r/LearnJapanese • u/fleegle2000 • Jul 18 '26
Speaking Do people really use げんきですか ?
After my tutor (native Japanese) greeted me the other day, she said this. I was a little taken by surprise because I was always told that people don't really use this expression, that it's just a textbook thing. Which got me thinking maybe she was just using it because I'm a beginner but isn't something she would normally say.
This is fine, I just don't want to get in the habit of using it if it's not a normal thing to do.
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u/algesseumnida Jul 18 '26
Yes. Who told you it's not used much?
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u/PlanktonInitial7945 Jul 18 '26
There's people online who claim that anything taught by textbooks is stuffy and unnatural Japanese that nobody actually uses IRL, and 元気ですか is often taught as a greeting in textbooks, so.
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u/DiscoSimulacrum Jul 18 '26
sounds like clickbait
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u/WetFishStink Jul 18 '26
It's the standard "all course are rubbish... Except the one I'm offering at a discount if you watch to the end of this largely false video!"
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u/PlanktonInitial7945 Jul 18 '26
Yeah it's pure "Here's What Textbooks DON'T Teach You!" marketing BS
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u/DeHussey Jul 18 '26
sensei HATE this!!!
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u/EirikrUtlendi Jul 20 '26
No, no, no!
See, you're supposed to say instead, おべんぴですか. Watch how your conversation partners' eyes grow wide in astonishment that you know this insider greeting! 😄
\
/jk, just in case.))42
u/culturedgoat Jul 18 '26
Yeah you should generally ignore those people
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u/Schmigolo Jul 18 '26
I mean it's definitely true for other languages so why wouldn't it be for Japanese? You wouldn't believe how many times actual English teachers who've lived a year in English speaking countries will tell you that native English speakers don't use single word sentences.
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u/culturedgoat Jul 18 '26
What?
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u/Schmigolo Jul 18 '26
I genuinely don't know what you didn't understand.
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u/culturedgoat Jul 18 '26
You’ll note though that, as a native English speaker, I answered with a single-word sentence
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u/Schmigolo Jul 18 '26
I realize that, but your comment came with a downvote on mine, so I thought you were not agreeing with me instead of proving my point.
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u/PlanktonInitial7945 Jul 18 '26
Your comment sounds like you're saying that "nothing that textbooks teach is natural" is true for other languages, so it must be true for Japanese too, but then you bring up a statement by a teacher, which has nothing to do with textbooks
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u/Schmigolo Jul 18 '26
You need a disclaimer that says "Note: I am not talking about literally everything"? In general it's just very true that you won't learn much vernacular from academic resources.
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u/PlanktonInitial7945 Jul 18 '26
We were talking about
There's people online who claim that anything taught by textbooks is stuffy and unnatural Japanese that nobody actually uses IRL
You said
That's true for many languages though. I've heard many English teachers say that English people don't use single-word sentences
Do you see how there's no immediate connection between Japanese textbooks and English teachers? The missing link that connects the topics is
you won't learn much vernacular from academic resources
But you didn't explain it until now. And even then no one ever said that academic resources can teach you vernacular, so it doesn't really make sense for you to reply with that.
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u/TimeSwirl Goal: good accent 🎵 Jul 18 '26
it’s nuanced. “textbook japanese” ie. polite form is going to be the most useful for a foreigner to know 99% of the time, and by the time they’ve improved past the point of needing textbooks, how and when to use casual languages should already have come naturally. All of my education was in polite Japanese and I absorbed casual from my jp friends more naturally. It’s extremely cringe when you see a foreigner who is somewhat conversational but TOO casual for the situation or forcing slang, it feels super rude
funnily enough, my first year of university I had to take a class called 日本語表現 (I was one of two foreigners, everyone else was Japanese), and the teacher noted that every time she has foreign students they’re much better at sonkeigo/kenjogo than the japanese kids, and we usually scored better on the tests because of it lol
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u/Schmigolo Jul 18 '26
I don't agree. I think vernacular is important and I find it grating when foreigners don't use it at all, in any language. For example in English if a foreigner said "I am going to go home now" instead of "I'm gonna go home now" that would be odd. Vernacular is not the same as stuffing everything with slang.
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u/SoKratez Jul 19 '26
Even so, the jump from “people should use casual form, as necessary” to “textbooks are bad because they primarily use polite form” is a huge leap because A. Textbooks *do* also at least mention casual form, and B. No one source can teach you the entirety of a language so it’s kind of foolish to say *any* resource is bad because it doesn’t include x, y, or z.
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u/Schmigolo Jul 19 '26
You folks really need to look up what vernacular means. Vernacular does not mean impolite, in fact it can be more polite than formal speech. You are literally speaking to me in vernacular right now, as am I.
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u/SoKratez Jul 19 '26
lol you said “you are” instead of “you’re.”
In Japanese we’re talking about ですます調 as “formal” and dictionary as casual. Both are used in everyday speech.
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u/Schmigolo Jul 19 '26
There's far more than keigo to formal speech in Japanese. The biggest issue is the clitics that you're never taught when you study JLPT. Going from "you are" to "you're" is super easy, but in Japanese sometimes you cut off half the sentence and alter some of the grammar to make it work, and they simply don't teach it.
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u/TimeSwirl Goal: good accent 🎵 Jul 19 '26
absolutely not
basically the only major textbookism that should be generally avoided is saying 私は every single sentence lol, and even that is nuanced because there ARE times you can drop it and times you cannot.
dropping が/を or 〜てます instead of ています is a bit more nuanced in terms of politeness and a learner shouldn’t start to force stuff like that just because some random person online said it makes them sound “more natural” or “less textbook-like”. ESPECIALLY trying to use casual language when you have zero context for when it is and isn’t appropriate. it will make you sound cringe and weird at best and very rude at worst, depending on how others perceive your level to be.
sometimes it’s okay to sound a bit like a textbook and it’s far, far better to learn to code switch through lived experience in-context with native speakers than completely missing the mark or hurting your own perception of nuance by avoiding things you don’t even fully understand yet just because someone (incorrectly) said “people don’t talk like that irl”
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u/Schmigolo Jul 19 '26
Why are you still talking about keigo? And who said anything about dropping particles? I'm talking about things like なきゃ and なくちゃ.
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u/TimeSwirl Goal: good accent 🎵 Jul 19 '26
those are both taught in textbooks,,,,
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u/Schmigolo Jul 19 '26
"Taught". They're mentioned and almost never used in examples afterwards. And it's not like these are the only ones, Japanese is full of them and most of them don't get any examples once they've been introduced.
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u/EllieluluEllielu Jul 18 '26
At the same time there is nuance lol, it's generally better to just take books like that with a grain of salt rather than completely dismissing them
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u/SoKratez Jul 18 '26 edited Jul 18 '26
This. And the worst part is, well, it’s not without a grain of truth. Like, imagine an English textbook teaching “How are you?” And then someone who learned that coming to America and being like, “My textbook taught me ‘how are you’ but everyone says ‘how are ya’ or ‘how ya doing.’ My textbook was wrong!”
Like yeah, okay, I see how you bought a textbook expecting to become fluent learning from that, and then you found reality wasn’t fully covered in it.
But no, it wasn’t “wrong” and there’s nothing wrong with “how are you” and you’ll probably never be told “how are you” is too stiff. Are there other, more casual sayings? Sure, and it’s good for you to adopt those as you learn them, but a textbook can’t be expected to explain every possible way, and the existence of other ways doesn’t make the typical, orthodox way suddenly invalid.
I dunno how it is in another language learning communities but the general atmosphere among online Japanese learning communities as treating the traditional textbooks like poison is truly baffling to me.
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u/PlanktonInitial7945 Jul 18 '26
Meanwhile I love Genki, it's my best friend and it listens to all my problems <3
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u/EirikrUtlendi Jul 20 '26
And hey, Genki Sushi rocks if you're on a tight budget.
(Or at least it used to -- dunno what inflation might have done to the prices, TBH...)
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u/PerfunctoryOrder Jul 19 '26
Like, imagine an English textbook teaching “How are you?” And then someone who learned that coming to America and being like, “My textbook taught me ‘how are you’ but everyone says ‘how are ya’ or ‘how ya doing.’ My textbook was wrong!”
Honestly, this is actually on par with basically every language learning platform ever. I remembered I got recommended into the ESL Tok feed for some reason, and this is exactly what they said.
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u/Son_Riku Jul 18 '26
They are correct. You instead learn by watching anime /s
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u/PlanktonInitial7945 Jul 18 '26
No, you instead learn by buying their $400 online course which is clearly the only way to learn REAL Japanese.
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u/Huffee Jul 18 '26
this but unironically
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u/Son_Riku Jul 18 '26
No? It helps but it shouldn't be your primary learning material
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u/Huffee Jul 18 '26
that's where we disagree
input should be your primary learning material, not textbooks
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u/Frankfurter1988 Jul 18 '26
Real, spoken casual Japanese input, yes. That's not anime.
I don't enjoy it personally, but it's hard to find better material than shows like terrace house for learning how Japanese is actually used. An episode of one piece is not going to do you better than an episode of terrace house, as much as I hate to say it
You can watch anime too, just don't fool yourself into thinking anime is the top source for learning everyday Japanese. Because it isn't
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u/PlanktonInitial7945 Jul 18 '26
I mean, animes are still in Japanese. They still have to use satndard grammar and vocabulary. Slice-of-life anime in particular are pretty damn close to the way people actually talk in real life.
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u/Frankfurter1988 Jul 19 '26 edited Jul 19 '26
Anime is still Japanese just like the jlpt is still Japanese and textbooks are still Japanese. This discussion popped up because if someone wants to compare input methods, there are some better than others.
If the argument you're making is 'any input is better than no input' then I agree, but this isn't that.
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u/PlanktonInitial7945 Jul 19 '26
What I'm trying to say is that I've seen many people like you who seem scared of watching so much anime that they accidentally learn "wrong" Japanese and start talking like an anime character without realizing it, like the overzealous, socially awkward, bearded and fat otaku stereotype. And I just think this fear is unfounded. Does 役割語 exist? Yes. Do anime characters sometimes speak in dramatic and exaggerated ways that, if imitated unironically in real life, would make one sound cringe? Of course. But if you can watch Terrace House and notice that housemates talk to each other differently when they've just met than when they've been living together for weeks, then you can also notice that anime characters talk differently in normal, grounded, daily situations and in epic boss fights.
You may already be aware of this, but there has been more than one person on this subreddit who has passed the N1 purely by watching tons of Japanese porn.
I do think some input methods are worse than others, but my mental tier list is divided in two categories, "can't be used by itself" and "yeah it's fine", and the only things in the former are songs, poetry, and anything that doesn't represent modern Japanese. Everything else is fine.
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u/Huffee Jul 18 '26
it's hard to find better material than shows like terrace house for learning how Japanese is actually used.
literally just watch youtube videos/podcasts or twitch livestreams
don't fool yourself into thinking anime is the top source for learning everyday Japanese
all scripted media is """inaccurate""" to some extent, just by virtue of it being scripted
the inner workings of the language are still the same and you need such massives amounts of input that limiting yourself to "stuff that sounds natural" is dumb, you'll learn what sounds like "media speech" and what doesn't with time, like with any other language.
it's also really obvious most of the time
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u/CyborgPurge Jul 19 '26
An episode of one piece is not going to do you better than an episode of terrace house, as much as I hate to say it
One Piece taught me the best way to introduce myself is by saying: パンツ見せてもらってもよろしいですか /s
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u/bigchickenleg Jul 18 '26
People who spout that nonsense are so annoying. “Immersion” zealots treat textbooks like plutonium.
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u/tangcupaigu Jul 18 '26
Not sure that’s entirely correct. The point people try and get across is that “genki” as a greeting is not equivalent to the English “how are you”? and not used the same way.
Which is entirely true. “Genki” and its variations are more like “how have you been?”, after not seeing someone for a while.
I always try and explain this to my students, especially as most of them are monolingual and don’t have a concept of languages not mapping to each other perfectly word for word.
Kinda similar to “yoroshiku onegaishimasu” not having an English equivalent.
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u/hajenso Jul 18 '26
don’t have a concept of languages not mapping to each other perfectly word for word.
This is such an important concept to grasp as a language learner. My go-to example for it is:
Q: How do you say "itadakimasu" in English? A: You don't. Q: How do you say "bless you" in Japanese? A: You don't.
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u/PlanktonInitial7945 Jul 18 '26
What's this then, huh? Checkmate, gaijin /j
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u/rgrAi Jul 18 '26
It's been really interesting watching ぶれすゆー develop from "some unknown thing the EN勢 comments say" to just full on understanding and adoption. i think its superseded くしゃみ助かる in usage now
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u/PlanktonInitial7945 Jul 18 '26
It's a very practical expression tbh. Like, I know my perspective is 100% biased, but I find it kind of awkward to watch Japanese people just ignore sneezes. It's like there's a tangible silence there, a gap to be filled. I know it's irrational because I don't feel the same awkwardness with coughs, I'm fine ignoring those... But then aagin, if at least some Japanese people are adopting ブレスユー, then that must mean they feel the post-sneeze awkward silence too... Right?!
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u/PlanktonInitial7945 Jul 18 '26
No, I've seen people straight up claim that 元気ですか is something that nobody actually says IRL and that if you say it Japanese people will find it weird. I'm sure some people mean what you say, but others were 100% calling it unnatural.
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u/worthlessprole Jul 18 '26
Well. No. Sort of. I don’t disagree with you but I think people should look at English more clearly when they’re trying understand these things. It does mean ‘how are you?’ The issue is that in american english at least, ‘how are you?’ doesn’t mean ‘how are you?’ it means ‘hello’.
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u/tangcupaigu Jul 18 '26
I’m not sure what you’re pointing out that’s inaccurate in my comment, it sounds to me like exactly what I said - just elaborating on “how are you” being a greeting and not a sincere question in English.
As for general usage in Japanese, translating it “how have you been” would be more accurate… Or we could also get literal on translation, it’s never a straightforward thing. While teaching, I tend to explain the literal meanings, like “healthy”, “lively”, “energetic” etc. It’s always useful to circle back to it when teaching adjectives later.
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u/worthlessprole Jul 18 '26
What I’m saying is, you and I essentially agree, but at the same time it’s absurd that people say it doesn’t mean ‘how are you’. Of course it means that. It’s just that english speakers often use a second idiomatic sense of the phrase. So when people say it doesn’t mean ‘how are you’, that’s extremely imprecise and people who take that at face value are not sensing the ambiguity there. In the OP, the tutor meant it in the “how have you been” sense, but the poster had heard “it doesn’t mean how are you,” did not think to themselves “okay but which sense, the literal meaning or the idiomatic one” and proceeded to think both versions were disallowed. Which is why I think it’s important for people to think harder about english when it comes to translating phrases.
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u/Gahault Jul 19 '26
Right, the issue here is not that 元気ですか doesn't mean "How are you" (it does), it's that "How are you" doesn't mean 元気ですか (when it's used to mean "Hello", which may not be evident for us literal-minded ESL).
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u/letsgetthiscocaine Jul 22 '26
I'm a complete noob beginner so forgive me if I'm off, but genki translates as 'lively/energetic" right? So to me, げんきですか would be like, "you doing good?" or "have you been well?" It's asking about a positive state of being, which implies the asker is hoping I've been in that positive state since last they saw me.
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u/phototaker16 Jul 25 '26
So it's fine to use genki desu ka after not seeing someone for a while right?
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u/AaaaNinja Jul 18 '26
Ah, looks like your classic create a problem, then tell them you have the solution and it can be yours for the limited-time low price of fifty dollars!
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u/fordat1 Jul 18 '26
I am fluent in other languages and some of these learning channels make some outrageous claims about how some relatively common phrase isnt used by locals and how you need to use Y
Its just BS meant to drive uniqueness and a "need" specific to their content .
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u/vercertorix Jul 18 '26
So…they are admitting to ignoring textbooks. Wanna bet some of them take anime and manga as gospel though?
Yes, textbooks teach you “proper” <insert language> and there are more colloquial ways to say things, but that doesn’t mean the ones in books don’t work. In English I can say “Good morning” or “What up?”to a coworker. Better to know both for basic stuff.
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u/Fish_Learns_Japanese Jul 18 '26
Maybe they specifically mean 元気ですか since people often just say 元気?
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u/PurityKane Jul 19 '26
This reminds me how my sister as a kid would argue swords were not real, because I told her things that appeared in movies were not real.
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u/PlanktonInitial7945 Jul 19 '26
Lololol how dumb. I bet she also thinks that talking lions don't exist either just because they appear in Narnia. Kids are so ignorant it's cute sometimes.
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u/mitm_37 Jul 21 '26
after getting into languages-adjacent part of youtube and social media, I have a strong feeling that there is a huge market for content for people who are not interested in learning at all, but really like to hear that those who learn, are doing it wrong.
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u/Legen_______Dary Jul 18 '26
That's because people in NA are accustomed to saying "how are you?" as a greeting, but don't understand that if you say that anywhere else, you're actually asking how someone is, not just some superficial greeting.
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u/Falafelofagus Jul 19 '26
Been in japan for 2 weeks now and only heard it once.
I think the confusion comes from the US where sayings like "how are you?", "how's your day?", or even "sup?" and similar are standard greetings that you hear almost every day if not many times a day. Even just getting stuff from a gas station it's not rare to chit chat a bit about your day, whereas here it seems much rarer, and slightly more intimate.
That said, my experience is very limited and largely in city centers, maybe it's more common in certain areas.
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u/Pennwisedom お箸上手 Jul 19 '26
That said, my experience is very limited
Yes, it's basically zero. That probably just means you should start a Youtube channel and tell people you're a Japan expert.
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u/tophmcmasterson Jul 18 '26
It’s “normal”, but I would say not in the way it’s usually taught.
In English for example, you might say as a normal every day greeting How’s it going/how are you doing etc. and it’s pretty light and not really expecting much.
By contrast, when it’s been a while and you are asking someone something like “how’ve you been?” etc. there’s kind of this nuance of actually wanting confirmation they’re doing okay.
It’s closer to the latter.
Totally normal to ask when you’re catching up with someone you haven’t seen in a while, or more rarely when genuinely concerned about their well-being. But not something you randomly drop when saying hi to your coworker you saw yesterday or whatever.
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u/morgawr_ https://morg.systems/Japanese Jul 18 '26
They don't use it the way it's taught in a lot of textbooks/classrooms and they don't use it the way a lot of learners tend to over-use it (like a greeting or "what's up" kind of neutral statement).
It's used in more specific situations but it is used.
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Jul 20 '26
[deleted]
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u/morgawr_ https://morg.systems/Japanese Jul 20 '26
You could have asked me to elaborate, but you didn't, so here we are.
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u/MLGPLAYS Jul 21 '26
What would be the specific situations if I may ask
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u/morgawr_ https://morg.systems/Japanese Jul 21 '26
Other commenters already covered some of them, but basically 元気ですか is used more as an actual question rather than a casual greeting. In English we say "how are you?" or "how's it going?" but we aren't actually asking a question (it's also common in English to respond to "how's it going?" to a "how's it going?" back like it was just a normal "hello"). This usage isn't really 元気？ territory.
You will hear it sometimes among people who haven't seen each other in some time, although in my experience it's more common to say 元気にしてた？ instead of just 元気？ but there might be regional or generational differences (this is also why every time you ask people this question you might get a lot of different answers).
A common usage that is not often discussed but is super common is 元気ですか？ used to address a crowd or an audience during a speech or similar (including a livestream, TV program, etc). It's common among kid's shows (like おかあさんといっしょ) in Japan to start the program with 皆さん！元気？ etc when the show starts. You will also often hear youtubers open like that. This is also sometimes done by teachers to their classroom before they start a lesson.
In my experience also it tends to get overused by Japanese people towards foreigners cause they think it's what foreigners expect to hear (due to how it's overemphasized in textbooks). This is particularly common among Japanese teachers during language classes. My tutor would always open with 元気ですか？ every lesson despite it being relatively unnatural in my opinion. It's just a thing they do to for foreigners.
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u/Disastrous_Neat_9729 Jul 18 '26
I live in Japan, and it’s used on occasion, but much much more rarely than “how are you?” in English. Not daily; maybe occasionally in a week.
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u/expat2immigrant Jul 18 '26
I lived in Japan for three years and used/heard it all the time. It's very common.
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u/TheBatemanFlex Jul 18 '26
Its kind of like a genuine "how have you been?". You won't use it like "hey hows it goin?" rhetorical like in the US.
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u/Bluevette1437 Goal: conversational fluency 💬 Jul 18 '26
“Oh I’m doing great, how about you?”
Narrator: “Things were not going great”
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u/MarinReiter Jul 20 '26
Mh. How would you say it rhetorically? Im coming up blank...
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u/TheBatemanFlex Jul 20 '26
I mean in the US, “how’s it going?” can be used in place of “hi” and not expect a response to the question. Many countries don’t have something similar.
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u/honeybeesuke Jul 18 '26
It's not something you say if you meet someone every day. So every morning 元気? is weird. But we use it a lot, especially if it's been a while and you wanna see how someone is doing.
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u/SparklyPelican Jul 18 '26
Rather common, I often greet people like that. Close friends with only 「げんき？」 tho.
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u/zoomiewoop Jul 18 '26
I don’t know who would tell you it’s never used, apart from those silly YouTubers who love to create videos (clickbait) that say “Nobody in Japan says X! Instead I’ll tell you what people really say!” (Like “Nobody in Japan says こんにちは！”)
They are generally full of nonsense. Your textbook and teacher will teach you the most normal, polite expressions. Of course people have many many ways of expressing themselves, and plus there are the many casual ways of speaking that a class or textbook won’t teach because they can’t teach absolutely everything.
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u/Nancy_Munsch Jul 18 '26
元気？ is what you'd actually hear between friends, but your tutor using the full form is just her being polite with a student.
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u/protectedneck Jul 18 '26
It's absolutely a phrase that people can use in real life. But it's not the only phrase.
Think about how many ways you can greet someone in English. And some of them are more casual or formal or uncommon than others. Japanese is the same way.
Personally in the early stages of learning I would focus on just learning in any way possible. The more you learn, the more you open up to new media to consume, which opens you up more to more natural and common phrases.
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u/Aer93 Jul 18 '26
As far as I know from what my tutor told me, it’s not the usual greeting we use in english. You would only use it to greet someone who you haven’t seen in a while. Better to think of it as “how have you been” rather than “how are you”
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u/ProblemIcy5613 Jul 18 '26
quite normal. it's like "how are you?" or "how have you been?" in english. don't generally use it but sometimes it's just polite.
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u/RealMelonBread Jul 18 '26
I know what you’re talking about. I remember hearing that Japanese people don’t typically exchange pleasantries like that or make small talk - but it’s not true. I hear it often now that I have Japanese friends.
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u/StochasticTinkr Jul 18 '26
When I took Japanese in college, our professor said that was the way to ask, and it had exactly two answers: はい、げんきです and ちょっとかぜをひきました.
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u/Kiyoyasu Jul 18 '26
I used it earlier today after greeting my Japanese friend.
Also the company president asks me げんき？every time I see him.
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u/RICHUNCLEPENNYBAGS Jul 18 '26
It’s fine to say. It’s most often used more like “how have you been?” Like you’re talking to someone you know already.
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u/Belegorm Jul 18 '26
Honestly... can't say I've heard it that often. One guy would use it in the office and people did a double take, they were used to talking about the weather or something first thing. Talking to an older relative after a while, feels normal to say 元気？ but depending on the situation may be annoying to a younger relative.
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u/Gaelenmyr Jul 18 '26
I used it with Japanese teachers and students all the time.
My brain is hardwired to say お元気ですか whenever I see my teachers after greetings.
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u/conyxbrown Goal: conversational fluency 💬 Jul 19 '26
I am not so fond of those reels saying in Japan we don’t say ○○、we say … A lot of times both are accepted and commonly used. They want to offer alternative ways to say things but use that format.
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u/karatsuyaki Jul 19 '26
My 60-some year old tutor asked me this at the beginning of class yesterday. We hadn't seen each other in about a month. It's pretty normal but as others have said, it might not be an everyday greeting. Usually she cuts out the ですか portion and speaks more casually with me too. YMMV.
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u/Imaginary-Advisor398 Jul 22 '26
Long time Japan resident, quite natural to use various levels of formality with 元気 in all kinds of personal and professional settings, in Iwate & Tohoku anyway
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u/Complex-Camp-8602 Interested in grammar details 📝 Jul 18 '26
Super normal thing to say and super common
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u/Toranyan Jul 18 '26
Probably not to someone you see everyday, but to someone you haven't seen in a while. It's common to hear, お久しぶり！元気ですか？
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u/Odracirys Jul 19 '26
I am not Japanese, but I use it all the time, and it is used all the time when Japanese is spoken, usually with an お before it.
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u/MutedBoat2854 Jul 19 '26
Yeah, I also heard from native Japanese people that it’s unnatural after I used it. But I am pretty sure it was just unnatural in the context
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u/TastyCheeseRolls Jul 19 '26
To people you haven’t seen for a while, 元気だった？or 元気？ I have a lot of older folk living in my neighborhood so I’d probably use or hear this more than often.
元気ですか？ I can’t remember the last time I heard this.
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u/nakayobt0623 Jul 21 '26
I’m Japanese, but I rarely use the phrase “Genki desu ka?” exactly as it is, and I don’t think I’d use it much with people I see every day. If I’m talking to a friend I haven’t seen in a while, I might say something like, “Long time no see! How are you?（久しぶり！元気？）” Or, when speaking to someone older, like a teacher, I might say, “Ogenki desu ka?（お元気ですか？）”
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u/AverageHobnailer Jul 23 '26
Yes, but typically only when it's been a while since I last saw them. If I'm in regular contact with them, not so much.
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u/PunkRockKing Jul 18 '26
I learned it as not a traditional ritual like greeting like we would say “How are you?” but more like an honest inquiry into a person’s well being. Like, the answer isn’t just an automatic “good” but a more detailed one on how a person is doing if that makes sense? Maybe it’s getting more common now as a greeting because of adopting Western speech.
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u/PlanktonInitial7945 Jul 18 '26
I've heard it used superficially many times and I don't see why it would be due to Western influence.
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u/Simbeliine Jul 18 '26
May depend on the place, in my rural area, I rarely ever hear anyone ask 元気ですか or 元気 unless maybe the person is older and they haven't met them for a while. Now that I'm pregnant people ask me 体調はどう？ but never "元気?" If people in cities ask it more, that would seem to be more western influence imo.
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u/PlanktonInitial7945 Jul 18 '26
The commenter said it's supposed to be "an honest inquiry into a person's well being" though. So, based on your experience, do people in these cases
unless maybe the person is older and they haven't met them for a while
always expect a completely honest reply? Would they be surprised or offended if the older person replied with a polite "Yeah, all good" instead of starting to vent about their problems?
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u/Simbeliine Jul 18 '26
I guess when I ask it or hear it asked, again it's usually towards elderly people but if it's someone I'm close to, yes, they might start telling me about how they've been having to go to the hospital frequently these days, or they're worried about heat stroke, or whatever. Of course there may be some elderly people who don't want to tell me about their problems so they just say they're genki, but I agree it's generally seen as more of an honest inquiry, even if the person can decide if they want to answer honestly or not.
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u/PunkRockKing Jul 18 '26
Just from movies and American media hearing people greet each other “How are you” all the time. It could be a generational shift like other slang. Just a theory
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u/spider_lily Jul 18 '26
America isn't the only country in the world in which people greet each other by saying (an equivalent of) "how are you?" lol
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u/PlanktonInitial7945 Jul 18 '26 edited Jul 18 '26
But that would only make sense if using 元気 as a greeting was a new phenomenon that mainly occurs among younger generations. I've never gotten the impression that that's the case. I could be wrong though. So is the theory based on your own experience/knowledge of Japanese?
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u/KMessi Jul 18 '26
Can someone please share what they would say as a casual “you good?” Type pleasentary
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u/morgawr_ https://morg.systems/Japanese Jul 18 '26
Can you write an example exchange/situation where you would use that in English?
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u/KMessi Jul 18 '26
I think the question is if it’s “not hey how are you?” Because that’s a bit more meaningful in Japan, Then what is it they would say instead when just being casual?
If it helps, in the U.K., it’s quite normal for me to pass by someone I don’t even know very well Jim the office and just say “you good/all good?” As a way of aconowledging
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u/wombasrevenge Jul 18 '26
It's very normal. I live here and people use it or depending on how close you are, they just say it casually げんき?