コーヒー

Pattern visualization

Examples

1. 朝はコーヒーを飲みます。▶ —
   I drink coffee in the morning.
2. コーヒー一杯ください。▶ —
   One coffee, please.

Collocations

Mnemonic

コーヒー — koohii, a loanword. Written in katakana ── the marker of foreign words. The route of the borrowing is carved into the word itself ── it came not from English coffee but from Dutch koffie. That is why the Japanese sound is 'koo-hii', not 'kuh-fee'. The reason: Japan first met coffee through Dutch trade at the port of Nagasaki, the one window left open during the Edo-era seclusion ── the word remembers that history in its sound. The deeper root of koffie is Arabic qahwa ── the language of Yemen and Ethiopia, coffee's homeland. There is even a kanji spelling, 珈琲, an 当て字 ateji from the Meiji era that mapped the sound onto characters. Today you see it only on old 喫茶店 signs. One line of katakana compresses the route Arabia → Netherlands → Nagasaki → modern Japan.

Quick check

1. What does 缶コーヒー reveal about Japanese beverage culture?

   • Japanese-invented vending-machine convenience category (UCC 1969)
   • Pure Western tradition
   • Cheap substitute
   • Child-targeted