Learn about making small talk, greeting people
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| INTRODUCTION |
| Natsuko: おはよう東京。ナツコです。(Ohayō Tōkyō. Natsuko desu.) |
| Kazunori: カズノリです。(Kazunori desu.) |
| Peter: Peter here and we are back with another lesson. Now we have a great show for you today. Kazunori is here and we have Natsuko here with us. So why don’t we start to show off with some basic greetings, Natsuko? |
| Natsuko: カズノリ、元気ですか。(Kazunori, genki desu ka.) |
| Kazunori: はい、めちゃめちゃ元気です。ナツコ、元気ですか。(Hai, mechamecha genki desu. Natsuko, genki desu ka.) |
| Natsuko: はい、すごく元気です。(Hai, sugoku genki desu.) |
| Peter: Okay, we have another great lesson for you. As always, we are bringing you basic and practical Japanese. Today we are taking it up another level. So now we have a conversation for you today and we'd like you to listen. There is going to be some pretty advanced stuff in there. Well basic, advanced of course and this is going to be great stuff. It’s going to impress your friends. It’s going to give you a real good grasp of understanding of how basic greetings go and not just the usual greetings. We got a lot of stuff in here. Okay, without further adieu, here we go. |
| DIALOGUE |
| 夏子 (Natsuko) : お元気ですか。(O-genki desu ka.) |
| 一徳 (Kazunori) : 元気です。(Genki desu.) |
| 一徳 (Kazunori) : お元気ですか。(O-genki desu ka.) |
| 夏子 (Natsuko) : お陰様で、元気ですよ。(Okage-sama de, genki desu yo.) |
| 一徳 (Kazunori) : 調子はどうですか。(Chōshi wa dō desu ka.) |
| 夏子 (Natsuko) : 調子はいいです。(Chōshi wa ii desu.) |
| Peter: Okay, very, very nice. Perfect, now I know that we gave you a few things and then we threw some curveballs at you. So please listen to the conversation again, try and get the general grasp of it and we are going to break it down afterwards. So here we go one more time a little bit slower. |
| 夏子 (Natsuko) : お元気ですか。(O-genki desu ka.) |
| 一徳 (Kazunori) : 元気です。(Genki desu.) |
| 一徳 (Kazunori) : お元気ですか。(O-genki desu ka.) |
| 夏子 (Natsuko) : お陰様で、元気ですよ。(Okage-sama de, genki desu yo.) |
| 一徳 (Kazunori) : 調子はどうですか。(Chōshi wa dō desu ka.) |
| 夏子 (Natsuko) : 調子はいいです。(Chōshi wa ii desu.) |
| Peter: Okay, very nice. Now we are going to do the conversation one more time and I am going to translate. Here we go. |
| 夏子 (Natsuko) : お元気ですか。(O-genki desu ka.) |
| NATSUKO: How are you? |
| 一徳 (Kazunori) : 元気です。(Genki desu.) |
| KAZUNORI: I am fine. |
| 一徳 (Kazunori) : お元気ですか。(O-genki desu ka.) |
| KAZUNORI: How are you? |
| 夏子 (Natsuko) : お陰様で、元気ですよ。(Okage-sama de, genki desu yo.) |
| NATSUKO: Thanks to you, I am good. |
| 一徳 (Kazunori) : 調子はどうですか。(Chōshi wa dō desu ka.) |
| KAZUNORI: How are you doing? |
| 夏子 (Natsuko) : 調子はいいです。(Chōshi wa ii desu.) |
| NATSUKO: I am doing good. |
| VOCAB AND PHRASE USAGE |
| Peter: Okay, very nice. My translation, there are many ways it could be interpreted. We gave you a few. Now what we want to do is we want to break down these expressions and we are going to have Natsuko help us out here because well, we need a professional and she is the pro. So we are going to break this down. Let’s start with the basic expression. |
| Natsuko: お元気ですか。(O-genki desu ka.) |
| Peter: Now we establish this as how are you but this is pretty much the standard introduction, right? |
| Natsuko: Yes. |
| Peter: All times of year, all times of day, you can ask this question. |
| Natsuko: Any time. |
| Peter: Yeah, okay. Now we have a couple of new things in here that are the very, very nice expressions. You can use them all the time and this is some very – these are some expressions, if you use them, you are going to impress some people. Now Kazunori asked you |
| Peter: お元気ですか。(O-genki desu ka.) |
| Peter: Yes, and you responded. |
| Natsuko: お陰様で。(Okage-sama de.) |
| Peter: Very, very nice. Now before we finish this, what does this mean? |
| Natsuko: Thanks to you. |
| Peter: Yes, as I said before and it’s a very, very common response to this question. |
| Natsuko: お元気ですか。(O-genki desu ka.) |
| Peter: Correct. |
| Natsuko: Yes, and also very – again polite and impressive. |
| Peter: Yes, this is very, very impressive. So can you break this phrase down for us? |
| Natsuko: (slow)おかげさまで (okage-sama de) |
| Peter: And one time fast, please. |
| Natsuko: お陰様で (okage-sama de) |
| Peter: Very, very nice and thanks to you, right? |
| Natsuko: Yes. |
| Peter: Okay, so お元気ですか (o-genki desu ka) is a nice standby but there is another very useful expression in case you want to change you know, spice up your greetings and spice up your questions when you meet somebody which is |
| Natsuko: 調子はどうですか。(Chōshi wa dō desu ka.) |
| Peter: Okay, very nice. So stop right there. We have a new word in there and this is |
| Natsuko: 調子 (chōshi) |
| Peter: Okay, and break this down for us, please. |
| Natsuko: (slow)ちょうし (chōshi) |
| Peter: And one time fast, please. |
| Natsuko: 調子 (chōshi) |
| Peter: Yes, and this means |
| Natsuko: Condition. |
| Peter: Yes, condition. Then we have the second part of the question which is |
| Natsuko: どうですか (dō desu ka) |
| Peter: Yeah, how is it? So how is your condition? Yes, so you know, this can be – that’s the literal translation but it’s kind of like how is it going, like how are you doing, right? |
| Natsuko: Yeah. So it’s used more frequently than お元気ですか (o-genki desu ka). |
| Peter: Yeah, exactly. The standard we gave you is something that you should know because it’s a good starting point お元気ですか (o-genki desu ka) but the more you speak the more you realize that there are many, many ways and as she said, it’s a very, very useful one. So how is your condition and you answered? |
| Natsuko: 調子はいいです。(Chōshi wa ii desu.) |
| Peter: Yes, which means |
| Natsuko: I am in good condition. |
| Peter: Okay, yes very, very nice. Again this is very, very useful and you can use this in many, many situations. Now let’s try some questions but let’s give some different answers than good condition. How about you say the condition is good? What is the word for good? |
| Natsuko: いい (ii) |
| Peter: And can you break that down for us? |
| Natsuko: (slow)いい (ii) |
| Peter: Yes and one time fast, please. |
| Natsuko: いい (ii) |
| Peter: I don’t know if many of you caught that but you have to kind of hold this one because it’s actually two ‘i’s together, right? |
| Natsuko: Yes. So you kind of extend it like いー (ī) |
| Peter: Yes, exactly. Okay, so we have the conversation, how are you and good and thanks to you but let’s just say, you know, I am not doing so good Natsuko. It’s not a good day. How can I respond, I am not doing so good? So what we will do is we will have Kazunori ask you how is it going. Here we go. |
| Kazunori: 調子はどうですか。(Chōshi wa dō desu ka.) |
| Natsuko: 調子は悪いです。(Chōshi wa warui desu.) |
| Peter: My condition is bad. Okay, good and we have a new word here. |
| Natsuko: 悪い (warui) |
| Peter: Okay, good. And this means bad. And break this down for us. |
| Natsuko: (slow)わるい (warui) |
| Peter: And one time fast, please. |
| Natsuko: 悪い (warui) |
| Peter: Okay, very nice. So now we have my condition is good, I am good and I am bad. Are there any other ones? How about the so-so…? |
| Kazunori: 調子はどうですか。(Chōshi wa dō desu ka.) |
| Natsuko: 調子はまあまあです。(Chōshi wa māmā desu.) |
| Peter: Very, very nice and we have a new word here. |
| Natsuko: まあまあ (māmā) |
| Peter: Okay, good and what does this mean? |
| Natsuko: So so. |
| Peter: Yes, okay and break it down for us. |
| Natsuko: (slow)まあまあ (māmā) |
| Peter: Okay, so we gave you the very polite form, right? So how about you guys are friends, right. So let’s do a very casual conversation. You know what we gave you today is the polite form with a です (desu) but if two friends meet, would you use this form? |
| Natsuko: No. |
| Peter: Okay, so why don’t we do this conversation without the polite form. Okay, so one more time from the top. You know what, we are going to give you first the polite form one more time and then we are going to give you the very casual form, okay. |
| Natsuko: お元気ですか。(O-genki desu ka.) |
| Kazunori: 元気です。お元気ですか。(Genki desu. O-genki desu ka.) |
| Natsuko: お陰様で元気ですよ。(Okage-sama de genki desu yo.) |
| Kazunori: 調子はどうですか。(Chōshi wa dō desu ka.) |
| Natsuko: 調子はいいです。(Chōshi wa ii desu.) |
| Peter: Okay, notice how we had the です (desu) in there. Now we are going to give you the conversation one more time and this is how it would be spoken among friends. |
| Natsuko: 元気？(Genki?) |
| Kazunori: 元気だよ。元気？(Genki da yo. Genki?) |
| Natsuko: お陰様で元気。(Okage-sama de genki.) |
| Kazunori: 調子はどう？(Chōshi wa dō?) |
| Natsuko: 調子はいいよ。(Chōshi wa ii yo.) |
Outro |
|---|
| Peter: Okay, very, very nice. Unfortunately we are out of time today but what we’d like you to do is put this into your memory bank and we are going to discuss more about casual speaking another time. Okay, so that’s going to wrap it up for today. |
| Natsuko: また明日。(Mata ashita.) |
| Kazunori: また明日。(Mata ashita.) |
| Peter: See you tomorrow. |
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