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it's all in the name

paresu, palace, paris, valese?

Like most characters in Japanese animation who are shipped far from their native lands, Paresu may have arrived on foreign shores intact, but her name did not. But before we jump up and down in a fit because FUNimation, those horrid people, had the utter gall to change her name (please note sarcasm), let's take a look at Paresu's name on the whole.

The spelling of Paresu's name in katakana, the Japanese alphabet used to spell out non-native words, is パ (pa) レ (re) ス (su). This spelling is confirmed by the Carddass collectible trading card released in 1996 featuring Goten and Paresu on their first date. パレス in Japanese translates to palace, as in the living area of royal families -- there is no 'l' sound in Japanese, thus the closest equivalent, 'r' is used. So, technically, both Paresu and Palace are correct names for her -- 'Paresu' is simply the Japanese pronunciation of 'Palace'. パレス is a 外来語 - a gairaigo, or loan word, which refers to a word in the Japanese vocabulary of foreign origin that was not originally borrowed from the Chinese language.

One of the fanon names tossed around for Paresu in the days of fansubs was 'Paris' -- like the English word for the French city (and the *ick* heiress...). This, however, is incorrect. The Japanese spelling for "Paris" is パ (pa) リ (ri) -- thus it's pronounced in the way of the French language, not the English one.

Paresu's English dub name is 'Valese'. It's pronounced the same way as the French word valise. I really haven't the faintest idea how the writers managed to construe 'Valese' from 'Paresu' -- in Japanese, Valese would more than likely be spelled and pronounced バ (ba) リー (rî) ス (su). The 'v' sound, non-existant in Japanese, is substituted by 'b'. Perhaps, for simplicity's sake, they wished to give Paresu a name that would sound almost normal in English, and didn't want the admittedly strange association with castles...or with afforementioned heiress. (I can certainly understand if that's the case!) Either way, Valese is a very pretty name, and while to a lot of fans, she'll always be Paresu, it's certainly not too bad a moniker.