As if I didn’t have enough hobbies, recently I started learning to play the violin. Knowing me, you might not be surprised to find that I’m doing it self-taught, at least for the time being. While I have had basic conversations about violin and music related topics, I realized that there are some terms I… Read More »
When I couldn’t sleep the other day, I got an idea for a new Japanese vocab list about, well, sleep. Without enough sleep it’s hard to function in daily life, let alone study Japanese effectively. As with my other vocabulary lists, a majority of the words are those I have heard used by native speakers… Read More »
This list is about words related to board (Catan, etc.) or card games (poker, etc.). I hope you find these useful! If you are interested in Chess specifically, I have a vocabulary list for that here. ルール (ruuru): rule / rules 解説 (kaisetsu): explanation 初心者 (shoshinsha): beginner ボードゲーム (boodo geemu): board game 遊ぶ (asobu): to… Read More »
The Japanese verbs する (suru) and やる(yaru) are used quite frequently in the Japanese language, and while both of these mean “to do”, they have different usage. Let’s start with two general rules to help distinguish between these two verbs. First, する is more often used together with a noun to describe some action: 今晩、一緒に練習しましょう… Read More »
With a country like Japan that has tens of thousands of years of history, I guess it’s not much of a surprise that there is always more to learn. This includes cultural stuff, but also words and expressions that you may not have had exposure to on a daily basis (especially if are studying Japanese… Read More »
(The other day a friend casually asked me about how I learn vocabulary words in Japanese, and at the time I could only give a fairly simple answer. So I thought about it some more and decided to write an article about effective learning of foreign language vocabulary.) Regardless of what foreign language you are… Read More »
This is a list of Japanese words related to school and educational institutions. I’ve always enjoyed school and If you are staring to use these terms either for yourself, or for a loved one, I wish you the best luck! While I haven’t attended a school in Japan personally, I hear that they are much more difficult… Read More »
It’s been awhile since I’ve posted a Japanese vocabulary list, so I thought I would make one about mathematics and numbers (数学用語). I’ve purposefully left shapes out of this list and may make another list later just focusing on those. (Interesting fact: In the 2015 PISA average scores, Japan scored #5 in math and #2 in… Read More »
Sometime back, I mentioned that I recommend reading children’s books in a foreign language as a good way to experience native-level content that isn’t too difficult. For Japanese, this is especially useful since you will have very little, if any, kanji to worry about, which is one stumbling block when reading Japanese books. I’ve read a great… Read More »
When studying a foreign language, just because you can understand something doesn’t mean you have the requisite vocabulary and grammar knowledge in order to summarize it and talk about it’s content critically. In my Japanese studies, I’ve found that it can be frustrating to describe in any amount of detail something I’ve just read (novel,… Read More »