Japanese Language Stack Exchange is a question and answer site for students, teachers, and linguists wanting to discuss the finer points of the Japanese language. It only takes a minute to sign up.
Sign up to join this community
Lets say you ask someone 元気, and they reply 元気, but their facial expression and body language says somethings wrong. In this scenario what would the Japanese equivalent be to asking "Are you sure?" or "Is something bothering you?"?
Also, someone told me Japanese speakers would respond in a less contextually generic way to things like this, with things like physical injury, romantic injury, etc. getting a different response. Is this true? And if so, could someone elaborate on it for me?
In this scenario what would the Japanese equivalent be to asking "Are you sure?" or "Is something bothering you?"?
I would say:
「ホントに？」 (Are you sure? / Really?)
「ホントに大丈夫？」 (Are you sure you're okay?)
「どうかしたの？」 (Is something bothering you? / Is there something wrong?)
「どうしたの？」 (What's wrong?)
Japanese speakers would respond in a less contextually generic way to things like this, with things like physical injury, romantic injury, etc. getting a different response. Is this true?
I would respond the same way (like 「ホントに(大丈夫)？」「どう(か)したの？」 ) in either situation.
Accordint to your situaion.
A: 元気？ How are you?
B: 元気（だよ）！ I'm fine!
But A feels B looks like having blues.
I'm not sure but in this situation, can A ask B "Are you sure?" ? in English. If B is down on the floor saying "I'm fine!", I'll ask B "Are you sure?"
If B just looks having blues saying "I'm fine!", I'd like to say "Really but you looks out of sprits," "そう？本当に元気？元気じゃないみたいに見えるけど・・・"
If B is your intimate friend, B tells the full story, but if you are just one of acquaintances, B don't want to tell much. I think it doesn't depend on the nationality.
