Tracking Twitter trends can teach us a lot about language, for instance that Japanese women are more likely than men to tweet about boobs. It can also introduce us to hitherto unknown expressions coined and trending in the Twitterverse. We at Rocket News have been looking into some very strange examples, and we’d like to enlighten you today. Get ready, because your eyes are about to get pregnant!

It seems that the faces of Tweeters have been practicing poor family planning, because some new expressions that have been popping up recently are me ga ninshin (my eyes got pregnant) and mimi ga ninshin (my ears got pregnant), as seen in the photo above. And it seems not even noses are safe from this epidemic of facial fecundity. So, what’s all this about? How is it that both men and women are going around talking about getting knocked up? Is Twitter just confused about how babies are made?

Maybe it will help to see the phrases used in context:

She was so beautiful, my eyes got pregnant.
She was so cute, I felt like my eyes were getting pregnant.
If you keep gazing at me like that, your eyes are going to get pregnant!

He had such a sexy voice, my ears got pregnant.
Listening with these headphones, my ears are getting pregnant.
Oh my god, your voice! My ears are getting pregnant.

So-and-so smells incredibly sexy. It’s enough to make your nose pregnant.
What is that scent? It’s making my nose pregnant.

The expression seems to be used when your sense of sight, sound or smell perceives something so fascinating or charming that it knocks you off your feet, to use another body-related expression. Naturally, you would only use it in a positive context, so don’t try an impress your Japanese friends by rolling out comments like onara ga kusasugite, hana ga ninshin suru (your farts smell so bad, you’ve gotten my nose pregnant) or joushi no sekkyo nagasugite, mimi ga ninshin shisou ni natta (the boss’s talk was so long, I thought my ears were going to get pregnant).

And as far as your next question goes, no, they do not say my mouth got pregnant. Of course, it would make sense to be able to use the expression for all five sense, so maybe it won’t be long before we start hearing things like “that liver sashimi was so good, my mouth got pregnant” and “it felt so nice, my fingertips got pregnant”. Try it out with your Japanese friends and see what kind of reaction you get. If nothing else, it should be good for a laugh!
[ Read in Japanese ]