[QUOTE=Megafan;39382241]She must have prior experience or something. It seems impossible for an English native speaker to do that, unless that was literally all they were doing. Even at upper division university level courses you don't learn that much that quickly.[/QUOTE]
The kanji progression for highschool was about 4 years for 100 kanji (1-4) and for the AP course is 400+ kanji in a year.
[QUOTE=Megafan;39396907]Either is fine, although I suppose the more explicit one would be more formal.
Similar to how in English one might refer to Valentine's Day as just Valentine's, or Hallowe'en as a contraction of All Hallows' Evening.[/QUOTE]
Thanks for all the help you provide; I really appreciate it, it helps out a lot.
[QUOTE=InvaderNouga;39396978]I don't have one even though I have SoftBank. I don't know many Japanese people who do, I like to use line though :).[/QUOTE]
Ahhh, mixi must be more of a teen thing then. I do use line, only to talk to one of my friends in Japan and to follow up on some Japanese bands. My username is deg_fan if you want to add me.
[QUOTE=titopei;39397020]The kanji progression for highschool was about 4 years for 100 kanji (1-4) and for the AP course is 400+ kanji in a year.[/QUOTE]
Yeah, so I'm quite suspicious of anyone saying they learn 150 kanji a week.
[editline]28th January 2013[/editline]
[QUOTE=DEG_fan;39397279]Thanks for all the help you provide; I really appreciate it, it helps out a lot.[/QUOTE]
It would be great if we had more native speakers around, although we have a few users here living or staying in Japan at the moment, whose insight is of course doubly invaluable. But, if my advice helps even a little bit, then that's good enough for me.
[QUOTE=Se1f_Distruct;39395522]I might be going to Japan. More specifically, I would spend 4 days in きょうと and then take the でんしゃ to the ぐんま prefecture. I'm sure it’s been asked before, but what fun things can you do in きょうと？ Megafan, you did mention a crab restaurant, what's that about?
ありがとう[/QUOTE]
You should definitely check out Nara (the ancient capital of Japan). The biggest thing there is Nara park, and there's a whole lot to see there. Museums, famous temples, gardens, forests and tea houses. It's really great. Plus the deer in the park are so friendly they'll come right up to you (provided you have crackers, or a map of the area....). The coolest thing there is the huge shrine with a gigantic Buddha in it. Can't remember the name but I think it's the largest wooden structure in Japan. I just took these pictures a couple days ago.
[t]http://img201.imageshack.us/img201/5987/imagehiw.jpg[/t]
[t]http://img194.imageshack.us/img194/551/imageshu.jpg[/t]
(Again sorry for the size)
[QUOTE=Lord_Schrotty;39387625]What are good websites to buy things from japan? (Like books, music, maybe food)[/QUOTE]
noppin.com if you want to buy things from yahoo auctions. good customer service and really easy to use. though their fees are harsh if you order a lot of small things like I do. I recently ordered 3 magazines which totaled 1600 yen before fees but 4400 yen after domestic shipping, bank wire, and service fees. basically add 1000 yen to every purchase
[QUOTE=Dori;39397566]I recently ordered 3 magazines which totaled 1600 yen before fees but 4400 yen after domestic shipping, bank wire, and service fees. basically add 1000 yen to every purchase[/QUOTE]
That's why I try to stick with eBay, I've always had gotten fair/free shipping for my purchases. This is mostly because I buy (CDs) from the same vendor. When I want to pre-order or get a new CD on CD Japan, the costs are quite hefty. Especially shipping.
[QUOTE=InvaderNouga;39397532]You should definitely check out Nara (the ancient capital of Japan). The biggest thing there is Nara park, and there's a whole lot to see there. Museums, famous temples, gardens, forests and tea houses. It's really great. Plus the deer in the park are so friendly they'll come right up to you (provided you have crackers, or a map of the area....). The coolest thing there is the huge shrine with a gigantic Buddha in it. Can't remember the name but I think it's the largest wooden structure in Japan. I just took these pictures a couple days ago.
-images-
(Again sorry for the size).[/QUOTE]
Fixed them for you, just remember to thumb any images larger than ~1000px. That's typically a good rule.
unfortunately ebay never has anything I look for which is mostly obscure 80s/90s music, magazines, and books
[QUOTE=Megafan;39397620]Fixed them for you, just remember to thumb any images larger than ~1000px. That's typically a good rule.[/QUOTE]
Thanks, not too sure how to thumb images even though I been here for 7 years almost haha. All in all I recommend anyone to visit the Kansai region, I enjoyed it much more than Tokyo. Planning on visiting Mt Fuji for 2 days in June, then heading up to Sapporo. Anyone ever been to the Sapporo or Fuji are?
[QUOTE=Dori;39397623]unfortunately ebay never has anything I look for which is mostly obscure 80s/90s music, magazines, and books[/QUOTE]
True, I've found a few things for some low-key Japanese 80s/90s bands on noppin. I also stumble upon those random Yahoo venders with some old magazines (I hope to get one day).
[editline]when[/editline]
[QUOTE=InvaderNouga;39397671]Thanks, not too sure how to thumb images even though I been here for 7 years almost haha.[/QUOTE]
Just quote the images bro :v:
Why is こんにちは spelled with は but pronounced わ? Also seen it in a few other words.
I'm pretty sure this has already been covered.
Well は is a subject marker meaning that it is pronounced as わ.
For こんにちは I'm not sure. When you do see the subject marker, it doesn't mean that it is part of the word.
When people are writing in Japanese, do they write the Kanji? I'm really just asking if they really have to memorise all of the tiny lines
[QUOTE=Cypher_09;39419408]When people are writing in Japanese, do they write the Kanji? I'm really just asking if they really have to memorise all of the tiny lines[/QUOTE]
People write kanji.
[editline]30th January 2013[/editline]
Without kanji, it'd be really hard to find what the context is in some cases.
[editline]30th January 2013[/editline]
They have to memorize the tiny lines. But if you remember some of the radicals, it's easier to memorize the actual kanji.
[editline]30th January 2013[/editline]
[url=http://japanese.about.com/library/weekly/aa070101a.htm]You should at least recognize some of these.[/url]
[QUOTE=DEG_fan;39419377]I'm pretty sure this has already been covered.
Well は is a subject marker meaning that it is pronounced as わ.
For こんにちは I'm not sure. When you do see the subject marker, it doesn't mean that it is part of the word.[/QUOTE]
It's because it's literally saying "It's day" or in the case of こんばんは "It's night". It's just how the greetings are structured.
Oh, I see. I was aware that は was the subject marker and all, and that it was pronounced "wa". I guess I didn't realize that こんにち itself meant "Today". But proper japanese requires a subject particle unless it's a verb so you add は to the end. Makes perfect sense.
So, you only pronounce は as wa if it's a subject marker? got it.
[QUOTE=Mp6;39419640]It's because it's literally saying "It's day" or in the case of こんばんは "It's night". It's just how the greetings are structured.[/QUOTE]
Holy crap, I never thought of こん as 今 before; now I just feel stupid x) Thank you.
Also, what's up with おはよう and 朝. Is saying おはよう like saying 'Early greetings' (something like that)?
[QUOTE=Wealth + Taste;39419804]Oh, I see. I was aware that は was the subject marker and all, and that it was pronounced "wa". I guess I didn't realize that こんにち itself meant "Today". But proper japanese requires a subject particle unless it's a verb so you add は to the end. Makes perfect sense.
So, you only pronounce は as wa if it's a subject marker? got it.[/QUOTE]
Well when you break こんにちは down it becomes 今 (いま/こん - now), 日 (にち/ひ - day/sun) は(わ); so as Mp6 said, it means "It is day". I never looked at it this way until just now :suicide:
From what I have learned, は only sounds like わ when used as a subject marker.
I'm not really sure to be honest, if I had to guess おはよう is good morning and 朝　is morning as a noun rather than a greeting. I don't know why good morning isn't structured like the other greetings.
[QUOTE=Mp6;39420077]I'm not really sure to be honest, if I had to guess おはよう is good morning and 朝　is morning as a noun rather than a greeting. I don't know why good morning isn't structured like the other greetings.[/QUOTE]
Well maybe it's not technically gramattically correct, just like a greeting in english "Morning!" is not correct but it's still used. It's also probably a bit more acceptable in japanese, since verbs without subjects are perfectly gramatically correct without subjects anyhow.
Maybe morning is a verb? :v:
[editline]30th January 2013[/editline]
Oh, and one more question, I've heard a lot of anime use ですか instead of plain old です. Is the か some sort of modifier or honorific?
[QUOTE=DEG_fan;39419851]Holy crap, I never thought of こん as 今 before; now I just feel stupid x) Thank you.
Also, what's up with おはよう and 朝. Is saying おはよう like saying 'Early greetings' (something like that)?
[/QUOTE]
For something like this it helps to look at the kanji, even if it is rarely or almost never written that way.
So for おはよう we have 御早う, which is essentially 'honourable' + 'early'. 'Early Greetings' is pretty spot on if you were thinking of it in English, actually.
So, technically speaking, 御早う御座います is grammatically correct, and 今日 is both 'konnichi' for 'this day' and 'kyō' for 'today'.
[QUOTE=Wealth + Taste;39420210]Well maybe it's not technically gramattically correct, just like a greeting in english "Morning!" is not correct but it's still used. It's also probably a bit more acceptable in japanese, since verbs without subjects are perfectly gramatically correct without subjects anyhow.
Maybe morning is a verb? :v:
[editline]30th January 2013[/editline]
Oh, and one more question, I've heard a lot of anime use ですか instead of plain old です. Is the か some sort of modifier or honorific?[/QUOTE]
か is a question marker. Japanese doesn't need the question mark essentially because か is technically the question mark.
お元気ですか。/ おげんきですか。
元気です。/ げんきです。
Also, instead of writing です/ですよ you could always use だ/だよ (informal of です/ですよ - but I've seen だよ used very casually, so I believe it's technically the same). I just think it sounds a bit cooler :v:
[QUOTE=InvaderNouga;39397671]Anyone ever been to the Sapporo or Fuji are?[/QUOTE]
Went to hokkaido for a two-week school trip a couple of years ago, including Sapporo.
You won't find any skyscrapers, narrow streets or really old Japanese architecture (though some relatively old Western architecture), so it's probably a little harder to tour than more typical Japanese cities, but below the surface you can find the best of the endemic cuisine, famous for ramen noodles and beer. Among (domestic and international) tourists, Hokkaido is better known for nature than culture, which is no surprise considering its history, but in Sapporo at least it's easy to experience Hokkaido food.
Never been to Mt. Fuji, though I know a lot of people who have, and most are surprised (some not, being prepared and having researched ahead) at how dirty it has become. It's possible to drive almost all the way to the top, and people have partied and picnicked over all the easily accessible locations (which is most of the mountain). Still looks good from a distance, though :v:
[editline]1st February 2013[/editline]
[QUOTE=Mp6;39419640]It's because it's literally saying "It's day" or in the case of こんばんは "It's night". It's just how the greetings are structured.[/QUOTE]
This is not accurate. The two greetings are not full sentences but abbreviations of a wide range of possible sentences commenting on the current day or evening. Whenever a sentence ends in a particle it's either ordered in an unorthodox way (e.g. いい天気だ、今日(きょう)は。) or not a complete sentence (e.g. ハサミを! for ハサミを[b]くれ[/b]!). The former is easy to spot because there should always be a comma to mark the pause if properly transcribed (it's not something you can use as a literary tool, it will only appear as a representation of speech, where this sort of thing can happen a lot, mostly when people choose to disambiguate previous sentences).
(Facepunch converts full-width exclamation marks to half-width, for some reason...)
[QUOTE=jA_cOp;39428871]Went to hokkaido for a two-week school trip a couple of years ago, including Sapporo.
You won't find any skyscrapers, narrow streets or really old Japanese architecture (though some relatively old Western architecture), so it's probably a little harder to tour than more typical Japanese cities, but below the surface you can find the best of the endemic cuisine, famous for ramen noodles and beer. Among (domestic and international) tourists, Hokkaido is better known for nature than culture, which is no surprise considering its history, but in Sapporo at least it's easy to experience Hokkaido food.
Never been to Mt. Fuji, though I know a lot of people who have, and most are surprised (some not, being prepared and having researched ahead) at how dirty it has become. It's possible to drive almost all the way to the top, and people have partied and picnicked over all the easily accessible locations (which is most of the mountain). Still looks good from a distance, though :v:
[editline]1st February 2013[/editline]
This is not accurate. The two greetings are not full sentences but abbreviations of a wide range of possible sentences commenting on the current day or evening. Whenever a sentence ends in a particle it's either ordered in an unorthodox way (e.g. いい天気だ、今日(きょう)は。) or not a complete sentence (e.g. ハサミを! for ハサミを[b]くれ[/b]!). The former is easy to spot because there should always be a comma to mark the pause if properly transcribed (it's not something you can use as a literary tool, it will only appear as a representation of speech, where this sort of thing can happen a lot, mostly when people choose to disambiguate previous sentences).
(Facepunch converts full-width exclamation marks to half-width, for some reason...)[/QUOTE]
if I wanted ramen noodles and beer I'd just raid a college dorm
I think this is the best place to ask, so..
I want to visit Japan sooner or later, i am however going alone (I will be around.. 20 i think when i go) now in terms of money i think i will be alright but its more the language and how things work, i know most of the things in terms of what to do and what not to do.
To anyone who visited Japan before, how hard is it to get around with a very little knowledge on the language? Do you survive well with just English?
Excuse me if this has been asked several times.
[QUOTE=darth-veger;39429184]Do you survive well with just English?[/QUOTE]
If you're visiting big cities or regular tourist locations, you can get by comfortably without having to say a word to anyone, so it depends on what you're aiming to do (of course, if you take it literally, it would require some planning).
However, if you don't overly resemble a tourist, going alone as a young person you should probably expect people to use Japanese when initially talking to you. Whether a person will try to open in English or not comes down to how much you look like a tourist and how proficient the person in question is with English (a significant amount of people want to practice English in real-life situations). Even if you look non-Asian it's not reason enough on its own to label you a tourist (thankfully, for non-tourists).
Examples where you might face conversation in Japanese include buying something at a supermarket or convenience store, entering a taxi, making reservations and checking in with your lodging etc.
So, depending on where you go and what you aim to do, it will usually be sufficient to either prepare the phrases you expect to encounter, or just tell people you don't speak Japanese.
アニメは、なにあなた好き?
Also, are there any programs that work like google translate's text parser does? I like the ability to type the romanji and it will give me the kana and kanji suggestions, it's so useful. Above is my attempt to fully construct a sentence by myself.
Windows has an inbuilt Japanese Keyboard, you can add keyboards in the Region and Language section of Control Panel.
[QUOTE=darth-veger;39429184]I think this is the best place to ask, so..
I want to visit Japan sooner or later, i am however going alone (I will be around.. 20 i think when i go) now in terms of money i think i will be alright but its more the language and how things work, i know most of the things in terms of what to do and what not to do.
To anyone who visited Japan before, how hard is it to get around with a very little knowledge on the language? Do you survive well with just English?
Excuse me if this has been asked several times.[/QUOTE]
I asked some people on Reddit a while back and got this (and some other responses that weren't in the Reddit mail, but cannot be bothered looking for them right now):
"I had just finished my second year of college level Japanese when I went to Japan, I thought I knew everything....I was wrong. In hindsight, I was still very much a beginner with no real language skill at all. There were definitely times when I could have talked to natives, made some friends, but my language skill quickly became in the way. That said, getting around was easy. Almost all the tourist destination cities, Kyoto, Tokyo, Osaka, have English signs and directions everywhere. Even when they don't, train station maps were always, huge, colorful and easy to read. But I did have a guide (my Japanese Teacher, a native Tokyoite) who did all the hard stuff, buying tickets, making reservations, etc. So overall, I would say if you know just little bit of Japanese, you should be fine to go. Don 't skip and opportunity to go to Japan just because you aren't fluent in Japanese, that takes years to learn. As long as you try speaking, people will be very helpful, and most of them will want to practice their English on you anyway. Going to Japan is an amazing experience either way, but do study up a bit before you go because the more you know, the more you will get out of it. "
" "Saw your great pictures, and wondered, how much Japanese did you know before going there?"
Arigato and Konichiwa.
I still don't know much. I know some accepted variants on Arigato, Good morning, Good evening, "Excellent food", excuse me, and sorry.
Other than that I don't know much. I brought along a tablet with an offline translation app that helped greatly.
I also became proficient in non-verbal communication :D"...
..."...If that is your only concern, then go! (IMO). You get quite a new perspective on things. Bring a dictionary or tablet (like I did), and you'll be fine. Also, almost all tourist locations are bilingual (Japanese and English). All trains, airports, peace park, temples, castles etc."
[QUOTE=Wealth + Taste;39429744]アニメは、なにあなた好き?[/QUOTE]
The object is most naturally omitted in this case:
アニメは　なにが　すき?
If the object is to be included, it would be most natural to formulate it like this:
あなたが　すきな　アニメは　なに?
When forming questions, the basic rule is to substitute the interrogative word (such as なに) for the subject or object. The verb becomes omitted or manifests as the predicative verb です (never だ). In either case, the question denominator か can also be appended. Whether the predicative or question denominator is omitted depends on a variety of factors. The two above examples with both omitted are appropriate for informal colloquial speak.
Remember that the word order is usually SOV (Subject-Object-Verb), although the two above examples are not very good because they do not contain any verbs at all. This does not mean that Japanese sentences can be full sentences without verbs, it's just that in this case the verb is an omitted predicative verb, so they can be hard to analyse. Written "properly", they could be:
アニメは　なにが　すき　[b]ですか[/b]?
and
あなたが　すきな　アニメは　なん [b]ですか[/b]?
(The predicative verbs are bolded)
[QUOTE=Wealth + Taste;39429744]Also, are there any programs that work like google translate's text parser does? I like the ability to type the romanji and it will give me the kana and kanji suggestions, it's so useful. Above is my attempt to fully construct a sentence by myself.[/QUOTE]
When using a keyboard, the language is most commonly written using an IME (Input Method Editor) which does exactly what you want, if I understand you correctly. Windows ships with a pretty good one, you just have to add it to your system's list of keyboard layouts in the control panel.
