My Honda is a ...

[Roper_imp]

I own both volumes of the book Honda DESIGN Motorcycle. These two volumes cover the years from 1957 to 2013, focusing on the design processes involved (as well as the designers themselves) behind a variety of notable Honda motorcycles built during this timeframe. The designs of Mitsuyoshi Kohama are spread throughout both volumes. For me personally, the most notable of all his designs would of course be the CB1100.

In the book's coverage of the design process that lead to the CB1100 as we know it, Mr. Kohama reveals a lot about what went on behind the scenes. At one point he mentions that the CB1100 needed to capture what he called "Honda-ness", yet that this had to be expanded to include a more adult sense of values. Later on the book discussed just the sort of word play that run-tmc and bioman have alluded to. (A number of years ago some of this information could be found on Honda's main website but sadly it has since been removed as newer versions of the CB1100 came around.)

In one of Kohama's initial sketches for a new CB, he included three Kanji characters along with his design. These three characters would later be used to guide the entire team working on the CB1100 project. Everything that they did pertaining to the CB1100 were to relate to these three characters in some way. They are as follows.

美 BI: Beauty

匠 TAKUMI: Craftsmanship

楽 RAKU: Ease

While this might not be the sort of thing that a marketing team has a field day with when it comes to creating a flashy product name, it obviously covers the CB1100 perfectly.

By the way, I've done my best to get everything above correct including the Kanji characters. But me being me, there is always a chance of error so please forgive any mistakes that I might have made. Also, none of this is to imply that I don't appreciate a good product name. As mentioned by others, Honda has had a number of them over the years. As a point of reference, I almost never referred to my previous motorcycle as a NT650. Instead it was always a Hawk GT, or simply the Hawk. Great motorcycle, great name.

Okay. Time for a geeky derail. But please be patient. It might be worth it.

I lived in Japan for a couple of years and learned enough Japanese to get by. Kanji characters have two pronunciations. There's kunyomi, which is Japanese pronunciation usually used when the Kanji character is by itself. There's onyomi, which is a pronunciation linked to Chinese, which is usually used when the character is combined with another character.

For example:

美 means beauty. Alone, it's pronounced "ustukushii." Combined with other characters, it's pronounced "bi" (bee) as in the word bijin 美人, which means beautiful person (akin to "babe" or "hot" in American English.)

匠 is takumi (kunyomi) or shou (onyomi) pronounced "show" with an extended "o" sound.

楽 is raku (kunyomi) or raku (onyomi). They're the same. What's cool about raku is that it can mean ease, comfort, simple, relaxing, trouble-free -- depending on the context.

Leave it up to the Japanese to guide industrial design with a three-word mission statement.

I might start calling my bike "Raku." It's hard to pronounce the Japanese "R" sound. It's made by lightly pressing the tip of the tongue on the upward curve of the alveolar ridge behind the top teeth, and then rapidly dropping the tongue. It's close to a "D" or "N" sound with a little bit of "L" (Japanese tongues are a little wider with a more blunt tip.) I guess the closest we have in the western hemisphere is a single-flapped Spanish "R" -- a light tap like in the middle of the Spanish word "Para". The "U" sound on the end of "Raku" is truncated and barely voiced. (That minor in Linguistics is finally good for something after 30 years )

Anyhoo... 楽 = Raku = maybe Rockette. Or maybe Racquel. Definitely not Rocky. Or just Raku. C'mon Raku, let's go for a relaxing trouble-free ride.