Favorite obscure/pedantic kango that can be used interchangeably with a commonly used loanword?

My top two are 写真機 (カメラ) and 喫茶店 (カフェ).

3 comments
  1. I never even knew about しゃしんき. My textbook used カメラ and きっさてん, but I heard about the recent transition to カフェ. Thanks!

  2. 喫茶店 is an old school Japanese coffee shop doing omu rice, curry rice etc along with drip coffee and cafe au lait. There aren’t as many around anymore but Hoshino Coffee etc are still going all right.

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