Shiritori – A play on words

Shiritori (しりとり/尻取り) literally means “take the end.” It is a word chain game in which each player says a word that begins with the final syllable of the previous word. No distinction is made between hiragana and katakana.

It is usually played by young children to learn words or improve writing by memory, however it has no player or age limit. ^^

Words cannot be repeated and since there are almost no words beginning with ‘n’ in Japanese, normally when one of the players says a word ending with this letter, the player loses and the game is over.

Both “raion” and “kirin” end in “n” so if you don’t want to lose you should look for another word. ^^

Normally the game begins by saying ” Shiritori “, where ” ri “ is the final syllable from which the next word must be started, being it ” ringo “ (apple), ” risu ” (squirrel).

There are no official rules, it depends on each place, although in general, the words to be used are limited to nouns.

It’s very fun and entertaining, especially to memorize words when we are studying Japanese or when going on a long trip in the car ^^

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