KAMINARI

I have a Japanese dog. He is soooo cute! His name is Lai. Lai means Kaminari; thunder and lightning in English. Lai is one way to read the Chinese character - 雷(Kaminari). Why is his name Lai? Because the day I met him there was a lot of thunder and lightning. By the way, I was really surprised that I was asked what Lai means, thunder or lightning, by my English teacher. It means both. I haven't bothered about it. Japanese don't distinguish between thunder and lightning. We don't need to distinguish. But he said that it was really strange. In English they distinguish things clearly. He listed some examples, mouse and rat (nezumi), monkey and ape (saru), blah, blah, blah, I forgot. This is very interesting. I think that it must be different for Westerners and Japanese to view things.