nookie

[Douglas G. Wilson]

>As for the Japanese, pending input from the savants, I'll present my naive
>notions (please correct me if necessary). ....

I disregarded the most obvious conjecture, that "nugi" is simply a
nominalized form = "disrobing" or so, since I didn't find any such thing in
my dictionaries or (at a brief glance) by Google. However I now find
several instances of modern "nugi" in more or less appropriate sense,
including a "nugi-nugi game" (advertised online) which apparently is
essentially "strip jankenpon" or "strip rock-paper-scissors". [I think I'm
probably not Googling properly in Japanese, or maybe the search engine is
not working right. Does Google (try to) identify word boundaries in
Japanese, I wonder?]

This is peripheral or irrelevant to the etymological question (WRT
"nookie"), of course.

Even more peripheral, maybe: at ProQuest: in the "Chicago Tribune" from
1887 there is a brief piece about geisha in which it is noted that <<they
go through all the first part of the national dance -- Chou Nugi or Chou
Kina -- in a way and with a grace ...>>: I don't know what "Chou Kina" or
"Chou Nugi" might be, but another article, from the "Congegationalist" in
1896, shows "chou kina, chou kina, chou, chou, kina, kina", apparently a
chant/song, as an accompaniment to a game of kitsuneken ... which is an old
equivalent of jankenpon as I understand it. Maybe one of the savants can
clarify this stuff?

-- Doug Wilson

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