What is this Japanese announcement?

December 6, 2014 11:14 AM

Maru is a Japanese dog on Instagram, and this specific announcement (?) makes him howl. What is it?

There's been a few videos of him howling at this noise, and I don't know what it is!

another example
and another

posted by quadrilaterals to Writing & Language (4 answers total)

Best answer: The first one is "everyone....[cut]...thank you very much". The second is, "with this/at this point....[something] broadcast [something]..." - it is to hear because of the howling and ambient sounds. The last is, "this is...." and then it again becomes too hard for me to make out because of the howling and ambient sounds. The cuts in the videos also make it hard to guess what the full announcements might be.

I found this video as well, where the announcer says twice "now we're doing a test broadcast".

Announcements over loud speakers like this is common in Japanese suburbs.
posted by Tanizaki at 11:39 AM on December 6, 2014

It's entirely possible that the equipment is generating a sound too high for us to hear, but not too high for him to hear.
posted by Chocolate Pickle at 2:57 PM on December 6, 2014

Best answer: In at least one of those videos, Maru is yelling at one of the most annoying things about living in Japan: Political advertisement cars that drive around neighborhoods on otherwise quiet days loudly espousing the propaganda of some party or other.
posted by Muttoneer at 5:21 PM on December 6, 2014 [1 favorite]

Best answer: In the second link, the musical tone at the end of the announcement makes me think it's a public announcement. In Japan, there are loudspeakers around every neighborhood, and they'll broadcast announcements, the amount depending on the town you live in. Standard is a chime around evening time announcing that it's evening. The main idea is for emergency use, but there are towns out there that will make announcements about all sorts of stuff. Luckily, I don't live in one of those.

The other ones could be political ad trucks (when there's an election coming up, they have people driving around with loudspeakers) though those are usually women's voices. Other than that. There are various loudspeaker trucks, like people driving around offering to pick up old junk, or to sell the junk they've picked up. All are annoying, and I empathize with the dog (though I wouldn't want to live next door to him).
posted by Ghidorah at 8:13 PM on December 6, 2014