Posts

By Sheer Chance of Timing…

 I made the connection between two words today.   Recently, we have been listening to, and practicing reading, the Tadoku book, シュモーハウス.  In it, at one point, they are met at the train station by the governor of Hiroshima Province and by the Mayor of Hiroshima City - 広島市長(しちょう) (& other suchlike luminaries など ;)).  This was a term that I had stumbled over a few times - the sh sound so close to the ch sound, and trying to keep the right speed and fluidity, whilst not running the shi for city too hard into Hiroshima or divorcing it from the rest of the term (& at some point, realising that it was the alternate pronunciation for the 長い (ながい) kanji - perhaps because they were originally picked village elders, or greybeards as we would call them (somewhat disrespectfully) in western culture - maybe long beards in Japanese?  Or just for length of life & experience? Anyway, I just started looking at the vocabulary for Nakama 2, chapter 3, at lunchtime today...

Vocabulary in the Wild Again

This is probably my third post like this, maybe my fourth*. But I was watching two episodes of a gender bending*** show for the radio show yesterday and in the second episode***** I paused it to text my study buddies and tell them that I can’t really recommend the series, but if one wants to hear a ton of Nakama 2 Chapter 1’s vocabulary in an anime episode, one should watch episode 2 of onimai! 🤣 Then shortly after that I paused it again to tell them that there were a ton of plain volitionals too (this past week’s grammar). And then again to tell them that I had just heard できた too being used for are you ready, is it done too (this chapter’s vocab) and an enhancement to the potential grammar point (or a gotcha to watch out for)… and that I had just realised I heard that before a ton of times and not known it but knew that potential form wasn’t right there from context... It's actually amazing that I managed to watch two episodes with all these pauses for language discussion.^^^ One...

I am in awe...

 I was thinking on Wednesday evening* & again on Thursday, about language teachers and the amazing job that they do. The specific item that prompted the pondering was listening to 中田先生 talking us through the vocabulary in chapter 2 of Nakama 2, and the grammar that they take, because it doesn't always** do a very good job of pointing out which verbs take に or を or が or could be more than one at different times depending on context maybe. And one of the vocabulary terms was 空港 (airport***) & another one was 海外, so she used them together in a sentence, to help us learn them by using them in context, instead of dead words pinned on a page of vocabulary like linguistic butterflies with all the life and joy gone out of them... We talked about having the new airport and if anyone liked it, and can you fly abroad from our airport**** and for overseas, we learned it can be combined into the phrase overseas travel & that got used in a sentence.  But it wasn't just any sente...

Nakama 2 Kanji Test 1

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  10 minute test, which took me four min… there’s a slight chance that I might have overprepared… むりをするでしょう。

しゅくだいができません…

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 カルちゃん、犬が年上は、心の病気があるんです。薬を飲んだ方がいいですが、苦すぎるんだので、朝ご飯と晩ご飯に薬を入れます。それでも、時々食べません。 ぽっピーちゃん、犬が年下は、食べるのが一番好きです。苦いも、甘いも、しょっぱいも、何でも食べられるんです!早く食べているそしてカルちゃんの食べ物が欲しいんです。ポッぴーちゃんは、心の薬を食べない方がいいです。大変ですよね。 カルちゃん ポッピーちゃん

Potential form…

 仕事で寝られますが、家で、夜遅くまで、寝られません。大変だ!

来科目!秋学期!

 今日は、二千二十三年八月二十一日です。月曜日なので、来科目(かもく)がはじまります。JCCCの大学の中級1(ちゅうきゅう1)の授業 (じゅうぎょう)が六時半に始まりあます。 とてもおもしろいですが、ちょっとこわいのです。私の日本語の先学期は、去年の秋学期でした。長い時間です。たくさん単語(たんご)と文甫(ぶんぽ)を覚えていないでしょう*。 それから、先々週は、新しい仕事を始りました(はじめりました)。いいですが多いなことを覚えるのです。^ 大変むずかしいですよね。

しあわせ

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A few weeks ago, we were learning the vocabulary for chapter 13 of Genki* . One of the vocabulary words, as you can probably guess from the title, was しあわせ.  The definition in the vocabulary was long-term happiness, lasting happiness.  It is a な adjective, so I naturally thought "well, there's a word I'm never going to need, they obviously included that so that we would have to practice な adjectives more and for some variety from たのしい..." But I learned it anyway (perhaps more from having had that internal dialogue about it ;)) & time moved on. This Sunday, I watched the last episode of the Mobile Suit Gundam: the Witch from Mercury.  A small group of us watch the shows simultaneously, the Japanese with subtitles version, then we talk about them together in voice chat on Discord.  On Sunday, there was just the core group of 3 - me, K & T.  K has studied a little Japanese ages ago and mostly forgotten it, T can mostly get by without the subtitles, and...

Signs you might be learning Japanese…

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 1. You hear “yoho”/“youhou” in a song’s lyrics and instantly think “It’s either pirates or they’re doing the weather forecast…” 🤣 2.  You’re scrolling through your amazon account, and come across this past purchase and realise what they did with the character name (hint look at the series name ;))… 3. You might be wandering around your house muttering “stand over tree, then you can worry about the axe…” (I was trying to remember the stroke order for 新しい…). 4.  You just tried to enter “han” and “hon” in an English crossword… 5. You learn more about English - https://nowling-jccc.blogspot.com/2023/09/vocabulary-in-wild-again.html