Hot weather has been news in Asia for some time, with scientists pointing out that climate change has made weather extremities more intense, frequent and unpredictable.
Last August, the BBC reported that “[w]hile torrential rains lash China, Pakistan and parts of India, sweltering heat has enveloped Japan and South Korea as extreme weather claims hundreds of lives in the region”.
That report said the pattern “is especially pronounced in Asia, which according to the World Meteorological Organization is warming nearly twice as fast as the global average”, with Japan marking its hottest day on record, with 41.8C registered in Isesaki city in the Gunma prefecture in the first week of August 2025.
The country had also experienced its hottest-ever June and July in 2025.
Summer 2025 was the hottest since records began in 1898, with average temperatures nationwide being 2.36C above average.
Temperatures reached 40C-plus on nine days between June and August.The 41.8C in the city of Isesaki was a new national peak.
Now, the record weather is being reflected in language: Japan has unveiled a new name for days that reach 40C or above: “kokushobi”, which has been translated as “cruelly hot”, “brutally hot” or “severely hot”.
According to the Japan Times newspaper, the description, introduced by Japan’s Meteorological Agency on Friday, uses koku – meaning harsh or cruel – to describe the heat.
This is based on a survey conducted in February and March, which received some 478,000 responses, in which people picked their preferred term from among 13 options to describe the hottest day.
Japan already has terms for days over 25C, 30C and 35C.
The new word for even hotter weather comes after the record-shattering heat of last year, when the cumulative number of extremely hot days surpassed the previous record set in 2024.
For example, Tokyo recorded 25 days over 35C, compared with an average of just 4.5 days. Kyoto logged 52 days above the same temperature, compared with an average of 18.5 days.
Source: BBC
[Image: Luis Graterol on Unsplash]