Hello, Japanese learners! As a sequel to #1, in this article I am trying to review a Japanese textbook, "GENKI (third edition)." Lesson 2 is the main target this time, but contents that belong to Lesson 1 may be dealt with when necessary.
At first, here are contents I will write about.
-
About "ね ne" in "たかい です ね Takai desu ne" & "よ yo" in "おいしい です よ Oishii desu yo"
-
Different senses of numbers between English & Japanese
-
Fundamental Japanese phonetics; through examining "とけい tokee"
Then, let's start :-)
-
About "ね ne" in "たかい です ね Takai desu ne" & "よ yo" in "おいしい です よ Oishii desu yo"
In Lesson 2, grammatical explanations are from page 60 to 64. これ kore, この kono, and ここ koko etc. are not so weird, aren't they? あれ are is an only new concept for English speakers. Whereas, Noun じゃ ない です ja nai desu is a little bit too tough for me to comment in a couple of words for people who have just started Japanese. As this blog series goes on more I hope to explain it one of these days. Instead of them above, I would like to deal with 〜ね ne & 〜よ yo (page 64).
In the dialogue (page 56), Mary says "たかい です ね。Takai desu ne." And, the translation of this phrase is "It's expensive." Then, compared to just saying "たかい です。Takai desu.", aren't there any differences? From my intuition, there are. It's improbable that I say "たかい です。", because such a judgment may offend salespersons. On the other hand, when I say "たかい です ね。", I not only add the meaning of "right?" but also imply that the message is my personal impression, not a concrete fact. So, I could avoid to make salespersons accept my opinion. He or she can go on talking freely from my former reference about prices, which is one of them that I'm searching for the most when shopping. To conclude, I prefer "〜ね" in such circumstances in order to secure flat relationships with salespersons and have fun talking with them afterward. If there are goods really expensive for us, we can pass by it without talking.
Next subject is "〜よ yo". In the dialogue (page 57), restaurant attendant says "おいしい です よ。Oishii desu yo." On page 64, "とんかつ は さかな じゃ ない です よ" is translated into "Let me assure you. Tonkatsu is not fish." I think it's a wonderful translation and totally agree with it. And I think "おいしい です よ" can be translated as "Let me assure you. It is delicious." Even in Japanese conversations, personal territories are reserved by each other, too. By adding 〜よ, you can suggest others that a matter belonging to such personal territories may be like you think. So in this case the restaurant attendant seems to say "Let me assure you. It is delicious. So why don't you try it?" as well.
-
Different senses of numbers between English & Japanese
On page 67, numbers in Japanese are explained. As the textbook says, Japanese has まん man that indicates ten thousands. I have been studying English for more than 20 years, but still struggle with numbers in English. It's a little bit shame to confess that whenever I listened to prices in dollars, I need to multiply them by 100 and get approximate converted values in yen in order to understand them. From my all experiences, I have a image of いち まん えん ichi man en, ten thousand yen, as the price that enables me to buy a pair of sneakers, and another of いち おく えん ichi oku en, one hundred million yen, as the price of a decent house inner Tokyo 23 special wards. And, as these memories of numbers are inevitably connected with the idea where ten thousands are recognized as a unit, it looks unrealistic for me to coordinate myself to recognize a thousand as a unit. So I suppose vice versa, that it may be difficult for Japanese learners as a second language to become familiar with Japanese number systems without living in Japan and shopping for groceries etc. in everyday lives. It's very natural that if you live in UK for example, you have vivid and unchangeable images of one pound, one thousand pounds and one million pounds, and that makes it hard for you to have clear images of いち まん えん or いち おく えん. Please forgive yourselves even if you don't feel confident about numbers in Japanese.
-
Fundamental Japanese phonetics; through examining "とけい tokee"
In the dialogue of Lesson 2, とけい's pronunciation is "tokee", ありがとう's "Arigatoo". But, と is "to", け is "ke", and い is "i", not "e". The problem is not new for Lesson 2. The dialogue in Lesson 1 has りゅうがくせい ryuugakusee, せんこう senkoo etc. Even if typical Japanese people say "tokee", he or she has a clear image of とけい, not とけえ. い has sound "i" and sound "e", and is read out according to the situations, and as native Japanese speakers make full use of い, Japanese learners may have difficulty when using Japanese without mastering the concept of い.
At #1, I wrote that Japanese phonetics was very simple and easy to master. But now I regret about having been a little bit too optimistic. From beginners' eyes, Japanese phonetics may be apparently simple but actually complicated. If so, I think that the reason of the difficulty comes from not being able to examine how to pronounce, as native Japanese speakers themselves aren't aware of how to pronounce and of course many of them cannot explain it.
In addition, as you may know Japanese has らりるれろ sounds, that are a kind of a fusion of "l" sound and "r" sound. English speakers are required to recognize l and r sounds as the same in Japanese phonetics, which may be tough.
But, once you have mastered hiragana and katakana, for example you would find original version of manga easy to read. Manga frequently uses onomatopeias and mimetic words, which I think are ones of the biggest wealths Japanese culture has.
Although this example below is neither onomatopeia nor mimetic word, please let me deal with it; つばさ、おれ の つばさ. This phrase was one that Roberto Hongoh said in "Captain Tsubasa". This may be translated as "Oh Tsubasa, my precious Tsubasa." But, the sound おれの is something by far deep. One man of Japanese root had dragged himself to Japan, and found a boy who was his. And the moment he found it, in order to protect the family of the boy he decided to go back to Brazil. Whole circumstances strongly indicates that the man had been loved by Brazilians and as a result loved the boy, so Captain Tsubasa is the story of love from Brazil to Japan. When reading おれ の, "れ" is neither "le" nor "re", but "れ". I hope readers of original Captain Tsubasa to listen to what and how Roberto Hongoh actually said.