Japanese

Idiom

舟に刻みて剣を求む ‎(hiragana ふねにきざみてけんをもとむ, romaji fune ni kizamite ken o motomu)

1. Foolish it is to ignore that times are changing. Lit. It is pointless to carve a mark on ship where a sword was dropped into the sea, in the hope of finding the sword later near that carving.

References

• The Kōjien (広辞苑) Dictionary of the Japanese Language, 5th edition, Iwanami Shoten Publishing, Tokyo.