Tweet of the Week #167: Remote Work Ruins Valentine’s Day for Salarymen

In Japan, Valentine’s Day is all about women giving chocolates to men in their lives—boyfriends, family members, schoolmates and work colleagues. But with coronavirus cases on the rise (again) and companies switching to remote work, workplace Valentine’s Day took a different turn.

The tweet below is a joke about how Valentine’s Day took a hit this year. Still, some people noticed a lot more men in the office than usual. Women apparently aren’t interested in gifting chocolate to coworkers when remote work is an option.

Were you expecting chocolates?

https://twitter.com/ryman_saeba1919/status/1493059505491300353?s=20&t=O15dqySfRYGy7wavbrd6uQ

なんか今日（きょう）、出社（しゅっしゃ）してる男性陣（だんせいじん）いつもより多（おお）くてワロタww

そして女性陣（じょせいじん）、全員（ぜんいん）在宅（ざいたく）勤務（きんむ）で更（さら）にワロタwwww

“Strangely, the number of male employees at the office is higher than usual today. Lol!

And what’s more impressive, all the women are working from home. Lol!”

Express ‘furthermore’ or ‘moreover’

Photo: Joshua Meyer

Time to get new Japanese conjunction under your belt with 更（さら）に. This JLPT N3 level phrase is used daily and can translate several nuances. The most common is to express an increase in the degree or stages of a situation.

• 更に彼女（かのじょ）はきれいになった: And now she’s even prettier.
• 更に上手（じょうず）になりました: I’ve gotten even better.
• 更に悪（わる）いことには雨（あめ）が降（ふ）りだした: To make matters worse, rain began to fall.

更に also indicates something that is being renewed.

A second nuance is a repetition or the addition of what has already been done before.

• 10年（ねん）の月日（つきひ）が更（さら）に流（なが）れた: Ten more years have passed.

Finally, 更に also indicates something that is being renewed.

• 契約（けいやく）を更（さら）に更新（こうしん）する: I’m going to renew the contract further.

Vocabulary

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