Japanese speaks flawless Bangla, loves shorshe-ilish

A Japanese woman's video of fluent Bengali speaking has impressed many on social media.

The video showed the Japanese woman, Sakura Ishikawa speaking fluent Bangla in a 7-minute conversation with a Bengali man, Apurba Das.

In the video, Sakura shared information about her educational background, her profession and hobbies among many other things, reports Hindustan Times.

Das captioned the video, "A Japanese girl who loves Bengali more than many Bongs..."

The video also showed that this Japanese woman is equally fluent in Hindi language. But her favourite language is Bengali, according to the 7-minute-long clip.

Sakura is heard saying in Bangla: "Namaskar, my name is Sakura, I work with TCS Japan. I studied Bangla at Jadavpur University, they have a Bengali department. I used to live in Golpark (Kolkata). I would walk from Golpark to Jadavpur."

Sakura also mentions: "I liked studying Bengali in Jadavpur and decided to pursue it long term. I lived in Kolkata from February to August before shifting to Delhi to learn Hindi."

"I love Rabindranath Tagore's "Postmaster". I love ilish maach (the Hilsa fish, a favourite among Bengalis), but in Japan, we don't have any fish preparations with mustard," she says.

"I did not like roshogolla the first time I had it, but loved it the second time," she adds.

The video, since being posted on February 1, has received over 11,000 shares and more than 8,800 reactions. Netizens are both surprised and happy with Sakura's linguistic skills.

"Bengali language is the sweetest language in the world," says a Facebook user. "It really feels good to see that our Bengali language and culture is appreciated and admired globally," says another. "Wow, it was nice to hear Bengali from a non-Bengali," comments a third. "I feel very proud to see this video as a Bengali," says a fourth.