日本語会話: The Japanese Conversation Thread

[GoktimusPrime]

I was in Parramatta on Friday to pick up my Transformers comics, and drove past the streets where they were shooting for the upcoming Wolverine movie. One of the Japanese signs on a building was a billboard for some (presumably fictitious) digital printing company, and it was called 文雄 (Fumio) which is a Japanese male given name, but 文 ("Fumi" or "bun") means "literature" or "text" and 雄 ("o" or "yuu") is used in the word 英雄 ("eiyuu") which means "HERO"... literary hero! I see watchoo did thar, Wolverine!

[GoktimusPrime]

ROFLMAO!!!


There's an English version here, but it's not as extensive as the Japanese version -- and at least one of the jokes in the JP version isn't translatable in English. Aww man... best laugh in ages. *wipes.tear.from.eye*

[GoktimusPrime]

How to say "I don't speak Japanese, do you speak English?"

NIHONGO GA WAKARIMASEN. EIGO GA WAKARIMAS KA?
日本語が分かりません。英語が分かりますか。
(say "nee-hon-go gah wah-kah-ree-mah-sen. Ay-go gah wah-ree-mas-kah?")

[GoktimusPrime]

From the Martial Arts Discussion thread:

There is a Chinese saying regarding hiding one's true skills... "The real man never gives himself away". I am sure the Japanese have a similar saying.

実るほど頭のさがる稲穂かな ("Minoru hodo kobe no sagaru inahokana"= "The mature rice plant lowers its head."; i.e. at full ripeness/maturity, the top of the rice plant becomes so heavy that it pulls the top of the plant toward the ground like a person bowing - the idea being that the more wisdom one acquires, one's head is filled with humility, i.e. with maturity comes humility and respect for others.

Some translate it as "the boughs that bear the most hangs lowest."

[Bidoofdude]

Got 25/25 on my speaking test, 25/25 on writing and 21/22 on reading for Accelerated Year 8.(we do year 9 stuff)
Not bad IMHO. I'm yet to see my wrong answer.

[GoktimusPrime]

Today was the 2nd anniversary of the 2011 Earthquake/Tsunami. 頑張れ日本！

[Dkaris]

In year 7 and 8 I begun learning japanese, but never followed it up in the later years of my schooling. Are there any good books out there to learn from?

[Bidoofdude]

BTW, it's began or had begun, never begun on its own.
Yeah. I'm in year 8 now and I'm doing this Year 9 Mainstream Jap. It's alright.
(I just hate getting vocab tests three days into the next unit.)

[GoktimusPrime]

Heh... our daughter was talking to herself in Japanese in her sleep last night.

In year 7 and 8 I begun learning japanese, but never followed it up in the later years of my schooling. Are there any good books out there to learn from?

http://www.kinokuniya.com/au/index.p...=9784906224500

Nothing beats just having conversations with people in Japanese (or whatever target language you're trying to learn) though. You learn tonnes more from speaking and listening than you would from reading piles of books. Speaking and listening are natural language skills -- when babies are born, they're instantly listening (some say they start listening while in utero; we were talking to our daughter and letting her listen to Mozart while she was in utero*) and later they will naturally try to talk. Simple utterances at first ("dada," "mama" etc.), then proper words, attempts to string sentences etc. But reading and writing are artificial skills. Less than 5% of civilisations invented writing. Literacy is a skill that must be instructed -- people will not naturally learn it (which is why you can have illiterate native speakers of languages. You need look no further than the internet to see grown adults who can't write properly in their native (and often only) tongue! ).

Having said that, literacy does massively improve one's ability to learn a language, so I wouldn't completely dismiss it either. When it comes to that, forget using Romaji -- just jump straight into Hiragana, Katakana and Kanji (in that order). I find learning Japanese with Romaji to be not as effective because learners often become too dependent on it, then they have to "ween" themselves off it when attempting to learn how to read/write Japanese script. I knew an American fella who lived in Japan for 8+ years -- spoke the language fluently, but was completely illiterate in it. Couldn't even read Hiragana... and all because he allowed himself to learn Japanese through Romaji first. I'm glad that I never allowed myself to become dependent on Romaji, and after meeting that guy, it convinced me that it certainly is a poor way to learn Japanese script.

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*While there's no definitive/conclusive evidence that this stuff actually works, we figured that it certainly wouldn't hurt.

[Dkaris]

I'd recommend this for adult learning:
http://www.kinokuniya.com/au/index.p...=9784906224500

Gotta go in there this weekend, ill try pick it up, cheers!