'Do your best', 'hang in there' — the Japanese encouragement that fandom lifted from sports anime and study-with-me streams and now sends to anyone with an exam, a deadline or a bad Tuesday. The record's entry for the loanword with no exact English equivalent, which is why it stuck.
A reader writes that the polite form is 'ganbatte kudasai' and the casual 'ganbare', and that the internet uses the middle one for everything. The record confirms it has been doing exactly that.
The record notes 'ganbatte' translates as 'good luck' only if one ignores that it means 'work harder', and that the Japanese never said it was gentle.
What does it mean? Write it the way you would say it out loud.
