tatoe and tatoeba

[Beliskna]

Hi all,

Could someone please explain the difference between tatoe and tatoeba please. Also what would it mean to say:

tatoeba ne namida ga koboreru hi ni ha

And what is the purpose of the ne in the sentence

I would also be grateful for answers to:
1. What does sono mean in sono senaka
2. What does jime mean as in hitorijime

Thanks, Beliskna

[Psy]

Hi all,

Could someone please explain the difference between tatoe and tatoeba please. Also what would it mean to say:

tatoeba ne namida ga koboreru hi ni ha

*doesn't know why but always gets irked when non-native Japanese speakers type ha instead of wa* tatoeba is "for example" and is pretty well a set expression. Here it means "say, for instance on days when the [lit. overflow] tears pour out..." tatoe, on the other hand, is sort of an emphasizer for temo/demo, like tatoe doko ni itemo "no matter where you are."

And what is the purpose of the ne in the sentence

Just like you can say kyou wa ne or watashi wa ne, it just kinda buys time in the sentence and gets the listener to pay more attention. It doesn't really mean much of anything.

I would also be grateful for answers to:
1. What does sono mean in sono senaka
2. What does jime mean as in hitorijime

1. sono means "that." You'll often hear words like this in songs to refer to the singer's object of affection.

2. jime comes from the word shimeru meaning "to hold" or "to constitute." Thus hitorijime is "one person hold" or "monopoly."

[Jason]

tatoe, on the other hand, is sort of an emphasizer for temo/demo, like tatoe doko ni itemo "no matter where you are."

例え/tatoe is a standalone word that means "example, metaphor." Like in:

例えの話ですが、[何何]
"This is just hypothetically speaking, but [something]"

例えば/tatoeba is the ~ba conditional form of the verb 例える/tatoeru which means "to speak figuratively/hypothetically." But like Psy said, it's pretty much a set phrase that means "for example..." I don't think I've ever actually heard 例える used any other way.

[Psy]

例えの話ですが、[何何]
"This is just hypothetically speaking, but [something]"

Cool! I hadn't heard that one. As Peter always says, 勉強になりました!

[jkeyz15]

ということは、今まで聞いたのがないのです。　僕も勉強になりました

[Beliskna]

Hi all,

Thank you for the replies.