だいじゅぅさん。Dai juusan.

Welcome to lesson thirteen. This week we'll learn how to count from one to one hundred! Don't worry though: it isn't nearly as intimidating as it sounds. But before I chase you away with a bunch of scary sounding lesson plans, let's get into the lesson and you can see how simple it is for yourself.


Vocabulary:

ゼロ or れえ
zero or ree
Zero. The first way of saying it that you see listed above is written in Katakana, as it's a foreign loan word, and it is pronounced quite similarly, but not identically to the English word zero.

いち
ichi
One.

に
ni
Two.

さん
san
Three.

よん or し
yon or shi
Four.

ご
go
Five.

ろく
roku
Six.

なな or しち
nana or shichi
Seven.

はち
hachi
Eight.

きゅぅ or く
kyu or ku
Nine.

じゅう
juu
Ten. Note that there is a y sound in juu.

ひゃく
hyaku
One Hundred.


Now for the rest.
Counting above ten in Japanese is incredibly simple. All you do is say じゅう juu followed by the appropriate number for eleven through nineteen.

So for example:
じゅぅ juu (ten) plus さん san (three) equals じゅぅさん juusan (thirteen, or literally, ten three).

So to translate it directly, I'm Japanese to count eleven through nineteen, you say "Ten one, ten two, ten three, ten four, ten five, ten six, ten seven, ten eight, ten nine. Easy, right?

To say twenty, thirty, forty, fifty, etc. all the way up to ninety, simply say a number -- one to nine -- before ten.

So again, to literally translate the above from Japanese, you would say "two ten (twenty), three ten, four ten, five ten" and so on.

And to say eighty five, you would say はちじゅうご hachijuugo or "eight ten five".

To simplify this, picture the numbers written as separate digits, each showing the value of a certain spot (which in reality, is all they are anyway), like so:
85
0|8|5
So eighty five is actually just a fancy way of saying eight tens and five ones.
So in Japanese:
85
はちじゅう|ご
Or eight tens and five ones.


Grammar:

You know, with the questions and comments that you guys leave here, I sometimes find myself wondering if I'm helping you learn Japanese as much as you're helping me. So with that said, I would like to thank m0ssb3rg935 for helping to drive me to study the following out. He introduced me to the terms SOV, OVS, and VOS.

This piqued my interest and drive me to search out which applied to Japanese, and as a result, greatly boosted my ability to grasp the structure of Japanese sentences and the usage of certain particles, even before my literature introduced them to me.


What does all that mean?
SOV = Subject, Object, Verb, OVS = Object, Subject, Verb, and VOS = Verb, Object, Subject.
English is considered an SVO, or in other words, in the average English sentence, the Subject (What you're talking about) usually goes first in a sentence, the verb usually goes next, and the object usually goes last.

Example: "Eirinn ate pudding". Eirinn is the subject (who/what we're talking about) of the sentence, ate is the verb (The action word) in the sentence, and pudding is the object (the thing that the Subject is acting upon) of the sentence.

Japanese however is typically referred to as an SOV language. So the Subject would go first much like I'm English, but the verb and object switch places.

So if we literally translate "Eirinn ate pudding" from Japanese into English, it would read: "Eirinn pudding ate".

However it's important to note that these rules don't apply to every sentence in Japanese. In fact it's been said that Japanese isn't SOV, but rather just V because the Verb always goes last, but the Subject and Object can change order at times, and can even be omitted much of the time.

So want to say "I am here"? It could easily be said a few different ways, depending on the current conversation:
わたしはここです。 I am here.
ここです。 Am here.
です。Am.


How about the Subject and Object switching places? Well thanks to the particle は, you could say ねこはしろいです。 The cat white is, or you could say しろいねこはです。 White the cat is, and both would be proper, and translate properly as The cat is white.


Takeaway:
In Japanese, the verb goes last.


Test Time!

This time we'll have two types of tests, so I'll be shortening the first one a bit to make up for it.

Send your answers to me via PM, or if you'd rather not, then grade yourself. Miss three or more and retest.
Here you go:


Match the following Japanese words with their numerical counterpart:

A. いち ichi
B. に ni
C. ご go
D. ろく roku
E. じゅう juu
F. じゅぅいち juuichi
G. じゅぅさん juusan
H. さんじゅぅ sanjuu
I. さんじゅぅに sanjuuni

1. 1
2. 10
3. 32
4. 2
5. 13
6. 6
7. 11
8. 30
9. 5


Translate the following from Japanese into English:

1. こんにちはなかむらさん。 konnichiha Nakamura san.
2. ありがとございますせんせい。 arigato gozaimasu sensei.
3. おはようございますちち。 ohayou gozaimasu chichi.
4. なかむらせんせいはおかあさんです。 Nakamura sensei ha okaasan desu.


Describe the function of the following particles:
1. The は (ha) particle is used to...
2. The か (ka) particle is used to...


That does it for this week. Time to work your butts off studying rest for now.

This lesson in video form, hosted by a handsome dude that you can't see

This video in audio form, still hosted by a handsome dude that you can't see

_____________________________________

EX Palen : Yeah, suffixes are almost always used, with few exceptions to my knowledge.

Even with me being over halfway through the first book, I'm still learning the most basic of things, so I suspect that will all be handled in the next book -- Advanced Japanese.


m0ssb3rg935 : That might be true. I've been trying to think up all of the different ways of using です that I can, and so far all of the sentences that didn't use an adjective used います instead of です. There may be some exceptions, but so far that seems to be accurate at the very least.

As far as I know at this point, the u in す is typically silent when it comes at the end of a word, but when it comes at the start of a word it's usually voiced. That isn't a hard rule, or even the real rule, but it seems to be fairly consistent with the words that. i be learned up to this point.
However, you did get me to listen to the audio again, and I realized when I did so that I seem to have made a mistake. For some reason the woman in the audio pronounced the u in むすこ, むすめ and むすめさん, but not in むすこさん, which I found a bit odd. Now bear in mind that this woman has some odd quirks in her pronunciation of some words that I know by heart, such as pronouncing ありがと as aringato, so this may be a dialect specific thing, but at this point I'd say that the u in むすこさん may be silent. It's really hard to say for sure, even listening to the sample audio.
But yeah, in short, I'm not sure what causes the u to be silent sometimes and not at other times.

Seems fair enough. I'll probably keep the Romaji in the written lesson, and consider dropping it in the video lesson, that way it can be referenced if needed, but with me saying them in the video, the Romaji shouldn't be needed. And then running together is an issue even to the Japanese, as it is indeed true what you heard, that in all kana writings, spaces are employed to indicate where one word ends and another begins. In these short examples spaces are omitted to give a better feel for the usual writing style (no spaces). Once we pick up Kanji it should be much easier to distinguish one word from another.

As for the long O, no, it can be made with う or お either one. I'll cover the long vowel combinations soon, but it'll probably be a few weeks from now.



Mynamescox44 :
deggle :
SacredShadow :
ZeroTails :
sevencube3 :
Jygin :
Frodlex :
Zlinqx :
Eniitan :
ordbelial669 :
tytytec04 :

Learning to count in Japanese is very easy: the 146 episodes of Yu-Gi-Oh! ZEXAL give all the hints you may need lol.

I didn't know that secondary form of "zero", up until now I was quite surprised they didn't have a specific word for it and strictly followed a foreign word. It's nice how you can learn something new the least you expect it.

Quite interesting that classification of languages, I'll keep it in mind for when I attempt to learn any other language. I may start right now by telling this to mom and see if it helps her in her learning of German

Also, sine we're talking about numbers, we all know the story behind the number 13 in Western cultures, but when talking about Japan the number with a backstory is 42. You'll eventually learn why, and will also learn how to send a threatening message with just a couple numbers :p

Is there any particular unwritten rule or situation in which one alternate word for a number is more appropriate than the other, or are they fully interchangeable? It seems like it would be rather complicated to have separate words for a number for specific pairings as opposed to being able to to just throw them together.

EX Palen :
m0ssb3rg935 :
Mynamescox44 :
deggle :
SacredShadow :
ZeroTails :
sevencube3 :
Jygin :
Frodlex :
Zlinqx :
Eniitan :
lordbelial669 :
tytytec04 :

I just finished recording the audio for the next lesson, and I realized that even though it will list thirteen words, there are only three new words that you don't already know really. So I have a question for you: since there are only three new words, and one of them is a modifier that you add to a list of words that you already know, do you want to stick with this as the entire list of new vocabulary this next week, or should we cover more words to make up for the lack of many actual new words? There will be more instances of this in the future, so we're setting an entire precedent here. Please weigh in if you have an opinion.

Well, if one of the thirteen words mentioned is a modifier of words we already know, then those would serve as more of an example of how to use the modifier than anything. If that's the case, I could handle more vocabulary this week since we wouldn't really need to be memorizing more than normal.

だいじゅぅよん。Dai juuyon.

Welcome to lesson number fourteen. In this lesson we'll cover the concept of measure words, along with learning our first measure word, and learning how to refer to various objects.

As a side note I would like to say that the frame rate of the past few videos have been adjusted (by me) via Freemake to only 12FPS. This shouldn't be an issue since the videos only consist of still shots and written text. The only issues I could find would be that sometimes the text, which has been adjusted frame by frame to appear in synch with the spoken words over audio may appear a moment sooner or later than they should, and the animation of the moving PlayStation symbols at the start drag slightly. If either of these present a problem for any of you, let me know and I'll leave future videos at the normal 30FPS.

Now, on to the lesson.


Vocabulary:
NOTE: This video lesson, as well as future lessons until further notice, will not contain written examples of any words utilizing Katakana, however the written lessons will.


にん
nin
Measure word for people. This is added to the end of most numbers when counting people.

Example:
Three people: さん san (three) + にん nin (measure word for people) = さんにん san nin (three people)

よんにん yon nin (four + nin. Four people)

ごにん go nin (five + nin. Five people)


There are some irregular numbers when it comes to counting people, they are as follows:

ひとり
hitori
One person.


ふたり
futari
Two people.


Now on to objects.

~があります。
...ga arimasu.
To have.../There is... (for an object)


~はありますか。
...ha arimasu ka.
Do you have...?/Is there...? (for an object)


~はありません。
...ha arimasen.
To not have.../There is not... (for an object)


なに or なん
nani or nan
What


なにがありますか
nani ga arimasu ka
What is there?


と
to
And.


ほん
hon
Book.


テーブル
teeburu
Table


いす
isu
Chair


テレビ
terebi
Television.


コンピューター
konpyuutaa
Computer.


でんわ
denwa
Telephone.


れいぞうこ
reizouko
Refrigerator.


くるま
kuruma
Car.

Also note that for some odd reason I mispronounced くるま (it's koo-roo-muh, not kuh-roo-muh) and it sounds as though I mispronounced れいぞうこ. The れい in this word is pronounced "ray", not "day" which is what it sounds like I'm saying in the video.



Grammar:

So you know how to say you have an older or younger brother or sister, but say you have two. What's the plural form of any of those? After all, you wouldn't want to say "I have two older sister", would you?

Actually, strange as it sounds in English, that's exactly what you would want to say in Japanese. As it turns out, nouns have no plural form in the Japanese language. So to say you have one older sister, you would say あねがひとりいます。ane ga hitori imasu. I have one older sister.
If you find yourself in the unfortunate position of having five older sisters (Just kidding, of course) you would say something like あねがごにんいます。ane ga gonin imasu. I have five older sisters, or literally, I have five older sister.
Kind of like in English you can have 1 sheep, or you can have 100 sheep, but you can't have 100 sheeps.


Takeaway:
Singular (one) and plural (multiple) nouns are the same.



Is it が or は in a question?

The word なに nani should be followed by the particle が ga . Note however, that while が is used in questions that use question words such as what, who, and where, は is used in yes or no questions. For example: くるまはありますか。kuruma ha arimasuka. Is there a car? Or なかむらせんせいはくるまはありますか。Nakamura-sensei ha kuruma ha arimasu ka. Does professor Nakamura have a car?
Since the questions above were yes or no questions, we used は ha instead of が ga.


Takeaway:
If your question uses a question word such as who or what, use が ga.
If it's a yes or no question, use は ha .


New particle:
Ladies and gentlemen, we have a new particle: が ga. が ga is what we will call an identifier particle, and it is used to, yes, identify things. For example: if asked if I have any sisters, I could reply はい、あねがいます。hai, ane ga imasu. Yes, I have an older sister.
But why am I using が (ga) here? Because I am offering additional information. I'm identifying the exact relationship, if you will. I'm adding the detail that my sister is an older sister. So が is used to offer new information, identifying who or what specifically we are talking about. This particle is used to answer questions that your statement might pose. For example: "It's precipitating." what is it precipitating? And yes, this actually needs to be specified in Japanese lol. "It's precipitating rain (ga)". Or 「おかあさんがくるまにいます。」"My mom is in the car", which answers the question of who is in the car.

If this isn't clear, please feel free to ask questions here or via PM. As this is being added around a year after the lesson was originally posted, if you ask for clarification in this thread, please specify which lesson and/or example you struggle with. If you ask via PM (or DM if you have me on Discord) then you don't need any additional information. We can work it all out as we go in those formats.



Test time:
Same as always.

Match the Japanese words to their English counterparts:
1. ひとり
2. いす
3. にん
4. くるま
5. ふたり
6. でんわ
7. ~があります。
8. れいぞうこ
9. コンピューター
10. と

A. Two people
B. To have/ There is (for an object)
C. Car
D. Measure word for people
E. Refrigerator
F. Computer
G. One person
H. And
I. Chair
J. Telephone


Translate the following sentences from English to Japanese:

Professor Nakamura has a car.

He/she/they have two older sisters. Hint: pronouns are usually omitted.

There is a computer.

There is a television and a telephone.


That does it for this week's lesson. You've covered a lot of ground already, and there's much more that we'll cover every week from here on out, so keep on studying and you'll be speaking basic Japanese in a few short months. Exciting, isn't it?


Everybody loves links!
sausageVideo link

Mp3 link

_____________________________________

EX Palen : Yeah now if I only knew why you would ever need to us a foreign loan word for a word that had a native counterpart. lol

Wait, your grandmother is learning German?? That's awesome! And yeah it comes in pretty handy. It doesn't always apply, and in some languages it changes based on whether you're asking a question or making a statement (and even English has some exceptions at times), but it's a nice quick reminder when you need to keep track of how to say something in a certain language.

42? That's interesting. I need to know about this now. lol I know 4 is also an unlucky number there, hence why in one of the early Harvest Moon games (don't remember which, as I didn't get to play it I don't think) on the 4th day of a certain season I'm told you sleep in and your cows fail to produce any milk.
And while it's unrelated, it bears mentioning while talking about HM and superstition that in Harvest Moon: Friend's of Mineral Town, you have a small chance of seeing some sort of ghost or monster or something in your mirror or having some other creepy thing happen if you look in the mirror at exactly 0:00 (midnight).


m0ssb3rg935 : Thanks for voting.

As for when to use which number when there's more than one, I don't know for sure, but when I searched it I found one explanation that よん was the Kun'yomi reading and し was the On'yomi reading (of the Kanji) and that なな was the Kun'yomi
and しち was the On'yomi reading. They also said if using it in a larger number (10's, 100's, etc.) you should use the Kun'yomi (よん and なな). No idea if that's true or not, but it's all I have right now since my literature hasn't gotten around to explaining it yet, though I believe it said it would eventually. If indeed it did, and the above is trye, then I suspect it will cover that once Kanji comes into play. We shall see. It is worth noting though, that my books use both よん and し in larger numbers as well.



Summon list:
Mynamescox44 :
deggle :
SacredShadow :
ZeroTails :
sevencube3 :
Jygin :
Frodlex :
Zlinqx :
Eniitan :
lordbelial669 :
tytytec04 : 

Eirinn : My mother, not my grandmother. And well, while she's actually trying, I wonder if she's learning anything lol.

Number 4 is normally pronounced "shi", which is the main syllable for the verb "to die". If one were to say 42 they would be saying "shini", simply translated into "death". So yeah, anybody carrying the number 42, like for example in a racing car, would be carrying death with him/her in Japanese standards, hence why it's not a welcome number.

And talking about numbers, I had expected this lesson to involve numerals. They mostly are pretty similar to the numbers themselves, just like in English, but there seem to be several versions of numerals like we have in Spanish. Have they combined the best of both worlds?

Eirinn : Hi! =) I saw that you were talking about how the number 4 四 sounds like/is homophonous to the word for "death" 死 in Japanese. Well, it's the same in a few other Asian languages like Chinese too (most likely because Japan and many of the Asian countries borrowed heavily from parts of the Chinese writing system, and in China the word for "death" is also 死 and it's pronounced in a similar way to "shi"), so yeah, you might want to be pretty careful/wary of using the number 4 in certain places/cultures in Asia (like China, Japan, Korean, Vietnam, etc.). ^^0;; In fact, in some of those countries, there are times when mentioning or giving the number 4 to someone is considered extremely offensive because some people even interpret it as being a death threat (yep, even though it's just a number to us), especially if it comes from a gang member, crime group, murderer, etc. (you can see hints of this idea in many of their murder mystery shows).

In a sense, their fear of the number 4 probably supersedes (by a lot) the fear we have in the U.S. of the number 13. In some places in Asia, when they go to sign up for new phone numbers (because they just got a new phone), they will often avoid choosing a number with 4 in it, as well as when they make business cards, address numbers, emails, security numbers, and pretty much anything that's considered personal or attached to an individual, since they think it will bring that individual bad luck, disease, etc. among other things when they have the number in their name or on their person.

This is also why some people would prefer to use "yon" rather than "shi" when they're mentioning certain numbers out loud (kunyomi vs. onyomi). Given a choice between pronouncing it a certain way out loud, some people will preferentially choose the kunyomi "yon," because then they don't have to verbalize something that sounds like "death" out loud (remember that 4 is taken as a death threat sometimes). Since you didn't know about this, I guess you might've missed some of the ways the number 4 is used and the references that they often make in anime to the number 4 as well.

For instance, if you've ever watched the anime series called Naruto, you probably already know that there's a Fourth Hokage called Minato Namikaze who died before Naruto grew up (which is quite sad because he's probably my favorite character in the entire series  ^^0;; ). They call him the "Yondaime" rather than something with "shi" in it, because "shi" sounds like death, but if you know anything about the story, you can sort of understand what the creator(s) of Naruto were thinking of or foreshadowing when they set the number 4 on a Hokage that died early, even before the Third Hokage...

Rather than the number 13 or some other number, they'll sometimes talk about how unlucky someone was to have something with the number 4 in or on it (like being stuck in patient room #4, or have a badge number with lots of 4's on it). If you've ever seen the anime series called Hunter x Hunter, you might recall that Hisoka (the weird joker guy) was applicant #44 during the Hunter exam and people feared him because they thought he was a deranged/crazy killer/maniac. While that part may be obvious to any observer, if you add what you know now about how a lot of the people in Japan view the number 4, you can better understand why the creator of the series probably decided on that number for Hisoka. He likely did that in an effort to inspire even more fear and dread in the people that read or watch the series (the manga was published in Japan and the initial TV broadcasts for the anime were for a Japanese audience, so yeah... ^^0;; ). All in all, you could pretty much infer that the creator of the series had probably wanted Hisoka to be a character that's scary because he brings death to the other contestants, and doesn't mind wearing the number 44 (or at least he appeared to be immune to those numbers during the Hunter exam).

Sometimes, however, you might notice that they don't seem to care very much about the number 4 (and they'll treat it as we usually do, as just a number), probably because they're trying their best to ignore the number 4 in a series that's supposed to be light-hearted and fun, without anything like fear or death in it.

On a brighter note, they also use numbers to represent some more pleasant things like "thank you." Sometimes (in Japanese), they'll say, "sankyuu," which could be represented with the numbers "39." =) Now you can try to guess what "3923" sometimes represents, or even better, why Konami has so many things with the number "573" in it, like high scores in their games, their telephone numbers, promotional materials, and even character names. =P

Anyways, I just thought that might be funny to mention, considering how serious the rest of this post has sort of been... ^^0;; Sorry if you didn't enjoy hearing about tetraphobia and what some people on the other side of the globe often consider to be way deadlier than the number 13, but I thought since you said you were serious about wanting to understand the Japanese language, I should mention it so you would be less likely to make some of the death threats numerical taboos that many people make when they're just starting to learn the numbers.

だいじゅぅごか。Dai juugoka.

Hello and welcome to lesson number fifteen. This week we'll cover more vocabulary pertaining to objects and learn a bit about particle usage.

So let's get on in to this.


Vocabulary:
さつ
satsu
Measure word for books, photo albums, and magazines.
This works just like にん nin did: say a word and attach さつ to the end of it. There are three irregular terms for books however. We'll cover them next.

いっさつ
issatsu
One book / magazine / photo album.
Note that the first つ in the word is smaller than the second つ is. We'll cover why this is later, but for now just know that when you see a small つ, it is not pronounced.

はっさつ
hassatsu
Eight books / magazines / photo albums.
Again, note the small つ.

じゅっさつ
jussatsu
10 books / magazines / photo albums.
Small つ.


だい
dai
Measure word for cars and machines. Say a number and attach だい at the end to count cars or machines, just like any other measure word.


Now for the native Japanese numbers.
Up to this point the numbers we've covered have been mostly of Chinese origin. Below we'll cover the native Japanese numbers which are used to count small and round objects, rooms, furniture, and some other things.

ひとつ
hitotsu
One. This one might seem familiar, as will the next one.

ふたつ
futatsu
Two.

みっつ
mittsu
Three.

よっつ
yottsu
Four.

いつつ
itsutsu
Five.

むっつ
muttsu
Six.

ななつ
nanatsu
Seven.

やっつ
yattsu
Eight.

ここのつ
kokonotsu
Nine.

とう
tou
Ten.

That does it for this week's vocabulary. Take your time and learn these at your own pace, and as always, if you have any questions or need any help with them, feel free to ask here or privately.


Grammar:
So it recently came to my attention that I've been teaching you new particles, but not showing you how to really use them. I have decided to right this wrong starting with this lesson. This week, we'll go over the particles we've learned, and learn how to use them in full sentences.

は
は ha is the first particle we covered, and it's used to designate the subject of a sentence. As was said when we first covered this particle, you should only use the は particle when establishing or changing the subject. Here are some examples:

Me - ユーザせんぱいはたかいくるまがあります。
Yuuzasenpai ha takai kuruma ga arimasu.
User-senpai [ha] has an expensive car.

Eniitan - すごいです!
sugoi desu!
(It's) awesome/amazing!

EX Palen - くろいですか。
kuroi desu ka.
Is (it) black?

Notice that I used the は ha particle when I spoke of User and how he had an expensive car, but Eniitan and EX Palen did not use は in their replies? That was because I was making User the topic of discussion, but when they replied, User was already the topic, so there was no need to use は, as the topic of discussion had not changed.
Also notice that the word "it's" was never actually spoken by either Eniitan or EX Palen, but was included in the translation. That's because, since they didn't change the topic by using は, they were still talking about the same thing. Also pronouns (such as it or it's for example) aren't often used in Japanese due to the fact that the particle は lets it be known what the topic is, so unlike in English, in Japanese there's no need to use pronouns to continue referring to the topic in most sentences.
So you see, Japanese is a language of implications and context.

Finally note that, much like the は particle, a person or thing need not be mentioned explicitly if they are the established topic already. Think of it like how in English you don't mention the person or object every time you talk about it, like so:


Me - Do you know how Eniitan is doing?

A user of this - I spoke with Eniitan earlier today. Eniitan is doing alright.

Me - Good to hear Eniitan is doing well.


Sounded pretty awkward, right? How about when we repeat that using implications similar to how Japanese works?


Me - Do you know how Eniitan is doing?

A user of this - I spoke with her earlier today. She's doing alright.

Me - Good to hear she's well.


A little robotic and stiff, but not awkward like before. There is however one big difference. Notice how we used pronouns to refer to Eniitan even after we had established her as the topic? As we've already covered, Japanese pronouns aren't really used much. So for example, the above conversation, if literally translated from Japanese would read something like this:

Me - Do you know how Eniitan is doing?
A user of this - Spoke earlier today. Doing alright.
Me - Good to hear well.

And why is it this way? Yes, because of the topic particle は. There's no need to say her name once she's the established topic of discussion, but there's also no need to say anything at all (such as "she") to indicate who we're talking about because we already know who we're talking about, otherwise we would have said that we were changing the topic by stating the new topic and adding は afterward.



か
か ka is, as you know, the question particle. As I stated before, the usage of か is quite simple and very easy to grasp. か is nothing more than a spoken question mark, and just like a question mark, か always comes at the end of a sentence. However, don't forget to still use a くてん kuten "。" still.

So for example:
Me - ユーザせんぱいはたかいくるまがあります。
Yuuzasenpai ha takai kuruma ga arimasu.
User-senpai [ha] has an expensive car.
Is a statement. However, add か to the end and it becomes a question:

Me - ユーザせんぱいはたかいくるまがありますか。
Yuuzasenpai ha takai kuruma ga arimasu ka.
Does User-senpai [ha] have an expensive car?

Simple enough, right? Add か at the end of a statement to make it a question.


が
が ga is an identifier particle, and it's usage is slightly more complicated than the above two.
In recent lessons we've learned things such as があります ga arimasu for "do you have/is there" for an object. This is accurate, but what might not have been abundantly clear is that が does not always immediately preceded あります or います. For example:

mynamescox44 - ごきょぅだいですか。
gokyoudai desu ka.
Does/do he/she/they have/has any siblings?

m0ssb3rg935 - おねえさんがふたりいます。
oneesan ga futari imasu.
He/she/they have two older sisters.

Notice how the が came after おねえさん (older sister) and before both ふたり (two) and います? This is because the が particle, being an identifier particle, should follow the thing it's identifying. So what is m0ssb3rg935 trying to identify/clarify? That the person he and mynamescox44 are speaking of has two siblings, or to be more specific (to identify what kind of siblings) they have two older sisters.

Again, が should follow what you are identifying, even if it means that another word will come between the が and あります or います.

One more time: が follows the thing you are identifying, regardless of where that thing falls in the sentence.


の
の no is the only particle that we've addressed multiple uses of, so let's clarify exactly how each of those roles work, as well as make sure that we are able to distinguish the two uses.

First of all, の is used to join two nouns , such as おとこ otoko (male) and ひと hito (person) to make おとこのひと (man) or おんな onna (female) and ひと hito to make おんなのひと (woman).


Then there's the ownership usage of の.
の can be used to show ownership much like an apostrophe and an s can in English.
So for an example, let's translate something from English into Japanese:

User's car is black. -- Note the apostrophe and s that we used on User's name to show he owned the car?

Now in Japanese

ユーザせんぱいのくるまはくろいですよ。
Yuuzasenpai no kuruma ha kuroi desu yo. -- Note the の that we used after User's name to show he owned the car?

So you see, の and 's work the same way when marking ownership. Remember: an ownership の = 's.

Oh, and I'll explain the よ particle at the end of that sentence in a later lesson.


Alright, now that we've cleared up any potential confusion regarding the particles we've learned, let's move on to the test.
And remember: if you have any questions, feel free to ask.

Test:
This time instead of matching Japanese and English terms, you'll be looking at the Japanese numbers and translating them into English or numerals.

1. ひとつ
2. ふたつ
3. いつつ
4. よっつ
5. ここのつ
6. むっつ
7. みっつ
8. とう
9. やっつ
10. ななつ

Explain how the particles below work.

1. は ha
2. が ga
3. か ka
4. の no

Fill in the blank with the appropriate particle.

なかむらせんせい__くるま__くろいです__。
Is professor Nakamura's car black?


Alright, that does it for this lesson. Good work everyone! Below you'll find the video and audio links as always.


Links:

A wild video appeared

Before downloading this Mp3, please slap me for the above Pokémon reference


___________________________________________

EX Palen : Oh okay, my bad. And hey, gotta commend her effort anyway. lol

Funny thing: I was looking at a game today that I wanted to buy and it was talking about "the presence of the dark shi" so that happened. lol Seems like I'm always learning a new word just before I end up actually hearing it used somewhere.

I haven't seen the numerals yet, but I do know that they use at least some of the same ones that are used in English thanks to some internet lingo I've seen, such as attaching a 3 at the end of a name instead of san, since it's spelled and pronounced the same, and I've seen the same done with 4, though I couldn't read the Kanji it was attached to. We'll pretend it wasn't a violent reference though.



Summon list:

Mynamescox44 :
m0ssb3rg935 :
deggle :
SacredShadow :
ZeroTails :
sevencube3 :
Jygin :
Frodlex :
Zlinqx :
Eniitan :
tytytec04 :
lordbelial669 :

Eirinn : It's really good that you are breaking it down oniichan. It really helps out understanding what needs to be learned. ^-^

Wait a minute, native Japanese numbers? These are what I thought to be numerals! 

Besides small objects, they're also used for counts. That's why I thought they were numerals: a game I play has your opponents coming one by one and they used "hitorime" instead of "ichimaime", so I thought the former would be translated into "first" and thus be a numeral. Looks like I was so wrong

So, the small つ is not pronounced... That may explain why many "u" aren't pronounced in Japanese words and names, even if I haven't seen how they're actually written. Looks like it also happens with "i", though not as often. I'm sure Eirinn-sensei will shed some light on this in future lessons

If you're still doing this, I would very much want to join in, and hopefully be able to understand the kanji which are in some of the games which I have seen about.

Mynamescox44 :
m0ssb3rg935 :
deggle :
SacredShadow :
ZeroTails :
sevencube3 :
Jygin :
Frodlex :
Zlinqx :
tytytec04 :
lordbelial669 :

Sorry for summoning all of you back so soon, but I found a few errors in the lesson, and also one of you managed to catch two of them as well. All mistakes that I found were in the particle sections of the lesson, specifically the が section. They were mostly translation issues, but there was at least one other minor typo. You may want to reread that particular section just to make sure the error doesn't teach you poor practices. If I find anything else that's significant, I'll let you know.

My apologies for this oversight.



Eniitan : I'm glad it helped, imouto. I'll be doing more things like that with future vocabulary and particle sections as well.



EX Palen : Ohhh okay. Yeah, the native Japanese numbers are fairly flexible, and it seems they can actually be used in place of the other numbers we learned as well, provided the number is ten or less. For example, so far I've learned to use it to count food portions, even though there's actually a word specifically for that. So the native numbers seem pretty useful, especially for a learner.

はい, we'll probably cover the small っ in the next lesson. The rest will be addressed at some point, just as soon as I'm comfortable with my own understanding of them. I don't want to backtrack any more than I already have had to in the past in this thread. xD

So just to be clear, the native Japanese numbers are pretty much just an alternate set which is interchangeable with others as long as they're small?

NOTE: Please read the message given after the links at the end of the lesson and let me know your answer via PM. Thank you.



だいじゅぅろくか。Dai juurokuka.

Hello and welcome to lesson number sixteen. This week we'll learn about glides, the small っ / ッ (tsu), and probably something else that's interesting! And maybe, just maybe, I'll learn how to not post lessons two weeks late!

But... yeah let's not count on that last one. For now we'll just get into the lesson.


Vocabulary:
Starting off with foreign loan words. These of course use Katakana, and all sound like their English counterpart, though not all foreign loan words in Japanese are based on English words.

ディスプレイ
disupurei
Display

モニター
monitaa
Monitor

ソフトウェア
sofutowea
Software. Please note that the Romaji example here uses a letter combination that we haven't used before (we). The actual characters used here to make the we sound are actually u and e. The reason why I chose to utilize this form of Romaji spelling for it is two fold: first of all, it's a sound we've never encountered before. The second reason we'll cover later in the lesson.

ハードウェア
haadowea
Hardware.

イーメール
iimeeru
Email.

インターネット
intaanetto
Internet. And that lopsided smile thing? It's a small tsu in Katakana, not a grin.

ペン
pen
Pen. Yes, the Romaji and English are spelled identically.

シャツ
shatsu
Shirt.

バッグ
baggu
Bag.

アパート
apaato
Apartment.


Now on to the native Japanese words as usual.

くつ
kutsu.
Shoes.

とけい
tokei
Watch/Clock.

いえ
ie
House. Notice how similar it is to いいえ no. The difference in pronunciation, theoretically, is the long vowel. More on both the pronunciation and the reason I say "theoretically" later in this lesson.

いぬ
inu
Dog.

ねこ
neko
Cat.


Grammar:
There's a lot of ground to cover today, so buckle up and get ready for the ride.

Glides: Remember how several lessons ago we covered our first words that used smaller kana mixed in with normal sized ones? These character combinations, specifically や, ゆ, and よ, and the vowels that immediately follow them, are called glides. When a glide occurs, you combine the sounds of the syllables and pronounce them as one. These, we are told, always make a y sound, but as we'll cover later on, there are some times when such is not the case. But for now just know that if the Romani used here doesn't show a y, it isn't pronounced (despite what some of my sources tried to teach me. Curse them! lol). We'll cover more on the exceptions later.

A few example words that use glides:
きょうだい kyoudai -- Siblings.
きゅう kyuu -- Nine.
じゅう juu -- Ten.

Notice that in きょうだい the syllables we see are ki yo u da and i, but we don't pronounce it kiyoudai. Instead we pronounce it kyoudai. This is how a glide works. It always starts with a character that ends with an i (ki, ji, hi, etc.) and drops the i, replacing it with a y sound and merging the two syllables into one, for example: kyo, hya, kyu.
As I said, there are a few exceptions, but we'll cover those later. For now, feel free to use this glide chart for reference. It took me a lot longer to make it than I'd care to admit, so hopefully it comes in handy. And yes, you can download or screencap it if you want.

 



The small tsu: Next we have more bite sized characters, specifically, the little つ that we discussed last lesson, and at the start of this one.
This little guy comes in quite handy, and when used in a word, is not read. Instead it serves as a way of showing that the next consonant should be doubled.
Examples:
いっさつ issatsu one book, photo album, or magazine.

Notice how the first つ is small, while the last one is normal sized? Also notice how the first one (the small one) comes right before さ sa, and instead of being tsusa like it would have been had it been a full sized tsu, it's ssu. That's because the small tsu tells us to double the first consonant of the next syllable, in this case, the s in sa.

To drive that home, let's look at a word that uses a large つ beside one that uses a small つ.

Small tsu: よっつ yottsu instead of yotsutsu.
Big tsu: いつつ itsutsu instead of ittsu.

When read aloud, you'll briefly pause to signify a break between the two doubled consonants.


Long vowels: Remember how earlier I mentioned the similarities between the Japanese words for house and no? There's only one kana separating their spellings, and it's a second i.
Let's look at them again:
House -- いえ ie
No -- いいえ iie

The difference in pronunciation is that long vowels, while spoken as one vowel, should be spoken longer than usual. Think of it like stressing a word for dramatic effect in English: if I said something was about to happen, and you wanted to be playfully dramatic, you might type "Noo!" instead of just "No!". This would indicate that you were dragging out the "o" in the word. Long vowels in Japanese are the same way, only they're a legitimate part of the Japanese language. An excuse to be emphatic? Yeeeeeesss!!!
Sorry, I couldn't resist.

Long vowels are created whenever a vowel syllable or a normal syllable that ends with a vowel is followed by a vowel syllable. For example:

ああ -- aa
かあ -- kaa
せい -- sei
おお -- oo
おう -- ou
ねえ -- nee
にい -- nii
もう -- mou
These are all examples of character combinations that we've seen or will see shortly. A full list of long vowel combinations will be covered in an incoming lesson.
Note that some long vowels can be pronounced identically to others, for example: おお and おう can both be pronounced as a long o sound.

For the sake of practice, let's look back at some words we've covered that used long vowels:
いいえ iie -- No.
とう tou -- Ten.
せんせい sensei -- Teacher/Doctor/Professor.
おかあさん okaasan -- Someone else's mother.
いもうと imouto -- Eniitan Younger sister.
ありがとう arigatou -- Thank you (imformal).
おはよう ohayou -- Good morning (informal).

One last thing to note is that in Katakana, you can signify a long vowel with a dash, but be sure to use the proper dash "ー", and not an English en dash "-".


Now then, why did I say earlier that long vowels were "theoretically" pronounced with an extended sound on the vowel? Because, while in properly spoken Japanese this is true, in any language we tend to cut corners when we actually speak it casually. Kind of like how in English we often say "K" instead of "Okay", or even slightly mispronounced some words because the roll off of the tongue more easily, such as how when we say "I haven't seen him around lately" many of us will actually cut of the h, resulting in "I haven't seen 'im lately". This is actually so common in most, if not all, languages that it strikes us as awkward or unnatural when people say pronounce the words properly. Say for example someone clearly enunciated each word they spoke in the above sentence "I haven't seen him lately" or if they said something like "I haven't seen him lately, but when I do see him again, I'll tell him that you're trying to get a hold of him." And they clearly enunciated the h in "him" every time, it would sound stiff and just plain strange.

This is what we call colloquial communication, or, how people of a given area actually speak. Because again, no one pronounces all words with absolute proper pronunciation, at least not without getting looked at strangely.

And so it is with some things in Japanese. Imagine my frustration when, after a few days of practicing on pronouncing long vowels without sounding funny, I fire up a Japanese game and hear 「 おはようございます」ohayou gozaimasu, but the character flips the long vowel words around, and says it like this: 「 おはよございまあす」ohayo gozaimaasu! I lowered my controller to my lap and stared at that group of pixels masquerading as a teenager, and sternly informed her that she said it wrong. おはよう has the long vowel, not ございまあす. What's wrong with her??

Then a week or so later I watch an episode of Sakura Quest (fingers crossed it stays as clean and hilarious as it is now) and I hear "Yoshi" say いいえ with a short vowel, and yes, she was saying "no". This time I nearly laughed at the way I had worked so hard to get these long vowels down only to hear the natives disregard them entirely. This girl just said "house" to a yes or no question, but everyone understood her perfectly.

And so it is that, while you should learn to use long vowels properly if you plan to be understood and to be able to differentiate between certain words properly, once you begin speaking Japanese fluently, you will probably hear yourself and others omitting the long vowel on occasion, and that's okay. Just know what a long vowel is, how to use them, and most of all, how to read and write them.

And again, try making sure to use them normally, but don't sweat it too much if, AFTER becoming at least somewhat fluent, you find yourself omitting them occasionally for comfort. After all, what really matters is that you're understood and can understand when spoken to.



What's up with that new Romaji?: And now for the promised second reason why we saw the new Romaji earlier.
Remember how the Japanese term for the syllabaries translated into English as "Fifty sounds" even though there were only forty six? Well if you recall, I said that this was because some characters in their syllabaries were now obsolete. The two we'll focus on here are wi and we: they are written ヰ and ヱ in Katakana, and ゐ and ゑ in Hiragana.

This then presents a problem for some foreign loan words, such as software, where the we sound is needed. To account for this, some special character combinations that are unique to Katakana are employed, such as the one we saw above: an ウ u and a small ェ e are combined to make a we sound without employing the use of the obsolete we kana.

There are more Katakana specific kana combinations, but we'll cover those in a later lesson.


Additionally, Katakana actually has a character that makes a V sound! Had you noticed the lack of said sound before now? Well now you do, and we all feel a bit more awkward about the vicious violation of the veritable cornerstone of spoken language that is our very v now, especially this syllabary chart that's feeling a bit silly with all of us sitting here staring at it's v column, noting for the first time how it's void of said v. How shall we use our words to present vivid views of the vigor and vitality of... okay...I think it's time I stopped with the v jokes. Actually in hindsight I probably never should have started them, but what's done is done and I'm too lazy to erase it.

But yes, the Katakana syllabary has a character for v sounds, unfortunately most Japanese people will avoid using it as it's difficult for them to pronounce. No mercy on foreign learners of their language. Very vicious. Very vicious indeed.
Okay...no more jokes now, I promise.


Test time:
This test will cover some of what we learned in this lesson, as well as things we learned in previous lessons. As such it could prove challenging. Those marked with an asterisk (*) are bonuses.

Section A.
Answer the following questions:

1. What is a glide?
2. How are glides written?
3. What is a long vowel?
4. What does the small つ do?
5. おげんきですか。* (answer in Japanese, but remember to use Romaji, as PM doesn't accept kana)
6. What is Katakana's main function? (when do you use Katakana instead of Hiragana or Kanji)


Section B.
Translate the following from Japanese to English:

1. くつ
2. いえ
3. いぬ
4. ねこ
5. いす *

Section C.
Translate the following from English to Japanese:

1. Internet
2. Software
3. Computer *
4. Watch/Clock

And that'll do it for this week. Thanks for your patience. I'll try not to tax your brains with so much information next week.


Link:
Video
No audio link this time. ごめん。Gomen (sorry. informal)


Message: I've been noticing that the videos are getting between zero and one views for the past several lessons usually (sometimes I'm one of the views, so not all 2 view videos are actually viewed by two users). With that in mind I can only conclude one of three things:

1. Most of you aren't following the lessons anymore.

2. Most of you aren't using the links.

3. Most of you are using the audio downloads instead of the videos.

Please let me know in a PM which of these apply to you, and please do not answer this particular question in a reply to this thread. Thank you.



___________________________________

m0ssb3rg935 : Well, yes, and possibly. I'm not sure that there aren't some things that aren't counted exclusively with the native Japanese numbers, but otherwise yes, they're handy for using in place of other numbers if the total is ten or less. In another lesson I may give a few examples of how swapping in th e native numbers affects th e sentence structure based on my experience with it so far.




Summon list:
Mynamescox44 :
deggle :
SacredShadow :
ZeroTails :
sevencube3 :
Jygin :
Frodlex :
Zlinqx :
tytytec04 :
lordbelial669 :
A user of this :

Eirinn-senpai, will you notice me so I get a summon next time?

I'm always amazed at loan words, or as they say in the Yu-Gi-Oh jargon, Engrish. I used to play around with loan words and put them into Spanish spelling, so doing it again with Japanese is like a jump in time. Now, however, it has an actual meaning because the words are literally loans and not "kicking the language" lol

I'm surprised that it's spelled "deisupurei", I thought it would actually be "daisupurei". Not that big of a change (there are Catalan dialects which have these differences in spelling) but still worth pointing out. Again, this is coming from what I've heard in anime and videogames, and we know they aren't the best tool to properly learn the language.

I can totally understand the glides because of the many diphthongs we have both in Spanish and Catalan. Looks like, as lessons progress, the more languages you know the easier your adaptation becomes. At this pace, I might be unstoppable lol

Eirinn-senpai, I am so far behind... ;-;

Can you give me some sort of PM speed lessons to help me catch up? I don't really grasp most of this lesson. I'm sorry, I haven't had as much time to study as I used to.

だいじゅぅななか。dai juunanaka.

Welcome to lesson number seventeen. This week we'll learn several adjectives (words that are used to describe things. ie. big, new, expensive, etc.), how to use the context sensitive words for "that", and a new particle. So get your learning pants on (Or any pants, really. Just please stop coming to these lessons in your underpants, User), and get ready to absorb more knowledge to increase your smarticles with!



Vocabulary:
This
これ
kore

That (far from the speaker, but close to the listener)
それ
sore

That (far from both the speaker and the listener)
あれ
are

Note that the above words are for standalone usage ("This is mine", "what is that?", ect.), and that when used to specify which item you're talking about ("that car" "this phone") they change form by dropping the last syllable in exchange for の. We'll see that in action in the next section.


What is...
~なんですか
nan desu ka

Very
とても
totemo


Now we move on to some of the i-adjectives*.

Big
おおきい
Ookii

Small
ちいさい
Chiisai

Expensive
たかい
takai

Cheap
やすい
yasui

New
あたらしい
atarashii

Old
ふるい
furui

Black
くろい
kuroi

White
しろい
shiroi

*There are two types of adjectives in Japanese: the i-adjectives and the na-adjectives. These are so called because they end in their respective syllables: i and na.

Grammar:

Refresher on the ownership の:
Remember learning that the particle の no can show possession? We're going to try a few examples of that so you can see it in action again.

My pen:
わたしのペン Watashi no pen

My house:
わたしのいえ Watashi no ie

My cat:
わたしのねこ Watashi no neko

And so on. As you can see, we simply add the particle の no to the end of a name (Or for oneself, it's added to the first person pronoun わたし Watashi which is of course the equivalent of I or me) and then place the thing we are ascribing ownership of to them.
Or: person's name + no + the thing that belongs to them.


れ vs. の:
Now for using これ kore, それ sore, and あれ are to specify what you're talking about:

To say "this car" for example, instead of saying これ くるま kore kuruma, you would say このくるま kono kuruma.

Instead of それ ねこ sore neko for "that cat", you would say そのねこ sono neko.

And instead of saying あれ いえ are ie for "that house", you would say あのいえ ano ie.

Simply drop the れ and replace it with の. Give it a try, and pretty soon the location variations and the れ vs. の stuff will begin to come naturally enough.


Practicing some vocabulary:
Note: I'm including spacing since the vocabulary here is all in kana, but remember that normally there would be no spaces.
__________________________________

それは くるまのたなかさん です。sore ha kuruma no Tanaka-san desu.
That's Tanaka's car ("san" will usually be omitted in translation due to it's lack of an exact English translation, and a lack of a need for honorific terms in English in general).

Or we could say:
そのくるまは たなかさん です。sono kuruma ha Tanaka-san desu.
That car is Tanaka's.

Notice the different forms of それ sore that we employed? Also notice how they changed the reading of the sentence. それ sore was used to say "That thing by you is Tanaka's car." and その sono was used to say "That specific car is Tanaka's." or "That car that you're standing next to is Tanaka's."
The same is true for これ kore and この kono, and あれ are and あの ano.


Any particular particles?:
If you were a U.S. teenager in the 1990s, you probably remember when people frequently attached the word "Yo" (and I use the term "word" loosely) to their sentences as a way of saying "You know what I mean?". Yeah well in Japanese that's actually proper. I kid you not. So get your 90s sneakers, plaid shorts, and sunglasses back on (please don't) and prepare for a return to that oh so familiar word.

That's right, our next particle is よ yo. And funny as it seems, it functions almost exactly the same as the old 90s yo people threw around in the states until they realized how ridiculous they sounded, yo?

So to clarify for all of you non-Americans and people who are too young and thus make me feel old: よ is often added at the end of a sentence in Japanese, and it's function (conjunction junction. Why did I have to make that reference? -__- ) is to imply that you're giving the listener new information, trying to get the listener's attention, or adding emphasis.
Yeah, all three of those sound familiar to us geezers in the West, yo? Please slap me someone.


And as I promised before, I'm going to give some examples of usage for all newly introduced particles. Prepare to be yo'd.

Me: いぬのマッスさんは しろい ですか。inu no Massu-san ha shiroi desu ka.
Is m0ss' dog white?

User: いいえ、くろいよ。iie, kuroi yo.
No, (it's)* black [yo].


m0ss: エニイタンちゃんのくつは かわいい です。Eniitan-chan kutsu kawaii desu.
Eniitan's shoes are cute. (because apparently he's a woman's fashion pro)

Enii: ありがとう。arigatou.
Thanks.

m0ss: たかいですか。takai desu ka.
Are (they) expensive?

Enii: いいえ、やすいよ。iie, yasui.
No, (they're) cheap [yo].

m0ss: すごい すごい。sugoi sugoi yo.
Awesome awesome! (he really enjoys those shoes, man.)

In the first example we saw User employing the よ yo particle to imply that he was giving me new information: the dog was black.
In the second example we saw Eniitan using yo to inform m0ss that her shoes were indeed inexpensive. Now she can buy more games with that money she saved. :V

And again, the particle comes at the end of a statement, just like か ka comes at the end of a question.

*Words in parentheses are implied, but not directly spoken in the Japanese text above.


Testing, 1, 2.
This section from now on will test you on every new word and phrase we learn, and include one to three older words or phrases to test your retention. As a result they will be much longer, as well as more difficult. You can do this, guys!
__________________________________

Section A.
Match the Japanese vocabulary to it's English counterparts.

1. これ
2. ~なんですか
3. おおきい
4. やすい
5. あれ
6. あたらしい
7. それ
8. たかい
9. ふるい
10. ちいさい
11. むすめ
12. とても
13. しろい
14. とけい
15. くろい


A. That (far from both the speaker and the listener)
B. Small
C. What is...
D. That (far from the speaker, but close to the listener)
E. Expensive
F. This
G. Watch/Clock
H. New
I. Old
J. Cheap
K. White
L. Very
M. Black
O. Daughter
P. Big

__________________________________

Section B.
Translate the following sentences into English.

1. これは たかいです。kore ha takai desu.

2. それは あたらしい ですか。sore ha atarashii desu ka.

3. あのペンは ふるい ですか。ano pen ha furui desu ka.

__________________________________

Section C.

Translate the following into Japanese.

1. My house is white

2. That dog is big (assume the dog is far from both the speaker and the listener)

3. This is new

__________________________________

Section D.

Answer the following questions.

1. Where in a sentence do you place the particle よ yo?

2. Name three things that the particle よ yo is used for.

3. What are the two types of adjectives in Japanese?


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Video stuffs

No Mp3 this time. Sorry.


That's it for this week. I'm trying to get the lessons posted on Sundays again, so please be aware that for the next few weeks, if I am able to finish them in time, there will only be six days between lessons instead of seven.

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EX Palen : *notices ペィレンくん (my best guess at how to spell Palen-kun)* lol Here's a special summon for you. Sorry for missing you last time. ()

I love the loan words while also being slightly bugged by them at times. I get why they need them (because of course they struggle with pronouncing certain words of foreign origin as anyone would), and they're usually pretty easy to learn if they're loans of English words since they're so similar. It's funny to see the reactions you get when you tell someone how to say a certain word in Japanese and it's practically identical to the way they say it already. xD

I actually misspelled the Romaji form of display. It's disupurei, which also better reflects the proper pronunciation, as the first e is silent. Sorry about that.
As for the sound of certain words in games and animé, I need to address that in a lesson at some point (I keep meaning to). I've encountered some dialect differences and there are the obvious familiarity things (ani/oniichan, and so on), so a discussion on them might be helpful.

As for the multilingual thing, I can't attest to the helpfulness of already knowing two or three languages beforehand making it easier, but I do know that the more I compare English with Japanese, the more I realize how many similarities there are despite it being so extremely different. The fact that I can almost always find something to compare what I know in English to what I'm learning in Japanese, makes it so much easier for me to grasp.



A user of this : Gomen, User-san. I really messed up with those summon fails. (u_u) We can do this! You'll be up to speed in no time.

Oh and don't worry if you don't understand all of the words I use in some of my example texts: I sometimes use words that I haven't covered in lessons on here yet because it can be difficult piecing together a conversation that's relevant to the lesson using only words that aren't related to the topic at hand. lol

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Summon list:
Mynamescox44 :
m0ssb3rg935 :
deggle :
SacredShadow :
ZeroTails :
sevencube3 :
Jygin :
Frodlex :
Zlinqx :
tytytec04 :
lordbelial669 :

Once again, knowing Spanish comes in handy. We do have separate words for the two "that" English has, so I perfectly know how to use those adjectives. Let me rant about this, because there's not many things we Spaniards can be proud of right now

I could be wrong, but I think I've heard "chiisai" differently in anime. But well, there may be other pronunciations than the politically correct ones we're learning here, even though the people I heard it from did actually speak in a polite way. Also, I've also heard using "nani desu ka" for "What is...", it makes more sense for including the whole word, but in Japanese making sense doesn't mean it's correct.

This lesson was very interesting. While I already knew most of the words and particles, now I know WHY they're used like that and the actual meaning of words I only theorised about. Let's see what else can the next lessons bring!

As for your reply, anime can sometimes feature archaic dialects which we shouldn't be interested about (already enough dialects in existence, amirite?). The familiarity things, like personal pronouns, relatives and familiar suffixes could be looked into, because so far your material only has the most formal way and completely skips more familiar ones. If the familiar ones aren't in your material then maybe we could make a special lesson about them some time, but if they're covered they can be a lesson on their own.

Mynamescox44 :
m0ssb3rg935 :
deggle :
SacredShadow :
ZeroTails :
sevencube3 :
Jygin :
Frodlex :
Zlinqx :
tytytec04 :
lordbelial669 :
A user of this :
EX Palen :

Just letting you folks know that I'll have to skip this week's lesson. I'll try to have one up for next week on Sunday (three days from now), but I can't have one before then. I've been too strapped for time and have been forced to make some difficult decisions, but I should have some more free time as a result starting now. My apologies. Hopefully this won't happen again.