Learning Japanese

[Vexx]

This is probably your best source for Shinto (wasn't able to find much online in the way of romanized prayer) .... You might hit the religious section of the bookstore and look for Shinto or Buddhist chants ... or ask at your local buddhist temple for some phonetic scripts (tell them its for class).

http://www.religioustolerance.org/shinto.htm
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Shinto
http://www.sacred-texts.com/shi/index.htm

The last link may be a good jumping point to find a prayer or chant.


Item: Shinto Norito: A Book of Prayers Author: Introduction and translation by Ann Llewellyn Evans; foreword by Yukitaka Yamamoto
Price: CDN $25.00
Publisher: Tenchi Press/Trafford Publishing
　

　

[deathreape98]

thanks for the links


i need some help with the language bar. i have XP SP 2, and i have the button(s) for the language bar clicked- but no language bar. i right clicked my taskbar and looked at the possible toolbars, but the language bar wouldnt show up. also, 90% of the time, it wont type in japanese for anything out of word processor when i do ctrl+shift+2 (what i have it set to change to japanese.) can anybody help me get the bar working?

[FatPianoBoy]

It does this for me sometimes, too. I eventually gave up maintaining the language bar and i now switch to hiragana input by means of left alt+shift to go to Japanese and then left alt+~ to switch input modes. I think you might be skipping that second step.

[Vexx]

In both Win2K and in XP, the language bar is both flaky and refuses to retain the settings I give it. Great idea, but they simply didn't finish the thing.
If someone has any clues on how to get the damned function to remember that I want to have it default to hiragana+no_conversion, I'd be appreciative.

[richvh]

Originally Posted by soka

The third one is South Korea but they use 韓国 (kankoku) where 国 is a simplified version of 國.
The second one is United States but they use 米国 (beikoku) or just アメリカ (America).

The 米 of 米国 comes from the phonetic kanji used for America in the Edo/Meiji era: 亜米利加. (Western placenames had their names transliterated into kanji, and usually the first character was used as a shorthand for it, hence 英吉利(Igirisu, England) became 英国. In the case of America, 亜 was already used for 亜細亜 Asia, so the second character was used. These have almost all fallen out of common use, replaced by katakana.)

[WanderingKnight]

In both Win2K and in XP, the language bar is both flaky and refuses to retain the settings I give it. Great idea, but they simply didn't finish the thing.
If someone has any clues on how to get the damned function to remember that I want to have it default to hiragana+no_conversion, I'd be appreciative.

I think the problem with that was because the thing works on a per-program basis. It has a global setup (default for each program that is opened), but you can specify it per program. So if you want to type Japanese on your web browser, you have to select your web browser and change while it's selected... but if for everything else other than the web browser, you'll type in your default language, unless you change it again for that specific app. It's a little retarded if you ask me, personally I found GNOME's SCIM to work much better (it sets the language globally every time you change it, and I finally found an intuitive hotkey configuration--never found one in XP's).

The thing would be much easier if it had any sort of documentation somewhere, but I never found it.

[Vexx]

aye, I figured out the 'per-program' issue... but every time I start it up after closing it, it has forgotten all my preferences. There may be a registry ick that can be twiddled.... but like you say, no docs.

[deathreape98]

benefit 1 to knowing japanese- telling your teachers "watashi no baka" means "i am smart' :P

little update for me, havent been able to study much because of school, but my times freeing up so ill get off my lazy behind and start learning katakana.

[Risaa]

I've discovered a great way to increase Japanese reading speed -- Japanese karaoke!!! It's a real challenge for me to be able to read fast enough to sing any normal to high-speed songs, but it's fun and I'm finding that I'm slowly getting faster and faster at it.

(...Of course, I've also gotten better at finding and picking the songs despite the massive amounts of kanjified names. I can find and select at least five songs in under thirty seconds now... And I usually do. )

[FatPianoBoy]

Originally Posted by Risaa

I've discovered a great way to increase Japanese reading speed -- Japanese karaoke!!! It's a real challenge for me to be able to read fast enough to sing any normal to high-speed songs, but it's fun and I'm finding that I'm slowly getting faster and faster at it.

Anime subtitles were how I learned to speed-read English, so I think you're onto something there

[Apple84]

ouuu okay kewl..this may help me too.and i was wondering if there is anyone who knows fluently in jap or is japanese..can u please help me translate this in english?thanks.


aisaretai demo aisou to shinai??? what does that mean in english? hopefully its nothing silly or funni =D

[richvh]

Looks like nonsense to me, though it could be an attempt by a non-native speaker to say "I want to be loved, but I won't try to love"

[Apple84]

to richvh:

ohh...is that really what it mean?? or close or similiar? i thought demo meant " but" though?

what does the rest mean? anyone else? i am just curious.

[FatPianoBoy]

Sounds more like: "I want to be loved, but it doesn't seem like I am/will be loved" to me.

[Li Jianliang]

That's the first line in the song Sen no Yoru o Koete from BLEACH. And yes, it is "I want to be loved, but I don’t try to love".

[lreth]

Originally Posted by deathreape98

benefit 1 to knowing japanese- telling your teachers "watashi no baka" means "i am smart' :P

little update for me, havent been able to study much because of school, but my times freeing up so ill get off my lazy behind and start learning katakana.

of course if i'm gonna embarass myself i'd tell that one to a japanese sensei:P

[richvh]

That "aisou to shinai" still looks weird to me. Are you sure it isn't "aishiyou to shinai"?

[Li Jianliang]

It's not. The kanji is 愛されたい　でも　愛そうとしない

[FatPianoBoy]

Originally Posted by Li Jianliang

愛そうとしない

Correct me if I'm wrong, but the そう in this context is something like 'seems like.' Though that may only be used as an adverb.

[Li Jianliang]

That's what it seems like at first, but in this case it's 'try to'.