Plutocrats…why…
i thought of a pokemon too
yes! i had the same issue…
I had no idea and now i just go with “zaibatsu”
which i know isn’t helping, because i am not associating it with anything
I know what zaibatsu are, but only because I learnt about how the US broke them all up after WWII during my Japanese cultural studies course at uni. Actually, you’ve probably heard of some of the big ones, like Mitsubishi (who today make cars) or Sumitomo (who today are a bank). Even Nissan has its roots in the same places.
Essentially they involved insider trading on a corporate scale. Massively anti-competitive.
oh wow, ok
i did pop culture stuff at uni about japan, not really into business side of things
By means of. (lion-person-drop, that “by means of” red kanji, sorry I couldn’t type “i” and picked the right “i” for the kanji because the list was too long on my computer.)
I’m not sure if I understand this idiom correctly. I know the translation in my native language (Indonesian. It’s “melalui, dengan, dengan memakai”. I had put these translations on my WK meaning note, anyway). I read some translations from three or four websites, but I found one translation from dictionary.com as an easy translation for me: by means of, with the help of; by the agency of; through: We crossed the stream by means of a log.
Can anyone please correct me if I’m still wrong or I got it right already? I made these three sentences by this new vocabulary “by means of”
I walk by means of a cane when I have gout attack.
I climbed a tree to perch on a branch with Koichi my dad by way of a leaf that turned to be a transformed iron man.
My uncle who got stroke ate by means of my aunt spoonfed him.
先回り anticipation
Still I have no idea what that means…
I’ve read so many example sentences in the last five minutes that literally everything sounds weird to me, and I’m not great at formal English grammar, but I’ll try to help.
“By means of” is more of a phrase than an idiom. It basically means that you do something “with the help of” or “with the aid of” X. X could be a method, an instrument, etc.
Your first example sentence is fine (though missing an article: “when I have a gout attack” or “when I have an attack of gout”).
The second uses ‘by way of’, which, though similar, has a slightly different meaning. I’m also not actually quite sure what your second sentence means, I think because you ordered some parts of it a little ambiguously, so I won’t try to dissect it!
The third doesn’t really work. I would say “my uncle, who had a stroke, ate by means of my aunt spoonfeeding him”.
Hopefully somebody else can provide a better grammatical explanation of why. I want to say X has to be a noun/gerund/gerund clause, but “my aunt spoonfeeding him” is not a gerund clause because those always start with a gerund…
Anticipation is the feeling of excitement when waiting for something you expect to happen in the (near) future.
“Fans of the franchise looked forward to the release of the next installment with eager anticipation.”
“To anticipate” is to expect something to happen (among other things), and anticipation indicates experiencing that wait with a feeling of excitement, expectation, or sort of eagerness. You might say somewhat ironically “we waited in anticipation for the train to arrive, only for it to be cancelled”, and you could describe things like “the courtroom was filled with anticipation”, like everybody is eagerly waiting to see what will happen.
People tend not to use “by means of” in usual conversation, usually abbreviating it to “by” or “with” or “using”.
So, sentences like “I went into town by bus” actually mean “I went into town by means of a bus”, but since “by means of” is unweldy to say, we just say “by”. “We crossed the stream by means of a log” becomes “We crossed the stream using a log” or “over a log”.
Your first sentence is ok, though “I walk using a cane” flows better. Your second and third sentences appear to have the words out of order, though.
@Radish8 @Belthazar Thank you very much for your help!
♂️
My second sentence, I basically wanted to say: I climbed a tree by a magical leaf.
Thank you very much for the explanation!
Okay yep, that would just be “I climbed a tree by means of a magical leaf”. But @belthazar is correct that this phrasing tends to sound a little stiff and formal in natural speech. You’d be more likely to see something like this in writing, especially in things which are trying to sound a little fancy.
@Rinchannn no problem! Does that make sense? It was a little difficult to explain, because I just wanted to use the word ‘anticipation’ to define it 
I totally understood it!
For “anticipation” I always think of Tim Curry and Sweet Transvestite, for some reason
I somehow remember plutocrats because I think those guys are so rich they get some Greek legend association. If it ever fails, zaibatsu will do 


Not from WaniKani, but today I learned 三段論法 (さんだんろんぽう) which means syllogism, which I had never heard before. For those who have also never heard the word, syllogism is a three pointed argument like “If X, and Y, then Z”. Pretty weird feeling to learn English while studying Japanese
“Vermillion” from 朱, which apparently means “a brilliant red color”. It’s also “a brilliant red pigment made from mercury sulfide (cinnabar)”. Isn’t cinnabar poisonous?
Anyway, I decided that there was no value in learning this English word so I just added “red” as a synonym.
Yep. It’s supposedly “the single most toxic mineral to handle on Earth”… though if that’s true, it’s probably because most other minerals aren’t quite as concentrated in their unrefined form.
I know a few people who wear jewelry made from cinnabar. Fortunately, they’re aware that it’s poisonous, so they have backing on it that separates it from their skin.
I didnt pay attention to it while watching but now I am never gonna forget it thanks!