ちゃんと is a word I use fairly often and I thought it would be a good choice to write a focused blog post about it. Although I have a fairly strong image of this word in my head, I decided on checking both the Japanese and English dictionary entries to see what the official definitions… Read More »
One frustrating thing about learning foreign languages is that many aspects of language (grammar, vocabulary, pronunciation, etc.) can appear to be random or arbitrary. I remember when learning Spanish my teacher used to respond to such comments by saying “One day, a long long time ago, there was a man who sat on a hill and decided… Read More »
The other day I heard from someone that they were having difficulty learning to read Japanese, such that they had to re-read passages several times over to fully grasp the meaning, and generally had trouble thinking in Japanese when reading. This is a difficult problem indeed, one I have faced for many years myself. I have… Read More »
余裕（yoyuu) is a great word to learn in Japanese because it has no direct translation to a word in English with the same nuance, and also because you’re likely to hear in in daily life once in awhile. Generally speaking, 余裕 represents some sort of resource, and oftentimes it is used in the negative sense to… Read More »
At popular request, I’ve decided to make a list for computer science and software development terms. If you know of any ones not listed here that you use frequently please let me know in the comments! Many of these words can be used as both a noun and a verb with する. For details check your… Read More »
The Japanese suffix ーがる is one of those things you aren’t too likely to learn about in a beginner Japanese course. You may have seen it in a advanced textbook if at all. I understand the reason for not introducing this expression until a student has more experience with the language’s fundamentals. After all you… Read More »
When first learning Japanese numerals, you probably have learned that the numbers 4 and 7 have two different ways to express them in Japanese: 4 ＝＞ し / よん 7 ＝＞しち/なな In some references and textbooks, they may leave it at that, which can leave you wondering which number to use when. To begin with,… Read More »
I’ve been dancing between a few different topics on this blog, and looking for direction for what types of posts you are all craving for. Please take a moment to answer this poll. The answers will help drive what sorts of articles I write.
You may have heard there is no word for ‘foot’ in Japanese. That’s only partially true, and in this post I’ll talk about this misconception. When speaking everyday Japanese, it’s true there is no single which maps exactly to the English word ‘foot’. Generally speaking, the word あし refers to both the leg and the foot, but… Read More »
The effectiveness of foreign language practice depends on part on how pressing of a need there is to communicate and understand correctly. When speaking with a native or fluent speaker of that language, there are all sorts of emotions that get engaged and one usually tries his or her hardest to comprehend and speak in… Read More »