Could I wave a pack of smokes and ask "daijoubu?" to see if I'm allowed to
smoke?
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2023-04-04T21:48:12.633
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2023-04-09T01:05:22.230
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question
translation
Is smoking allowed?
**Hello Malu, i assumed that you're a foreigner office worker, who traveled to
Japan to work for the 1st time. In case you wanted to ask permission from
others to smoke, you can say these sentences (depends on context/ situations
you're in)**

**1/Sumimasen, kokode tabaco wo sutte moiidesuka ? ( "Excuse me, can i smoke
here ?" )**

This is the polite version, when you're speaking with your boss or a stranger
you met for the 1st time.

**2/Kokode sutte moii ? ( "Can i smoke here? ")**

Short and casual version, if you wanted to speak with a JP friend/ colleague
at your working place.

**Hope my answer will help you have motivation to learn Japanese and having
fun while working/ living in Japan.**
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2023-04-08T16:57:18.527
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2023-04-08T16:57:18.527
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answer
To give a full breakdown:

[大丈夫]{daijoubu} cannot be "okay" in the sense of "permissible", but only in
the sense of unharmed, in good condition, feeling all right, etc. It overlaps
to some extent with [元気]{genki}, but the latter is more affirmative - actually
in high spirits, more than just "okay" - and forms different idioms (大丈夫 might
for example be used colloquially as something like "I'm fine, you don't need
to bother helping me with this", or "don't worry, everything will be okay",
depending on context, whereas [お]{o}[元気]{genki}[です]{desu}[か]{ka} is a common
expression roughly equivalent to "How are you?").

The plainest form of "okay" in the sense of "permissible" is [いい]{ii} (also
written 良い), literally "good". However, you will definitely not get away with
just saying that by itself and gesturing - that will just be rude, and call
attention to your status as a foreigner and lack of effort in trying to
communicate properly. Even formalizing this like いいですか will not realistically
get you anywhere; you'll want to actually explain what you're asking about.

The standard idiom here is to use the te-form of a verb (roughly comparable to
forming a participle or gerundive in English using the `-ing` suffix) plus
[も]{mo} + いい. The literal meaning works out something along the lines of "also
okay in the case of whatever-ing", i.e., "will the situation still be good if
I do whatever?".

In the current example, we use the verb [吸]{su}[う]{u} - in the primary sense,
to breathe or to suck up/in, but also to smoke (cigarettes). We can be more
explicit by saying what we propose to 吸う - in this case, [タバコ]{tabako} (a
loanword from the English "tobacco", normally used specifically for
cigarettes). Thus, fully elaborated,「タバコ[を]{o}[す]{su}[って]{tte}もいいですか？」. In
Daniel's example, we also add [すみません]{sumimasen} (a set expression for "excuse
me"; the hyper-literal meaning is something more like "the matter is not
settled" or "I still owe you something") and [ここ]{koko}[で]{de} meaning "here".
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2023-04-09T01:05:22.230
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answer