Dear Japanesepod101 team,

I have been coming to Japan for 9 years and have visisted over 28 times on business. I just recently decided it was time to seriously learn the language to better interact with my customers. I started listening to your pod cast a few weeks ago and have only got up to this lesson. However, your pod casts are fantastic and I have learned so much in a very short time. My next trip is in June and I can’t wait to practice more on my business associates.

Keep up the great work!!! You guys are great.

Jack

Hi JapanesePod,

I was going though the transcript of Lesson 13. It looks like it doesn’t match the audio. In the paragraph on Sushi, there is a “totemo” which is not in the audio. Note that this is also “really” in the translation.

It’s not a big deal, but may be worth correcting.

Keep up the good work.

PS. As per Ben’s comment, the romanji is in fact the translation.

hi there,

and hi peter
watashi wa polo des
i really like the way u r doing this and i have 2questions

1- is it right to say ” anata wa sogoee des” or “anata tachi wa sogoee des” or in general hot to say “you are amazing”
and for example “he’s amazing”
( because you are amazing) lol
because i wanted to say that to you, you deserve it

Hanaさん,
I have heard this explained as follows.
kore something near the person speaking
sore something near the person listening
are something not near either the speaker or listener.
Hope that helps.
ジョン

Hana,

Try this explanation:

kore = thing is within reach of the speaker
sore = thing is outside of reach of the speaker
are = thing is quite far from the speaker but within view, perhaps across the room or street

kore = this
sore = that
are = that over there

SUNGOI is actually すごい or sugoi. The ‘g’ sound is often pronounced back in the throat like that. It’s not spelt with an ‘n’ because nothing in Japanese is spelt with Roman letters actually… it “spells” like that to our ears (eyes?) but there’s just no way to spell sungoi in Japanese.

Oh it’s Sakura, not Natsuko, sorry for the error. Thanks for the clarification. Maybe in such instances, the moderator can point out to the student to also take note of such differences in pronunciation.

eric

the g sound is interesting. I was using a Japanese grammar book with accompanying CDs to learn and one of the first words you get is “kagi”(key). The CD pronounces it “ka ngi” so I was doing the same till Japanese friends told started correcting me and telling me to say “ka gi”. Truth of the matter is I hear the latter more than I hear the former around here (I’m only 30km from Tokyo centre). Often in train stations I’ll hear the “ng” sound. For example, there’s a train that goes to a place called Koganei and you’ll hear the platform announcement go “ko nga nei”. When I brought this to the attention of my friends and students (I’m teaching English), some of them professed never to have noticed the two sounds while others were aware of them. It’s the same in all languages. How many people are aware that we actually say “dringk” and not “drink”?
As a pron feature I’d say it’s not that important. Much more important is the shortening of the “u” part of a Japanese syllable between voiceless consonants, as in the initial variation in the pronunciation of “suki”(like) by Sakura and Peter, who was effectively saying “sooki”. It might have been helpful to explain to listeners why you dropped your original pronunciation for Sakura’s (also notice the difference in her pronunciation of her own name and Peter’s pronunciation of it). Well done with your initiative. So far it’s been very enjoyable.

oh, sorry It’s professor Mutsuhiko Miki

Why is the Romaji of the kana for daisuki given as mishii?