Given my previous post, you’ve no doubt encountered the word “skosh,” meaning “a little bit.” As in:
PERSON 1: Do you want some ketchup for your hotdog?
PERSON 2: Just a skosh.
You may never have encountered the word in writing, but you likely know it in its spoken form skosh.
What you probably don’t know is its origin: It’s Japanese.
In my previous post, I gave you what you needed to decode several Japanese words. One of them was skoshi, which is a popular contraction of sukoshi, which means “a little bit,” and that is where we get “skosh” (however you spell it).
That takes care of the word skosh. But what about ketchup?
It turns out, ketchup isn’t either an English word or a Japanese word. It’s a Malay word–that is, a word from Malaysia.
In Malaysia they make a sauce for food that is called kechap, and this sauce is remarkably similar to what we in the West call ketchup (not completely similar; it’s somewhat different from ketchup). That’s where the name comes from.
So what do I want on my hotdog (in a low-carb bun)?
Just a skosh of ketchup.
While living in Yokusaka sometimes I would go out on the economy for a military hair cut. Interesting experience in trying to explain what you wanted, but saying skoshi usually sufficed.
In the Phillipines they use banana catchup – but this is even worse on a low carb diet.
You mean that Minnesotans are really originally from the Pacific Rim and not The Old Northern Shore?
Ketchup is from Indonesia.
It’s black and it’s sweet. I don’t remember what it’s made from.
When I came to USA I realize that there’s no ingrieient beside sugar that westerners use to sweatened their cooking. Indonesian use Ketchup. It’s also good for Satay, an Indonesian style BBQ where you have smal cube meat, put it on a stick and grilled it. Of course you have to add, garlic, fried onion, salt, a bit of butter …mmmm
True. Ketchap is also Indonesian, though Bahasa Indonesia and Bahasa Melayu are so closely related that they are like two dialects of a larger language.
Incidentally, I really like satay. My favorite kind is chicken satay with peanut sauce. Mmmmmmm!
Thanks you for reminding me about Indonesian, Beng! I’ve been meaning to study up on my Indonesian before the Catholic Answers cruise this year, and I need to get started.
The reason I want to study up on it is that a lot of the crew on Holland-America ships is from Indonesia, and they get a kick out of it when I (an orang putih, and even a *literal* ang moh) speak in Indonesian.
Last year the Indonesian crew in the dining room started talking about me, and waiters from other people’s tables started coming up to me to engage me in little conversations.
Unfortunately, at the moment, I’m limited to not much more than greetings and how to order food, but this year I’d like to be able to say more as a way of honoring their culture.
Fortunatley, Pimsleur does have an Indonesian set, which I just ordered. 🙂
Language key for previous comment:
Bahasa Indonesia = Indonesian language
Bahasa Melayu = Malaysian language
orang putih = white person (something westerners are commonly called)
ang moh = red hair (also something westerners are commonly called; not considered very polite; seems to be derived from the Hokkien dialect of Chinese)
Beng, “Ketjap” is basically spiced soy sauce. The two main Indonesian varieties are ketjap asin (salty) and ketjap manis (sweet, and I mean REAL sweet). And I make a pretty good satay, too 😉
Haven’t run across “skosh” before, though. In this house the quantity in question is a “schloop”.
In the Chinese dialect of Cantonese, the word for tomato sauce is “keh jup”. “Keh” is short for “fon keh” meaning tomato. It was also a term used to call a pickled fish sauce. It then made its way onto other South-east Asian countries if other various forms of sauces, satay in Malay/Thai and sambal or ketjap manis in Indonesia.