Regardless of your level of Japanese ability, there are always times when you want to say something in Japanese, but your mental book of words, phrases, and grammar doesn’t give you a good answer. Even if you have friends or family who speak Japanese fluently, it may be a bit annoying to constantly asking them… Read More »
Just like the particle は, it can take some time to get the hang of understanding and using the Japanese particle の。I’ll use what I’ve learned from textbooks, from experience, and from dictionary.goo.ne.jp to illustrate the many uses of this important element of the language. 1) Possessive or descriptive This is by far the easiest… Read More »
I’ve been keeping an eye on this manga in Japanese book stores for a few years now, whose mysterious cover and title piqued my interest. During a recent business trip to New York, I finally decided on picking up the first issue at Book Off. (I have a review of this Japanese bookstore here.) From… Read More »
In my time studying Japanese I’ve been fortunate enough to have several pen pals and conversation partners who have corrected my grammar mistakes, and in some cases pointed out more natural phrasing. Unfortunately, experiences like that are few and far between, not only because it can be tedious and time consuming to correct someone’s language… Read More »
In this post I’ve decided to list a few of the commonly used colloquial abbreviations and transformations in Japanese. Keep in mind that many of these are slang/informal (くだけた言い方）and would typically only be used in conversation with someone you are close to, or very informal writing like a blog. This list isn’t complete and I’m… Read More »
Manga, along with Anime, is one of the biggest forms of Japanese imports to America for entertainment. I wouldn’t be surprised if there were many people who started learning Japanese after they became interested in manga. (My situation is a little different, but I’ll discuss that in another post.) As I’m sure all of you… Read More »
As I mentioned in a previous article, in my initial years of studying Japanese I made a huge emphasis on learning as much grammar as I could. For me, one of the most difficult elements of Japanese grammar is distinguishing between the particles は and が. There are surely hundreds of books and websites that describe… Read More »
We are fortunate to leave in an age where nearly unlimited resources, in nearly any language, are available online. This is a boon especially for those studying a foreign language. Blogs, news, message boards, and even videos are available with a simple search, in a matter of a seconds. But the quality and variety of… Read More »
For lovers of Japanese culture and language, living in South Florida can be tough since there is a limited number of native Japanese speakers and authentic Japanese restaurants. One thing that goes a long way to compensating for this is the Morikami Japanese Museum & Gardens, located in Delray Beach, Florida. The Morikami gardens are… Read More »
I’m not exaggerating when I say that Podcasts are one of the most important tools for self-study, especially for experienced students of Japanese who are living outside of Japan. I’m always surprised when I mention to people I listen to podcasts and they have no idea what that means, or have only a vague clue.… Read More »