[MrDrEsq]

don't know a whole lot about historical japanese, don't know anything for that matter, but there be whispers around the department about keigo being court speech- some keigo even coming directly from words that were used only to refer to and talk to the emperor. I also know that some funky kind of slang came out of the court too. apparently it was uncouth to talk about food directly so the women came up with slang. examples being agari for tea, murasaki for shoyu, gari for ginger. anyway, flash forward a couple hundred years and the slang is still beign used. by old women, sometimes, but predominantly in sushi bars as, i guess, sushiben