Skip to content

【No. 1932】Kaya no Soto (蚊帳の外 - Leaving out)

Aug 10, 2021 16:25
Kaya no Soto

Have you ever been ignored or treated unfairly, and found yourself unable to get involved in something?

A person in such a situation is described as kaya no soto (蚊帳の外) in Japanese.

Since kaya (蚊帳) is a net used to protect people from harmful insects such as mosquitoes, which is equivalent to "mosquito (bed) net" in English, and soto (外) means "outside," the literal meaning of kaya no soto is "outside a mosquito net."

Inside a mosquito net is safe, but if you are outside the mosquito net, you will be attacked by mosquitoes or harmful insects.

Because of this, kaya no soto came to have its current meaning.

In addition, it is often used to mean just "leaving someone out."
蚊帳の外

無視されるなど不当な扱いを受け、物事に関与できない立場に置かれたことはありますか?

そのような立場の人を、「蚊帳の外」と表現します。

「蚊帳」は蚊などの害虫から人を守るための網、「外」は "outside" を意味するので、「蚊帳の外」の文字どおり意味は "outside a mosquito net" となります。

蚊帳の中にいれば安全ですが、蚊帳の外にいると蚊などの害虫から攻撃を受けてしまいます。

このことから、蚊帳の外は上記の意味を持つようになりました。

単に、「仲間はずれ」の意味で使われることも多いです。

Corrections (1)

No. 1 Timmy
  • Inside a mosquito net is safe, but if you are outside the mosquito net, you will be attacked by mosquitoes or harmful insects.
  • Inside a mosquito net is safe, but if you are outside the mosquito net, you will be attacked by mosquitoes or other harmful insects.

Perfect! To be honest, it was not easy to find something worth correcting in this text of yours)

Toru
Thank you for the correction and comment! (^^)

Comments