case that a malfunction should occur, only repair service will be offered." or "We do not accept orders by FAX."
The text is incomplete and overlapping and hard to read, so it is pretty pointless to try to read much more than this, but I think you get the point.
I don't know, but it might have a certain Japanese computer geek allure, although I have no idea if that is up your alley.
Tian, I love your site. Though, to toss in a friendly comment, IMHO you often respond to inquiries with just a simple explanation of what some character means. Without delving into the writer's real, unspoken question: "Yeah, but does this make any sense as a tattoo?"
So, if I may humbly attempt to give this poor defaced person some extra context to help understand what he's done to his arm :
The character with meanings of "slip/slide/slippery" is perhaps the closest one could get to a single character meaning "smooth" – but just in the literal sense of "non-rough (surface)". Unless I'm mistaken, it carries no Chinese/Japanese meaning equating to the English slang meanings of "smooth" - sophisticated, cool, polished, urbane, etc. - which I would guess is what Mr P had in mind.
Often, you also (kindly) decline to comment on the artistic merit of the tattoos you present. But, assuming that Mr P would bravely want to know:
It's awful. Just hideous - yet another hack job by an "artist" who simply has no idea how a character is properly constructed.
So, assuming Mr P really wants to know whether his tattoo makes any sense or not: No, from the perspective of a Chinese/Japanese reader, it's both meaningless and ineptly drawn. That said, from the perspective of people who don't read Chinese/Japanese - presumably the majority of this tattoo's "audience" - well, I suppose it may be just fine. Mr P can tell people it means "smooth", or "smooth operator", or "Ninja samurai dragon honor", and that it's an expert artistic rendition by Shaolin calligrapher monks... and few will be the wiser. In that sense, he can go forth and feel comfortable with it!
