Japanese etymology: やばい Yabai
Japanese people like saying these phrases:
ヤバイ！
Awesome!/Cute!/Terrible!
ヤバくない？
Isn’t this awesome?/cute?/terrible?
ヤバイでしょ！
This is absolutely awesome/cute/terrible!
But most people don’t know how the phrase Yabai came about.
The word appears in a novel written over 200 years ago, so it’s pretty old. One of the few theories for its origin has to do with a bow-and-arrow shooting range.
Japanese people during the early Edo Period (1603 - 1867) played at bow-and-arrow shooting ranges as often as Japanese people now sing at Karaoke. These shooting ranges were called 矢場 Yaba. But soon, these Yaba were abused as a facade for prostitution services.
After you shot all your arrows, a female attendant walked to the target and bent over to pick up the arrows. As ashamed as I am to say this, that can sometimes be a good enough reason for men to pay for another round. Things escalated over time, and some Yaba started offering extra options in that direction.
The cops cracked down on these services from time to time. So if you were hanging around close to these shooting ranges, you could get into a Yabai situation as a suspect.
So when Japanese people say Yabai, there’s a chance what they’re saying is:
Shooting range!
ヤバい！
Isn’t this a shooting range?
ヤバくない？
This is a shooting range.
ヤバいでしょ！
Hi, I’m Kyota, the author of Amazon Best Sellers [Folk Tales of Japan], [Underdogs of Japanese History], and [Horror Tales of Japan].
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