Wash My Hands

Wednesday, February seventh, two thousand and seven

I saw an interesting English idiom, "wash one's hands of something", in an email newsletter that I received on my cell phone, when the production line in my factory was working well. The idiom sounds similar to a Japanese idiom "足を洗う(ashi wo arau)" - means "wash one's legs of something".

In Japan, people say like this - "I've just washed my legs of gambling", when the people have quit gambling. Especially, when Japanese Mafia's members(やくざ yakuza) quit their jobs to be serious men, they say "I've just washed my legs, so I'll never do criminal things."
Don't you think those similar idioms are interesting? Even though western people and eastern people were born in the different areas, I strongly think the feelings are very common.

Today, I had to work 14 hours due the malfunction of our machinery, but I couldn't help but wash hands because of lots of oil spots. Besides, I cannot help but write my diary even though I'm exhausted, because that kind of interesting idioms have me activate. Since I'm drunk now, there are tons of mistakes in this English diary, I bet. :)

Anyway, I've been really worried how long the malfunction lasts(continues).... (ToT)


wash one's hands of something: ～と手を切る、～から足を洗う