Curiosities about the Japanese anime Toradora

Have you ever wondered why the anime is called Toradora? Why is Ryuuji compared to a dragon and Taiga to a tigress? Is she really called a pocket tigress? In this article, we will look at a few curiosities about the anime and the names of the characters in Japanese.

If you don't know the anime Toradora, it is a charming romantic comedy based on a light novel. If you have not watched it yet, do not worry, this article contains no spoilers.

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About the anime Toradora

The story begins with the male protagonist Ryūji Takasu, who feels frustrated trying to show his best when he enters his second year of high school. Despite his gentle personality, his eyes make him look like an intimidating delinquent, and that look costs him any real hope of getting a girlfriend anytime soon. After receiving greetings from his mother in the morning, Ryūji goes to school and is happy to find out that he will be in the same class as his best friend Yūsaku Kitamura and Minori Kushieda, the girl he is in love with. On that same day, however, they accidentally bump into the famous "pocket tigress," Taiga Aisaka, who is also in his class and a friend of Minori.

Why is the anime called Toradora?

First, the name of the anime itself: とらドラ! (Toradora). The syllable tora literally means tiger (虎) in original Japanese. The syllable dora, written in katakana, is the abbreviation of the English word dragon, which in Japanese is ドラゴン (doragon).

Japanese often keeps the original way of saying a word and, at the same time, borrows an imported version from another language, the way English speakers sometimes say download instead of transfer. Notice that the title of the anime uses one animal in Japanese (tora) and another imported from English (dora)? The same thing happens with the names of the two main characters.

Taiga and the pocket tigress

The name of the main heroine is 逢坂大河 (Aisaka Taiga), written with the following ideograms:

• 逢 — to meet, to encounter;
• 坂 — slope, hill;
• 大 — big;
• 河 — river;

So why is Taiga's nickname tigress, if her name does not contain any ideogram for tiger? As we saw above, Japanese keeps a word derived from English, written in katakana, that means tiger, and that word is precisely Taiga / タイガー.

The expression pocket tigress that appears in the subtitle of the anime is the translation of 手乗りタイガー (tenori taiga). The original word 手乗り, however, has nothing to do with pocket: the two ideograms that form it mean hand and to place, so tenori literally means to place in the hand. That is why several scenes show a tigress sitting in the palm of someone's hand.

Why is Ryuuji considered a dragon?

The name of the male protagonist is 高須竜児 (Takasu Ryuuji), written with the following ideograms:

• 高 — high, tall;
• 須 — necessarily, obligatory;
• 竜 — dragon, imperial;
• 児 — newborn, child, cub;

Put together, Ryuuji's name simply carries the original Japanese ideogram for dragon (ryū), which is where the dragon comparison comes from.

Other curiosities with the names of Toradora

The name of the character Minori Kushieda is written 櫛枝 実乃梨 and breaks down as:

• 櫛 — comb;
• 枝 — branch, twig;
• 実 — reality, truth;
• 乃 — possessive particle no;
• 梨 — pear tree, pear;

The name of the character Ami Kawashima is written 川嶋 亜美 and breaks down as:

• 川 — river;
• 嶋 — island;
• 亜 — Asia, sub-, classification;
• 美 — beautiful, pretty;

The name of the character Yuusaku Kitamura is written 北村 祐作 and breaks down as:

• 北 — north;
• 村 — village, town;
• 祐 — help;
• 作 — to build, to make, to prepare;

What do you think? Do the characters' personalities match the meanings of their kanji, or do they surprise you?

If you enjoy this kind of Japanese-language breakdown, you may also like our pieces on why Japanese anime characters have such unusual names, the different ways to say dragon in Japanese, and what context really means in Japanese.