山田教授：ここに赤、青、黄色、柴、緑、白、黒とありますが、どの色が病人には落ちつく色だと思われますか。
佐々木：紫ではありませんか。
山田教授：よくお分かりですね。
佐々木：当てずっぽうで言っただけですよ。
Atezuppoo
(Shikisaigaku no kyooju to)
Yamada kyooju: Koko ni aka, ao, kiiro, murasaki, midori, shiro, kuro to arimasu ga, dono iro ga byoonin ni wa ochitsuku iro da to omowaremasu ka.
Sasaki: Murasaki de wa arimasen ka.
Yamada kyooju: Yoku owakari desu ne.
Sasaki: Atezuppoo de itta dake desu yo.
(To a professor teaching about colors)
Prof. Yamada: Here we have red, blue, yellow, purple, green, white and black. Which color do you think people who are sick find the most comforting?
Sasaki: Isn't it purple?
Prof. Yamada: That' s right. Very good.
Sasaki: It was just a wild guess.
* * *
Atezuppoo means a guess, guesswork, a wild guess, a shot in the dark, a rough-and-ready guess; atezuppoo wo iu (to hazard a guess).
There was a child suffering from autism. He couldn't play with other children and so didn't go to nursery school. Instead of going to elementary school he stayed home and watched television all day long.
One day the television screen filled with a picture of a field of lavender-colored flowers. Upon seeing this, the child suddenly began to speak. I had remembered this. My answer to the professor's question had thus not been just a wild guess (tan ni atezuppoo de itta wake de wa arimasen).
Japan's period-adventure films always seem to have one important person who is sick. And he also always seems to have a purple cloth wrapped around his head. Kore wa atezuppoo ni sugimasen ga (Though this is just a guess), perhaps people at that time believed purple had medicinal value.
The color purple has played an important role in Japanese history. When Shotoku Taishi chose 12 men to rule under him, he is said to have had the person at the top wear purple clothes. From that time, purple has been the color of royalty. Also remember that in the Tale of Genji, Hikaru Genji loved most a women named Murasaki (purple) no Ue (Lady Murasaki).
Cleopatra, also said to have been partial to purple, had her ship's sails made out of purple cloth. She must have intuitively sensed that purple would give people moral support. Kono kangae wa tatoe, atezuppoo da to shitemo, machigatte iru to omoenai (Even if she'd just been making a wild guess, she wasn't mistaken).
Female leaders in the ancient world always seemed to possess a keen intuition. It's even said that the an- cient Japanese Empress Himiko practiced magic.
Perhaps. In any case, it's certain she possessed an acute intuition.
Blind people who are sick are said to sleep peacefully in rooms with light purple walls. An experiment has shown that if the walls are red their pulse rate goes up to 95 and their body temperature rises. We apparently have a light sensor built into our skins. Colors are full of mystery and charm.