Suki: All About the Word “Like”

If you watch anime in Japanese at all, one word you will probably become aware of quickly is suki which means “like,” usually pronounced quickly so that it sounds like “ski.” This compels all students of the language to say sukii ga suki! (I like skiing!) as soon as they learn the word since it sounds funny to the ear. The proper usage would be something like watashi wa sushi ga suki desu, literally “as for sushi, I like it,” but since the Japanese love to omit words, a more common phrase would be just sushi ga suki, “[I] like sushi,” since the subject is generally understood. When one person confesses their feelings for another, suki desu is what they’ll probably say, although this is actually using the word for “like” rather than “love”; in at least one manga I can think of, a character had to revert to English — “Like or love?” — to get around the vagueness that seems built into the Japanese language. A variation of suki (“like”) is dai-suki (“big-like”), usually said by a cute female anime character before they glomp a male character violently in a big bear-hug.

In the manga ending to Kimagure Orange Road, Madoka has to ask for clarification: “Like, or Love?”