IVIV (13) what are these three?

[Clément Lévy]

Douzo rather means "please, do" or "go ahead." To ask for a drink in  
a bar, one rather says "onegaishimasu," or "sumimasen." I firstly  
thought Kenichiro was a colleague that Bigfoot was inviting to eat  
some more.

But you're right, douzo is polite. Chotto is rather informal (sukoshi  
would be more formal).

Even so, it is still pretty good for that assu-kikaa!
Clement

Le 4 nov. 09 à 02:19, John Bailey a écrit :

> That's pretty competent Japanese from Pynchon.
>
> Chotto is hard to translate but kinda means "a little". It's used in
> many different contexts but is a sort of polite, evasive phrase.
> Rather than saying a direct 'no', 'chotto' can be used to indicate the
> negative while actually being literally positive. ie 'you want some
> more sake?' 'A little...' which would mean 'not really'.
>
> In this case Bigfoot's sorta using it to get the counterman's
> attention politely.
>
> Closest translation would be:
> "Sorry, Kenichiro! Please, more pancakes?"
>
> Pretty nice chat for bad old Bigfoot.
>
> On Wed, Nov 4, 2009 at 11:57 AM, Peter Petto <ppetto at ppetto.com>  
> wrote:
>
>> p212 "Chotto, Kenichiro! Dozo, motto panukeiku." ???
>>