# Sounds like f\*\*\* you?
**URL:** https://boards.straightdope.com/t/sounds-like-f-you/773525
**Category:** Factual Questions
**Created:** [December 1, 2016, 1:12pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/sounds-like-f-you/773525 "2016-12-01T13:12:59Z")
**Posts on this page:** 17
**Page:** 1
### Author:  [@Lumpy](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Lumpy)
#### Post date: [December 1, 2016, 1:12pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/sounds-like-f-you/773525/1 "2016-12-01T13:12:59Z")
Is there any phrase or words in Japanese that sounds phonetically close to “fuck you” or fuh-kyu, or so forth?
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### Author:  [@TokyoBayer](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/TokyoBayer)
#### Post date: [December 1, 2016, 1:26pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/sounds-like-f-you/773525/2 "2016-12-01T13:26:46Z")
Not that I’m familiar with. Japanese does not have a native sound “fa”. The only “f” sound is “fu”.
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### Author:  [@jtur88](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/jtur88)
#### Post date: [December 1, 2016, 2:33pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/sounds-like-f-you/773525/3 "2016-12-01T14:33:39Z")
There is in Romanian. “Fac eu” sounds exactly like the English expletive, and means, roughly, “I’m doing it”. Which in some contexts, might mean pretty much the same thing, too. “I’m all over this, your stupid input is not needed”.
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### Author:  [@Thudlow\_Boink](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Thudlow_Boink)
#### Post date: [December 1, 2016, 3:20pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/sounds-like-f-you/773525/4 "2016-12-01T15:20:27Z")
Were you perhaps thinking about the [Japanese twins from Austin Powers](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=QpsZQ_8MOSw)?
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### Author:  [@Johanna](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Johanna)
#### Post date: [December 1, 2016, 3:26pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/sounds-like-f-you/773525/5 "2016-12-01T15:26:23Z")
I just watched _To Die For_, in which Alison Folland wears a T-shirt with an unzipped jacket over it. The letters visible in the middle of the shirt are:
…UCK SH…
It was probably director Gus Van Sant’s intention for the reptilian brain in the viewers to fill in the rest of the words.
Then at one point her jacket is open wide enough to read:
TRUCK SHOW
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### Author:  [@Lumpy](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Lumpy)
#### Post date: [December 1, 2016, 5:23pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/sounds-like-f-you/773525/6 "2016-12-01T17:23:13Z")
> [@Thudlow\_Boink](#):
>
> Were you perhaps thinking about the [Japanese twins from Austin Powers](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=QpsZQ_8MOSw)?
More like this thing that I don’t know the proper name for; when Japanese shout some word or phrase in two quick clipped syllables.
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### Author:  [@Shagnasty](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Shagnasty)
#### Post date: [December 1, 2016, 5:40pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/sounds-like-f-you/773525/7 "2016-12-01T17:40:08Z")
There is the small chain of Japanese resturants in the Boston area named [Fugakyu](http://fugakyu.net/).
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### Author:  [@August\_West](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/August_West)
#### Post date: [December 1, 2016, 5:58pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/sounds-like-f-you/773525/8 "2016-12-01T17:58:42Z")
See also, former Major Leaguer [Kosuke Fukudome](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Kosuke_Fukudome)
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### Author:  [@Squallous](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Squallous)
#### Post date: [December 1, 2016, 10:29pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/sounds-like-f-you/773525/9 "2016-12-01T22:29:58Z")
If you seek Amy you might find it.
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### Author:  [@Darren\_Garrison](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Darren_Garrison)
#### Post date: [December 1, 2016, 10:41pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/sounds-like-f-you/773525/10 "2016-12-01T22:41:01Z")
> [@Lumpy](#):
>
> More like this thing that I don’t know the proper name for; when Japanese shout some word or phrase in two quick clipped syllables.
If it is from some movie or something, maybe you could post a link to a clip.
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### Author:  [@Atamasama](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Atamasama)
#### Post date: [December 1, 2016, 11:24pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/sounds-like-f-you/773525/11 "2016-12-01T23:24:17Z")
“Fugu”, Japanese for pufferfish, is a bit close.
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### Author:  [@thelurkinghorror](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/thelurkinghorror)
#### Post date: [December 1, 2016, 11:27pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/sounds-like-f-you/773525/12 "2016-12-01T23:27:44Z")
> [@TokyoBayer](#):
>
> Not that I’m familiar with. Japanese does not have a native sound “fa”. The only “f” sound is “fu”.
Occasionally, it can be approximated with a small character, Fa = ファ. But this is a more modern thing, and you’re right it’s not a native sound.
And it’s not “fu” as in the first part of “food,” but [a sound that doesn’t occur in English](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Voiceless_bilabial_fricative).
> [@Lumpy](#):
>
> More like this thing that I don’t know the proper name for; when Japanese shout some word or phrase in two quick clipped syllables.
From where, a game show or something?
Complete WAG: are they saying something like “thank you” with a Japanese accent? It comes out something like “san kyuu.”
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### Author:  [@harmonicamoon](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/harmonicamoon)
#### Post date: [December 1, 2016, 11:40pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/sounds-like-f-you/773525/13 "2016-12-01T23:40:50Z")
I once drank a Thailand beer. It was called Phuk.
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### Author:  [@jtur88](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/jtur88)
#### Post date: [December 2, 2016, 12:59am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/sounds-like-f-you/773525/14 "2016-12-02T00:59:33Z")
> [@August\_West](#):
>
> See also, former Major Leaguer [Kosuke Fukudome](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Kosuke_Fukudome)
I expect two future baseball stadiums to be named Fuk-u Dome and Chan Ho Park.
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### Author:  [@Giles](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Giles)
#### Post date: [December 2, 2016, 1:13am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/sounds-like-f-you/773525/15 "2016-12-02T01:13:55Z")
“Fuku” is reasonably common in place names in Japan, e.g. Fukushima (where they had a nuclear power-plant disaster) and Fukuoka (the largest city in Kyushu). That “fuku” is written as 福 and means “good fortune”. It is pronounced as /ɸɯ̥kɯ/, i.e., roughly /fookoo/ in English orthography.
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### Author:  [@glowacks](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/glowacks)
#### Post date: [December 2, 2016, 3:57am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/sounds-like-f-you/773525/16 "2016-12-02T03:57:30Z")
普及 (diffusion), 不朽(everlasting, or more literally, non-decaying), and 不急(in no hurry) are all pronounced ふきゅう (fukyuu). That doesn’t really sound exactly like “fuck you”, because as noted the Japanese ‘a’ sounds more like an English ‘short u’ than the Japanese ‘u’ does, but it’s pretty close. It’s basically “book you” with an ‘f’ instead of a ‘b’. You’re not going to get any closer because there are no native Japanese words that have ‘fa’ as a syllable.
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### Author:  [@TokyoBayer](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/TokyoBayer)
#### Post date: [December 2, 2016, 4:14am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/sounds-like-f-you/773525/17 "2016-12-02T04:14:56Z")
> [@thelurkinghorror](#):
>
> Occasionally, it can be approximated with a small character, Fa = ファ. But this is a more modern thing, and you’re right it’s not a native sound.
I should have been more precise. Native Japanese doesn’t have the English “uh” sound so even the Fa = ファ would have the same sound as “father.”
They do use this for writing “loan words” phonetically.