When I had tummy ache as a child, my mother would say, "Take a diastase." So, I naturally thought — as did my mother — that what I was putting into my mouth was a "diastase."
What I was actually swallowing, though, was a product known and widely used in the United States called Taka-Diastase. My mother was saying "take a" instead of "taka," a natural mispronunciation, seeing as taka is not an English word.
In fact, taka comes from the name of the Japanese scientist, Jokichi Takamine, who invented the method of producing this effective medicine for dyspepsia.
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