How do you say It looks/sounds cute?かわいそう (kawaisou?)【Japanese Columns 1】

Usually, when you want to say “It looks/sounds + い (i)-adjective” in Japanese, you can remove the final い (i) from an い (i)‑adjective and add そう (sou).

For example, おいしい (oishii) becomes おいしそう (oishisou), and おおきい (ookii) becomes おおきそう (ookisou)

But here’s a question!

Does かわいい (kawaii) become かわいそう (kawaisou)?

The answer is NO. But.. why?

Why you can’t say かわいそう (kawaisou) to mean It looks/sounds cute

Of course かわいそう (kawaisou) is grammatically correct. But here’s the thing.

かわいそう (kawaisou) means “poor thing”, a word used to express sympathy!

So we never say かわいそう (kawaisou) to mean “It looks/sounds cute,” because it just means “poor thing.”

If you use かわいそう (kawaisou) to mean “It looks/sounds cute,” it will be like this..

What should we say to mean “It looks/sounds cute”?

If you want to say “It looks/sounds cute”, you can say the following:

Or simply say かわいい ね (kawaii ne), which means “it’s cute”.

Those are common phrases used to mean “It looks/sounds cute.”

Interestingly, even Japanese speakers themselves aren’t always sure what to say when they want to express that.

People sometimes say かわいそう (kawaisou) to mean “It looks/sounds cute,” and then add, “I mean, it must be cute — not ‘poor thing.’”

But overall, using かわいそう (kawaisou) to mean “It looks or sounds cute” sounds unnatural. It’s strongly recommended to use other phrases instead.

Let’s check the usage with some example sentences