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This sentence appeared here:

<https://www.asahi.com/articles/DA3S15638672.html?iref=comtop_Opinion_05>

>
> 日本語【にほんご】では東西南北【とうざいなんぼく】だが、中国語【ちゅうごくご】では東南西北【とうなんせいほく】と書【か】く。一方【いっぽう】で、英語【えいご】では北南東西【きたなんとうにし】の順【じゅん】になることが多【おお】い。
>
> _In Japanese it's east, west, south, north and south, but in Chinese it's
> written east, south, west and north. In English, on the other hand, the
> order is often north, south, east, and west._

  1. Are the computer-generated furigana correct?
  2. If the furigana are correct, why do the kanji have different readings?
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readings culture idioms
readings of north, south, east, west?
In such compounds, I would rather expect that on'yomi would be used, not
kun'yomi.

西 has 2 widely used on'yomi readings: さい and せい.

東西南北 happens to be pre-existing Sino-Japanese word, included in dictionaries,
with reading とうざいなんぼく. Voicing of /s/ to /z/ in ざい is result of
[rendaku](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Rendaku). It happens sometimes, but
not always, in compound words. Change of /h/ to /b/ in ぼく is also caused by
rendaku. Modern Japanese consonants /ɸ/, /h/, /ç/ come from Old Japanese
consonant /p/.

Japanese reading generated for Chinese word 東南西北 (in Modern Mandarin: Pinyin
romanization: dōngnánxīběi, /tʊŋ⁵⁵ nän³⁵⁻⁵⁵ ɕi⁵⁵ peɪ̯²¹⁴⁻²¹⁽⁴⁾/) at least
consists of valid on'yomi of these kanji. (せい reading was guessed here for 西.)

Japanese reading generated for 北南東西 consists of kun'yomi for 北, on'yomi for 南
and 東, and kun'yomi for 西. This does not seem correct.
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とうざいなんぼく is the correct reading of those characters when they are put together
in that order.

The second one being Chinese, it is natural to read it in all on’yomi.
Besides, 東南 and 西北 are both existing words in Japanese and they are read とうなん
and せいほく, respectively. No one would think it’s strange. (In a mahjong
context, it would be read トンナンシャーペイ. I don’t know why 西 is シャー, not シー.)

The last one is not a valid compound in Japanese. It’s just a list of
directions, It could have as well been written 北、南、東、西. The auto-generated
furigana picked the first valid compound 南東 and gave it the right reading. It
should be read in either all on’yomi or all kun’yomi.
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