Embarrassing Moments In Learning!

[Tom]

The moral is that you can't necessarily expect to be talking to Japanese people even if you are in "little Tokyo".

Even in Japan.

[kc8ufv]

[quote="G San"]
That's when she told me she was Chinese. As was the whole staff. It was a Chinese run Sushi restaurant.
[quote]

I understand completely. I frequent a sushi restaurant in Ann Arbor, it is primarily run by Koreans, although several of the ladies on the wait staff are Chinese. When I started studying Japanese, (I made the mistake of trying to learn Kanji right away), I asked one of the waitresses how to say 水 in Japanese.

More recently, at a meetup for Japanese speakers, and those studying Japanese, (that month, I was the only "student" that showed up) I goofed up in the introduction.
The greeting format that month was Name, Hometown, Job, and something you like.
Immediately after saying "Toledo ni sundeimasu", I followed up with "tech support ni sundeimasu" instead of "tech support de hateriteimasu", realized it, could not think of "hateriteimasu", and completely lost my train of thought.

[Ulver_684]

The moral is that you can't necessarily expect to be talking to Japanese people even if you are in "little Tokyo".

Even in Japan.

I think it is even all around the world where there's a little Japan town!

[untmdsprt]

Oh, and yes, I could have typed this in kana, but I felt that the newbies learning Japansese would like to read these, too. That, and my Japanese Input thing isn't working right now for some reason.

Can someone please explain to me why everyone is being taught romaji first? I was never taught romaji and it seems like I'm being thrown back into the dark ages when I find a cool conversational book, only to find it's entirely in romaji. I'd like to hear from a native Japanese that was taught romaji before anything else.


My embarrassing moment was when I typed "非子機" 「ひこき」instead of 飛行機「ひこうき」to a friend of mine when telling him about my vacation. He asked if I rode a delinquent to see my family. I gave him a good laugh over that one!!

[joroniconia]

! getting the menaing of は wrong
and mixing up paritcles and so forth,
i have dihonsored myself, of coruse im still ocnfused wether to to use atashi boku or watashi?

[untmdsprt]

! getting the menaing of は wrong
and mixing up paritcles and so forth,
i have dihonsored myself, of coruse im still ocnfused wether to to use atashi boku or watashi?

あたし - informal for women
ぼく　- informal for men, women never use (maybe changing with younger crowd)
わたし - standard for women, formal for men

[joroniconia]

! getting the menaing of は wrong
and mixing up paritcles and so forth,
i have dihonsored myself, of coruse im still ocnfused wether to to use atashi boku or watashi?

あたし - informal for women
ぼく　- informal for men, women never use (maybe changing with younger crowd)
わたし - standard for women, formal for men

i am confuzleed how to reply to you in 日本語。
also im confused when to use, formal and informal,

Oh, and yes, I could have typed this in kana, but I felt that the newbies learning Japansese would like to read these, too. That, and my Japanese Input thing isn't working right now for some reason.

Can someone please explain to me why everyone is being taught romaji first? I was never taught romaji and it seems like I'm being thrown back into the dark ages when I find a cool conversational book, only to find it's entirely in romaji. I'd like to hear from a native Japanese that was taught romaji before anything else.

i can tell you its mostly lazyness

[untmdsprt]

i am confuzleed how to reply to you in 日本語。
also im confused when to use, formal and informal,

Hmm, I still use わたし for close friends. I also use the 「ます」form of verbs, even though with close friends I can be more informal. I guess it is based on your level of understanding and what everyone is comfortable with. Also, how good of friends you have and whether or not they will tell you what to say and when.

A good rule of thumb would be how do you talk to people in your own native language? How long does it take for you to consider a new person your friend and you change the way you speak to them?

This is why you have to learn the culture in addition to the language. BTW, if you want to type in Japanese to me, the polite form would be a good place to start. Most people learn this first, and I find it easier to read. If you are a man, then I would expect either ぼく or わたし.
Does this help?

にほんごをべんきょうがんばってください

[joroniconia]

i am confuzleed how to reply to you in 日本語。
also im confused when to use, formal and informal,

Hmm, I still use わたし for close friends. I also use the 「ます」form of verbs, even though with close friends I can be more informal. I guess it is based on your level of understanding and what everyone is comfortable with. Also, how good of friends you have and whether or not they will tell you what to say and when.

A good rule of thumb would be how do you talk to people in your own native language? How long does it take for you to consider a new person your friend and you change the way you speak to them?

This is why you have to learn the culture in addition to the language. BTW, if you want to type in Japanese to me, the polite form would be a good place to start. Most people learn this first, and I find it easier to read. If you are a man, then I would expect either ぼく or わたし.
Does this help?

にほんごをべんきょうがんばってください

oh quite simple respect me… talk polite
person is rude, me not talk polite………O0.
did you say please speak japaense? hello!?

[untmdsprt]

No, I said good luck with your Japanese studies.

[joroniconia]

No, I said good luck with your Japanese studies.

どもありがとう。
as just beffore now im getting more confused, out of simplicity ill just use… わたし, meh…… why would girls use あたし why not あし?

[kichigaijin]

I started learning Japanese in 1993, before there was an internet, before the advent of these super powerful electronic dictionaries, and well before iPods, let alone japanesepod101. don't get me wrong, i still stink, but it was definitely the dark ages back then.

learning consisted of taking your pocket dictionary (the best pocket-sized paper dictionaries at the time still had less than 20K words) out "into the wild" and going through each word that looked interesting on a "trial by error", "case by case" basis.

Living on Okinawa was especially difficult because with so many tourists from all over Japan, you REALLY realize how regional Japanese can be. Even words in "standard" Japanese can vary on likelihood of usage or even intricacies of how they are used based on region of the respective speaker.

For example: saying "jotou" 上等 in 沖縄 is an honest compliment, where as in Kansai 関西 or Tokyo 東京　it might get you shot.

making that many mistakes, so early on, you eventually just learned to shrug your shoulders if you messed up and keep going. being too nervous to talk wasn't going to get you anywhere.

the only times i've really felt bad (blamed myself) about a mistake is when the mistake is ongoing. some mistakes i make almost everytime i open my mouth, but i still do well enough with japanese conversation to hang in most conversations without my dictionary.

being unafraid of making errors is how you eventually refine your stuff into something useable. just about the entire nation of japan studies english from the time they're in middle school (or even elementary school) and most can't use what they've learned coz they're so afraid of making mistakes. hey, mistakes can be good.

that being said, my longest running errors have been:

using yappari やっぱり　incorrectly:　I was using it more of as "in the end" than "as I expected", pretty much made a world of difference.

using aikawarazu 相変わらず　incorrectly: for the longest time I was using it as "as before" instead of "as usual"- in other words, using 相変わらず　where また was more appropriate.

levels of politeness. I've resigned myself to never really getting this one down perfect, kinda like how a lot of foreigners learning english either get or don't get sarcasm. I still work on it and try to do right but it kinda bothers me when I see someone get so angry in response to a slip in the levels of formality made by a non-native speaker.

most embarassing?:

in high school one morning after spending the whole night in a few japanese bars, half asleep before physics class, i said "ね" at the end of a sentence to one of the popular guys in school (on-base high school). I swear they rode me for a good 15 minutes for that one.

[kichigaijin]

No, I said good luck with your Japanese studies.

どもありがとう。
as just beffore now im getting more confused, out of simplicity ill just use… わたし, meh…… why would girls use あたし why not　あし?

I've never heard a girl use "あし" to refer to herself; if I had to guess why not, it's probably coz it's close to the word for "foot"、"leg", even "transportation" 足.

[kichigaijin]

....
The greeting format that month was Name, Hometown, Job, and something you like.
Immediately after saying "Toledo ni sundeimasu", I followed up with "tech support ni sundeimasu" instead of "tech support de hateriteimasu", realized it, could not think of "hateriteimasu", and completely lost my train of thought.

just a word of help, because nobody's brought it up.
not sure if you're having a hard time with roma-ji but i think the word you were looking for is:
hataraiteimasu　ー＞　 はたらいています　ー＞　働いています

[joroniconia]

No, I said good luck with your Japanese studies.

どもありがとう。
as just beffore now im getting more confused, out of simplicity ill just use… わたし, meh…… why would girls use あたし why not　あし?

I've never heard a girl use "あし" to refer to herself; if I had to guess why not, it's probably coz it's close to the word for "foot"、"leg", even "transportation" 足.

ども。
O_o i hope i go tht emeianing of domo right,
わたしはがんばって、（∧＿∧）