Learning Japanese

[Doughnuts]

I should imagine it's fine to ask here, though you might wanna try the "advanced" thread.

Originally Posted by iLney

How do I read two particles sitting next to each other?

Like "hazu" or "wazu," "niha" or "niwa," "deha" or "hewa"

Sorry I can't type Japanese here.

Chained particles are read the same as normal, so your examples, 「には」 is read as "ni wa" and 「では」 as "de wa".

「はず」 is a particle of it's own that appears after a plain verb to indicate something that should be done. It's read as "hazu".

[Nerroth]

Originally Posted by Doughnuts

I should imagine it's fine to ask here, though you might wanna try the "advanced" thread.

Sorry, I couldn't seem to find it - which one do you refer to?


(As an aside, I found an Ainu sub-board at UniLang - not bad!)

[Alchemist007]

Where can I find a nice list/poster of the 常用漢字表?
(zyou you kanji hyou）. The first result on google was OK but I'd prefer if it was numbered.

[Circular Logic]

Originally Posted by Alchemist007

Where can I find a nice list/poster of the 常用漢字表?
(zyou you kanji hyou). The first result on google was OK but I'd prefer if it was numbered.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_jōyō_kanji

[Alchemist007]

Thanks, should I treat it as a holy grail of sorts?

[Raiga]

Originally Posted by Circular Logic

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_jōyō_kanji

Awesome. =O I wasn't planning on using Wikipedia anymore (after all, it's an encyclopedia, not lessons) but I just might study with this.

Wish the Romaji wasn't there though. Whenever it's there I tend to spoil myself with reading it (I can't help it! My eyes are trained to drift to Roman characters) and I know I need to practice my kana at every opportunity...

[Circular Logic]

Originally Posted by Raiga

Awesome. =O I wasn't planning on using Wikipedia anymore (after all, it's an encyclopedia, not lessons) but I just might study with this.

Wish the Romaji wasn't there though. Whenever it's there I tend to spoil myself with reading it (I can't help it! My eyes are trained to drift to Roman characters) and I know I need to practice my kana at every opportunity...

I wouldn't use it to learn kanji from scratch, cause the order it uses is not the most useful for learning Japanese as a foreign language, you'll end up learning some rather obscure kanji at the start andry common ones at the end. It's ok for reviewing what you do know, however, and measuring your progress.

[Ryuou]

Originally Posted by Nerroth

Sorry, I couldn't seem to find it - which one do you refer to?


(As an aside, I found an Ainu sub-board at UniLang - not bad!)

I also think it'd be better to discuss this in the advanced thread, which can be found here -
http://forums.animesuki.com/showthread.php?t=78887

I'd be very interested in learning some things about the Ainu, especially the language. So hopefully you can drum up enough interest for a good discussion. At the least I'll try and do a little research to see what I can find.

[theorys]

wow this thread is made of win

[Nerroth]

Originally Posted by Ryuou

I also think it'd be better to discuss this in the advanced thread, which can be found here -
http://forums.animesuki.com/showthread.php?t=78887

I'd be very interested in learning some things about the Ainu, especially the language. So hopefully you can drum up enough interest for a good discussion. At the least I'll try and do a little research to see what I can find.

Thanks for the link - or should I say, Iyayraykere!

[Ryuou]

Originally Posted by Nerroth

Thanks for the link - or should I say, Iyayraykere!

You're welcome. And wow, that's thanks in Ainu?

[Nerroth]

Originally Posted by Ryuou

You're welcome. And wow, that's thanks in Ainu?

Indeed it is - pretty cool, eh?

[iLney]

ごもっとも= You're quite right.

無理= unreasonable

ご無理ごもっとも = it is just like what you say

Is there some mistake in translation of the last sentence or Japanese people just love to use sarcasm....?

[yononaka]

Think of it in the same vein as "The customer is always right." It's about the treatment, not about actually being right. In fact you may well know the other party to be completely wrong, but you still give them the right because you have to. (I'm not sure how applicable second person usage, like in your given translation, would be though. That would seem sarcastic, yes.)

[iLney]

Thank you.

雨がぱらぱらと降り出した

What is "と" doing there? Would it be okay to omit it?

[yononaka]

Originally Posted by iLney

Thank you.

雨がぱらぱらと降り出した

What is "と" doing there? Would it be okay to omit it?

Onomatopoeic words like that can be thought of as quotations of some sound, thus many (may) take と. It's OK to omit it in this case, but in some cases (generally with shorter words) と is customary.

[iLney]

Thank alot. That's the first case I see onomatopoeic followed by an article though

Next:

砂糖を入れましたか？

First off, I don't study grammar .... Is that sentence in past tense? If so, why is it translated into "Do you take sugar?" ("Did" wouldn't make much sense either)

[Raiga]

Bit of a tangent and I'm sure there are plenty of people who already know of this blog (it's over four years old) but I just recently discovered it and I got a huge kick out of it.

http://www.hanzismatter.com/

My favorite is still the guy with the "gaijin" tattoo.

EDIT: This one's gold

First of all, the name Washington is usually written ワシントン [washinton] rather than ウォシントン [woshinton] as was presumably intended by the tattooist.

Next, someone left out the first ン, leaving only ウォシトン [woshiton]. Then, they used the large オ rather than the small ォ, making the tattoo actually spelled ウオシトン [uoshiton], so I guess it would be pronounced sort of like the English words "Whoa Shit On." That's probably not quite what Mr. Washington wanted when he got his tattoo...

[RandomGuy]

Originally Posted by iLney

Thank alot. That's the first case I see onomatopoeic followed by an article though

Next:

砂糖を入れましたか？

First off, I don't study grammar .... Is that sentence in past tense? If so, why is it translated into "Do you take sugar?" ("Did" wouldn't make much sense either)

It says, "Did you add [lit. "put in"] sugar?" Not sure of the context, of course, but the meaning seems pretty straightforward...

[iLney]

Well, the sentence looks like a waiter asking if his customer wants to add sugar in something? "Did" wouldn't make sense here... Or is it a polite way to put it?