Mottainai (もったいない, 勿体無い) is a Japanese term meaning "a sense of regret concerning waste when the intrinsic value of an object or resource is not properly utilized".[1]
The expression "Mottainai!" can be uttered alone as an exclamation when
something useful, such as food or time, is wasted, meaning roughly "Oh,
what a waste!"
In addition to its primary sense of "wasteful", the word
is also used to mean "impious; irreverent" or "more than one deserves".[2]
In ancient Japanese, mottainai had various meanings, including
a sense of gratitude mixed with shame for receiving greater favor from a
superior than is properly merited by one's station in life.[1]
One of the earliest appearances of the word mottainai is in the book Genpei Jōsuiki (A Record of the Genpei War, ca. 1247).[3]
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