Everything is Going Well

一路順風 (ichiro junpū): a fair wind the whole way, the blessing said to someone setting out. 一路 is the whole road, not a journey, and 順風 is the wind at your back. The phrase is Chinese and twelve centuries old, and it has stayed Chinese: no Japanese dictionary gives it a headword, and the Japanese sentences that use it lean on a native proverb, raise sail on a fair wind. Its oldest text is a governor's thanksgiving to a mountain god after he fled a mutiny by boat with his whole household: from there north, a fair wind the whole way, as if something held the boat. The Ming and Qing novels made it the stock sentence for any journey that goes well, a fair wind and fair water the whole way, and by the late Qing it was the thing said at a parting: a courtesan, eyes reddening, says softly "一路順風" and turns away. A prime minister used it as the courtesy that opened a peace conference. So it is a wish for a departure, a graduation, a voyage begun, and Everything is Going Well is the dictionary's gloss for the state it hopes for. Its sister 順風満帆, fair wind and full sail, is the Japanese wish for the voyage itself. 一路順風 is composed of the words 一路 (read ichiro) meaning "the whole way" and 順風 (read junpū) meaning "favorable wind".