This restaurant or that restaurant? Decisions, decisions! Today we learn how to get your voice out there. Today we bring this week’s work together, with a real-life practical situation! You don’t want to miss today’s episode.
Today’s location included in the comments.
This entry was posted on Friday, January 27th, 2006 at 2:49 am and is filed under Beginner Lessons. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.
21 Responses to “Beginner Lesson #27 - Deciding Where to Eat”
japanesepod101.com says:
January 27th, 2006 at 5:25 am
Today’s location is Tokushima・とくしま・徳島
Is the capital of Tokushima Prefecture and can be found on Shikoku Island.
This is Kazunori’s hometown.
Steve says:
January 27th, 2006 at 8:42 am
Hello and Konnichiwa.
I hope you are all genki.
This is going back to an older podcast…..but……
Recently I wrote to you to tell you that I have just discovered your wonderful site and as such I have been trying to catch up on all your podcasts. I have just heard your podcast on Japanese superstition and you mention about the fact it is bad luck to see a spider at night in your home, but good luck to see a spider in the morning. You also mention that you were not sure were this idea came from….well. I did some research on this, and I could not find anything, so I asked my Japanese friend, who lives in Tokyo, she also did not know, so she asked her mother and according to her mother;
A spider in the morning is the sign of good luck especially for merchants, as it is believed to bring lots of customers. On the contrary, a spider at night is the sign of bad luck as it is believed that it brings thieves.
I hope that information is good for you.
O-genki de
Steve 
Peter says:
January 27th, 2006 at 8:51 am
Sugoi Steve-san!!!
That post was amazing!! Thank you so much!! There are a lot of people on this side too who were wondering! Thank you so much for taking the time to research this! Thank you for making our day!!!
Do you know, we were actually debating that one, as many younger Japanese aren’t aware of it, but in the end we decided to go with it! Thank you for helping us prove our instincts right!!
We’ll be mentioning this in an upcoming podcast, so if you would like your friend’s mother to get credit for that great piece of information shoot us an email with a last name and a hometown! Thank you again!
chanun (チャナン) says:
January 27th, 2006 at 8:56 am
That’s interesting Stevesan!
Back to today’s episode, what’s the difference between けっこう、かなり？And is あまり the negative form of けっこう、かなり? 
Peter says:
January 27th, 2006 at 9:05 am
チャナンさん、毎度有り難う！
Sakura will be with you shortly to answer this one. 
Amari - あまり - tends to be used with the negative form and with a negative experience. The key words are tends to! As sometimes this is not the case.
Kekkou and Kanari, I be back in the morning to tackle this one! Thanks for listening and for posting!
japanesepod101.com says:
January 27th, 2006 at 9:45 am
Videocast just released, please see blog for details! 
Athara says:
January 27th, 2006 at 3:53 pm
Peter, you mentioned in the podcast that the new Kanji corner is written out in 2 forms (I think you said Yon and Kun):???:. Why are there 2 forms and what are they? Can you explain this please? I have a decent grasp on kana but I find kanji pretty difficult to learn. But I’m trying. 
What do you think is the best way to learn Kanji?
Oh and I loved the vidcast. As I said before, visual aids rock. The driver was really nice too. I found it interesting that they have LED signs that say reserved, occupied, etc. I didn’t know that.
Scott says:
January 27th, 2006 at 4:47 pm
スコットはビデオiPodを見た。
何？ 一日に二回のジャポンニーズ・ポッド１０１だか。変だね…
あっ、ビデオ・ポッドキャストなんだ！すごい！僕のiPodでビデオを見るのが大好きだ。もっとビデオを作ってください。
Gevorg says:
January 28th, 2006 at 5:14 am
Hello !
It’s Gevorg again ^^ !
I am also learning 漢字 ! I know what 音読み and 訓読み are, but I do not know when to use them… T_T ! Are there any rules ? It is very very complicated o_O ! And is it true that if you put several 漢字 together, some of them get a whole new pronounciation ?
Thank You very much !
And my greetings to Kazunori-San, Sakura-San, Natsuko-San and of course Peter-San ^^ !
Gevorg~.
チャナン says:
January 28th, 2006 at 6:51 am
Hi Gevorg,
Maybe you find this site helpful http://www.kanjiclinic.com/kc4final.htm
or go here for the list of interesting kanji-related articles
http://www.kanjiclinic.com/preart.htm
Thanks to those people at www.kanjiclinic.com
Ja!
Peter says:
January 28th, 2006 at 7:36 am
Athara-san, thanks for watching the video! Yeah, that guy was great! He was pretty into it too! We have a lot more in store! Stay tuned. 
Regarding your question:
On-yomi・音読み (the upper most reading of the Kanji (Chinese Character) in our Kanji corner) is a reading of a Kanji based on the Japanese approximation of the original Chinese pronunciation of the character at the time it was introduced (a long time ago!).
http://www.factbites.com/topics/onyomi
Kun-yomi・訓読み：(the lower reading of the Kanji (Chinese Character) in our Kanji corner) is a reading based on the pronunciation of a native Japanese word that closely approximated the meaning of teh Chinese word when it was introduced.
http://www.factbites.com/topics/kunyomi
Kind of like On is closer to the original pronunciation, and Kun is a Japanese pronunciation.
What seperates Japanese from the pack is the many different Kanji readings. The best way to learn is practice. I learned by making index cards, a lot of them!, and using them as flashcards. But that was quite some time ago, and since then the chisel has been replaced by the ball pen and then the internet! There are some really good resources on the net. I will spend tomorrow scoping them out and let you know which ones I like. Also, anyone with any suggestions, please keep them coming.
Was this helpful?
スコットさん、見てくれてありがとうございます！これからもよろしくお願いします！だいたい週に一回ビデオを公開します！よろしく！
Any trouble reading the kanji here, paste our link into Rikai.com and come back. You can roll over the Kanji and the hiragana will appear.
Gevorg-san,
チャナンさん provided us with a very useful article! Yes, this is topic that gives Japanese its bad reputation! 
There are general rules, but they are broken quite a bit. In the article, there is a very important line “On・音 readings are favored over kun・訓 in forming compounds (Japanese words with two or more Kanji characters)”, I agree with this statement and is my advice, as when I don’t know the reading I tend to stick to this rule. However…….the latter part of the sentence is, “but exceptions are abound!” I also agree with this! But for now, I say stick with the first piece of advice.
Also, I would recommend that you use rikai.com! This is a tool I wish I had when I was studying! It would have saved me so much time. Go to rikai.com, and I prefer to read yahoo.co.jp, paste in a link and if you scroll over the kanji words it will give the hiragana reading and meaning. Practice is key, and rikai.com makes it easy.
Was this helpful?
チャナンさん Thank you for the great post! What you did is what we have envisioned. We are working towards a Japanese language community in which we help one another learn. Please keep posts like that coming!
chanun (チャナンさん) says:
January 29th, 2006 at 12:09 am
Petersan,
どういたしまして，you’re very welcome! I’m more than willing to help other students lean this fascinating language (not that I’m good at it but I’m working on it ). I hope to see more people helping each other learn too in a near future. It’ll be すごくすてきね！
じゃ！
Gevorg says:
January 29th, 2006 at 2:59 am
Hello !
Thank you Chanun-San for the helpful links you gave me ! They helped me out a lot ! And thank you Peter-San for your explanation ! It has gotten much clearer now ^^.
Gevorg.
Peter says:
January 29th, 2006 at 3:29 am
Gevorg-san,
Please also read this post from another listener Scott-san:
Peter, you recommended that I use the Rikai.com website to help me read kanji. Actually, I’m using a plug-in for Firefox called “Rikaichan”. It does the same thing as going to rikai.com would, except all you have to do is right click on the page you need help with, and select “Enable Rikaichan”. No need to copy and paste any URL.
This is a must have plug-in for anyone studying Japanese and using Firefox. Check it out at http://www.polarcloud.com/rikaichan/
I would like to change my recommendation to this!!
John Kaiser says:
February 3rd, 2006 at 5:26 pm
Help…
Lesson 5. the .pdf file dl ok, but the verbal lesson is #27…a mis match. Can you please correct this? You have a great website and the most useful language teaching I have found. Thank you so much.
Calvin says:
March 7th, 2006 at 3:52 pm
Konichiwa!
These lessons are so great, want to know if it is possible to teach a topic on making a restaurant reservation.
Dave S. says:
March 13th, 2006 at 2:43 pm
Peter-san,
In the lessons, we haven’t had an explanation yet of when someone might use:
desu ne
or
desu yo
Any help any one can provide on these would be excellent!
Arigatou gozaimasu!
Lonna says:
April 11th, 2007 at 5:14 am
Hurrah! I FINALLY know the kanji for ’sushi’!
My dictionary didn’t even have it…
markystar says:
May 29th, 2007 at 6:06 pm
Dave S.さん、
the difference is よ (yo) is assertive, ね (ne) is usually confirming something (like ‘isn’t it?’ or ‘don’t you think’)
Carla says:
February 20th, 2008 at 2:28 am
Konnichiwa
lol the answer in already given in the 1st vocabulary question, again lol
You are being very generous to us lol 
Watashi wa JapanesePod101 ga totemo suki desu yo. Hanatatachi wa omoshirokute tanoshikute ii desu.
(I hope I got that right)
Doomo arigatoo gozaimasu minasan
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Category: Beginner Lessons |
Function: expressing dislikes, expressing likes, making plans | Topic: food | Politeness Level: Polite
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