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japanese

Japanese Books I Bought Today

So today I went to Half Price Books, and I bought some Japanese language books.  Let’s take a look at what I found. I spent less than $100 on everything you see. First, I found some dictionaries. I like dictionaries. I’m not sure why, as I can find everything I need online, but these are in good condition, so I thought why not add them to my collection. It’s also why I didn’t feel too badly snarling them – the online dictionaries are available to everyone else too, so it’s… Read More »Japanese Books I Bought Today

I Love how Japanese Women Talk

It’s funny how, in all my studies of Japanese, and their obsession with all things cute, the thing I love the most is how some Japanese women say “ka”. They pronounce it “kaw”, and it’s the cutest thing ever. It’s funny because the Japanese have built entire industries on being cute. Idol culture, schoolgirls, kawaii culture, mascots. Animal faces on everything, etc., and the cutest thing is how some women say “ka”. I first heard that pronunciation on a game with Japanese voiceovers, and I thought they were doing it… Read More »I Love how Japanese Women Talk

An Update on Japanese

So, I’ve gone all over the place on this blog, and I haven’t posted about Japanese for a long time. And I kinda don’t want to, really. But this blog is ostensibly about Japanese, so, I guess I’ll write about that. I’ve lost all interest. True, if I abandon Japanese for much longer, I’ll start to forget it, and it’s a useful enough skill that I don’t want that to happen, but I’ve lost interest in Japanese, I’ve lost interest in Japanese culture, I’ve lost interest in Japan. All of… Read More »An Update on Japanese

Japanese: Off The Rails

This has not been an easy week for me. The combination of over a day of no power, several days of no water, being stuck in with literally nowhere to go and nowhere to get there even if I wanted to, because of six to nine inches of snow – gives me a lot of time to think. Or try to avoid thinking. This blog has gone off the rails. I’m not apologizing for it because it’s my blog and if I want it to go off the rails I’m… Read More »Japanese: Off The Rails

Why I’m learning Japanese

I have mentioned several times on this blog that Ihave no idea why I’m studying Japanese. Well, dear reader, I’ve figured it out. And I may quit. My mother tells me that from a very early age I loved learning. And Iguess that’s true. But there’s something else I’ve also loved, and that’s collecting. I don’t know why, but from a very early age, I’ve liked collecting things. I never had anything good to collect, so I just ended up collecting random, stupid things. Things that a child with little… Read More »Why I’m learning Japanese

Is My Past Life Japanese?

I feel like I should post something – it’s not a pressure, really, but just a kind of nudge. But I don’t know what. So I’m just going to write a stream of consciousness post tonight and see what comes out of it. Maybe it’ll even be good. I am… not sure what I believe on many different topics. I am a Christian in the sense that I believe Jesus died and rose from the dead and is now King – I’ve seen too much firsthand evidence to doubt that.… Read More »Is My Past Life Japanese?

Writing Japanese names in English

So for those of you who don’t know, Japanese family names come first. In English, Takahashi Minami, for example, would be “Minami Takahashi”. This, frankly, causes no end of confusion, because it’s really difficult to decide when to use the English word order. One could easily say “never”, but to be honest, that doesn’t sit well with me. Japanese and English are two different languages, and it’s by no means disrespectful to use English word order when writing something in English. It’s, in my opinion, not unlike translating from Japanese.… Read More »Writing Japanese names in English

Tips and Tricks for Japanese Learners

Over the past ouple of years, I’ve learned a few things about Japanese that are not obvious to people just starting out in Japanese. Let me try to summarize them here. Maybe I’ve said some of these before, but I’ll just repeat here if so, I guess it bears repeating. Okurigana Okurigana are those hiragana characters on the end of Japanese words. Here’s the tip: An English speaker is going to be tempted to look at a kanji and think that it is a word. In many cases, it is… Read More »Tips and Tricks for Japanese Learners

What Japanese has taught me about English

I’d say this is a pretty good topic to talk about, right? There are many things about Japanese that are very different from English. Some are just what they are – they’re different, but there’s no real useful insight to be gained about my own language. The fact that Japanese is postpositional, for example. It’s different, but neither system is better than the other. It’s just how things are. But there are other things that are useful, and at least one thing that I intend on taking from Japanese and… Read More »What Japanese has taught me about English

The most difficult things about Japanese

I’ve been studying Japanese (to varying degrees of success) for close to three years now (I think).  It’s most certainly been a while.  Over this time I’ve grown to understand where Japanese is simple and straightforward – and where it’s not.  Here are what, in my opinion, are the most difficult things about Japanese. Understanding Spoken Japanese It is very difficult for me to understand spoken Japanese.  It may be because there are many different dialects than Tokyo standard that are just different enough to throw me for a loop. … Read More »The most difficult things about Japanese