Tennis!!!!
How about a lesson talking about running in snow and when its 14 and windy!

Oh my gosh, I told you guys that I play tennis right? And meet some Japanese people in class?
I gotta use this weekend.

How to say l love to play tennis instead of hate?
I love today’s episode!!!

You guys made my day again!
Good day~~~

Hey Peter, Sakura and the gang of Japanese pod101, i would like to say a very huge thank you to you guys for producing such a wonderful programme! “Tomo Arigato!” (did i get it right this time?) Haha! I aced my japanese speach exam! And my japanese teacher was quite impressed with the bits and pieces of nifty stuff i used!

She introduced my class to listen to your show cause like she felt it really helped me a lot!

And guess what? She said i was moving too fast from the class! haha!! Thank you so much guys!

d0w (singapore)

Today’s location is Honolulu・ホノルル！ capital of Hawaii and popular travel destination for Japanese vacationer’s.

Is that mean I love tennis or I love to play tennis?
Or is it same?

Tenisu ga suki desu!!!

Gotcha!

you know I have to ask this too….how about, do you like to play tennis?
I should stop for today before I get so crazy.

Vicky-san,
It’s ok, Steve-san was yesterday (電車), now it’s your turn!

Thank you for sharing your language learning insight. To use a New England dialect (even tho I’m on the west coast), I’m wicked jealous that you know so many languages! Japanese is only my 2nd, with English being my first. I guess I know 1.25 languages.

I’ve heard that learning your 2nd language is actually the hardest, but after that other languages are easier to learn. Do you feel this is true?

I’ve dreamt in Japanese before, but like Michael-san mentioned, I have no idea what in the world I was saying, so I’m not sure this counts.

Since Japanese is my first language to learn other than my native language, I’m interested in hearing how it came together for people, and I suppose that process would be similar for any foreign language, not just Japanese.

Jonas-san and Nathan-san, thank you for sharing your stories too. Nathan-san, you *are* resourceful, and I think you have studied more than the “official” Japanese II.

I look forward to hearing more stories. I’d also be interested to learn *why* you want to learn Japanese (versus another language).

Ok, now I know how Steve-san feels, my boss just walked by. I gotta get back to work.

Soory..the Romaji is meant to read ‘Tenisu o yarimasen ka’ I missed ‘ka’ at the end

Vicky-san, good luck at tennis!
d0w-san, nice job! That’s a huge compliment when the teacher says you are too advanced
Rhonda-san, I have the same sentiment as you! Well, why do you want to learn japanese?

Me, well I want to learn it because
a. I really just want to learn something to keep my mind fresh.
b. There is lots of material available to immerse yourself without actually going to japan (ie, movies, comics, tv shows)
c. My flatmates wanted to go for a trip there at the end of the year so I thought “why not”
d. I actually put off learning it until a friend at work told me about jpod101. It re-invigorated me

MY main problem is I think I need to take a japanese COURSE. with homework and stuff.. as I am absolutely the laziest person when it comes to self-study.. I need some discipline

Oh Steve-san…

Rhonda-san, I don’t speak none of language right. I fit everywhere but don’t belong anywhere……
Soon, you will able to noticed what you are saying in dreams. It’s around the corner.
Yes I agree with the others 2nd language is the hardest and after that it will be easier.

I heard that Japanese language is the easiest language to learn as Korean. Don’t get me wrong here, I just heard and I’m not sure it’s true or not. Also it’s for Korean. And, I heard that Chinese language is the hardest to learn in the world that even Chinese people can’t communicate each other.

I look a like Japanese people and have Chinese eyes and they expected me to speak something. When I said, I’m Korean I felt bad that I don’t know their languages. So why not, I should speak something as well since they told me Japanes is easier.

Here is another problem…..I have couple of Chinese friends. They asked me why Japanese? So maybe next year I will try Chinese????

Later~~~

God, Natsuko has the coolest ringtone !
What song is that ?

Piet-san,

The issue of する can become quite complex, so to keep it simple I’ll just address your specific question. The difference between 「日本語の勉強をする」 and 「日本語を勉強する」 is an issue of emphasis. In the first, する is an independent transitive verb meaning “to do” which is taking the noun phrase 日本語の勉強 as its direct object. So this would be “to do Japanese-study”, and the emphasis would be on what is done. In the second, 勉強する is a transitive verb meaning “to study” which is taking the noun 日本語 as its direct object. This would be “to study Japanese”, and the emphasis would be on what is studied. It’s a very slight difference in this case, but if you seperate the direct object it becomes clearer. Consider the following:

What are you doing? / I am studying Japanese.
何をしていますか。／日本語の勉強をしています。

What are you studying? / I am studying Japanese.
何を勉強していますか。／日本語を勉強しています。

The English answer is the same, but you can see where the focus is when looking at what has been asked. If I am off on any of this, hopefully Sasahara-sensei should be here soon to make corrections!

Vicky-san,

テニスが好きです (tenisu ga suki desu)
I like tennis.
テニスをすることが好きです (tenisu o suru koto ga suki desu)
I like to play tennis.

For both of these, you can add 大 (dai) to suki to make it “reeeaaally like”. Also, you can add か (ka) to the end of either sentence to make it a question. However, depending on the situation, it might be more natural to just say “how about you?”. For instance, if someone asked 何が好きですか (nani ga suki desu ka - what do you like) and you answered with the second sentence, it would sound unnatural to repeat it all again and add ka to make it a question. Instead, you would just say あなたは (anata wa) with rising intonation, meaning “how about you?”. (As we’ve discussed before, it would be better to use their name if you know it. So to me, you would say “Nathan-san wa?”)

Gevorg-san,

That’s close! そ should be そう, and わ should be は (the particle wa is written with the ha hiragana).

Rhonda-san,

I’ll talk a bit more about Japanese and why a little later. Right now I’m trying to rush through these because my roommate is waiting on me to watch a movie

Steve-san,

You can’t use asobu with tennis as the direct object. It’s a common mistake for learners. I believe the most natural would be to use suru. Take me to Holland with you next time

Jay-san,

Again, we’ve got so much in common. I’m sure I’m at least as lazy as you are

Vicky-san (again),

Yeah, Japanese is supposed to be easier for Korean speakers. The grammar is very similar, as well as a number of words, etc. I also have a long list of languages to learn Korean, Mandarin, and Tagalog, among others. Once I get to Korean, maybe you can help me out

ps. also.. kedo = but
demo = but?

When is which used where and why?

cool, ta nathan-san!
I understand that I reckon.

Hi every one,

Great idea to replace the　ひらがな版 by the ふりがな晩　!!!

あなたたちの労力はどうも有難う!

(I don’t know if I have been using the right word for effort)

Hervé.

To the team at japanesepod,

初めました。わたしのなまえはシャノンフロイドです。わたしはニュージーランドじんです。どうぞよろしくお願いします。(*^o^*)

You guys are awesome!!! I love your podcast!! Its the best I’ve come across to date and is an excellent aid for anyone looking to further their knowledge of nihongo. The notes you provide on the lessons are extremely useful and to tell you the truth I can’t believe the lessons and the accompanying PDF’s (kanji) are free!!! To the sponser, “Eric Laylen” (I hope i got this right m(_ _)m) my sincere thanks for making this all possible. ほんとに有難うございます。

Take care everyone and 日本語がんばって下さい。

Shannon

シャノンさん、

Welcome to the community!!

Just a quick note… it’s 初めまして (notice the “te” rather than “ta”). Also, the sponsor is Erklaren Co., Ltd. - a translation and interpretation company located in Tokyo, Japan.

http://www.erklaren.co.jp/English/index.html

Steve-san,

Your Japanese is not terrible - you add a lot of good stuff to the discussions here! Also, you’re right, the question mark is not used a whole lot in Japanese. I just wanted to point out to Kristina-san that it was indeed valid.

And now I must sleep a few hours before classes tomorrow!

また明日ね。

Aaaaah! I need to sleep at night…I should have aimed the reply at Kristina-san…not Piet-san…Gomen nasai That’s what you get for staying up all night watching a Japanese film and not sleeping… But last night I ate late (I cooked Oyakodon) Not a lot of people know this but I enjoy cooking and I love cooking Asian food. That was about 11:00pm when I ate that. And as I was so stuffed, I sat up and watched a couple of comedies and then decided to watch a film…and before I knew it was 3:00am and I had to get up at 6:30am.

Anyway, Nathan-san, thanks for the encouraging words. My biggest problem is confidence, which is why when I do meet a Japanese person, I tend to get all nervous about speaking any Japanese and end up speaking English, only to end up feeling angry at myself and depressed that I did not try…or I was too much of a coward. But saying that, I did pluck up the courage to speak to the Japanese shop assistant, in a shop I brought some Japanese crockery from, last Saturday. If it was not for Jpod and this community I do not think I would have done that.
And you know what is even worse. One of the company’s I look after is a Japanese company, now even though the people that work there are all British, every now and then the Japanese manager or account manager, etc., will pay a visit. I spoke to one of the chaps for quite a while (just general chit-chat) and not once did I speak Japanese….how angry am I at myself.

Anyway Oyasuminasai Nathan-san

O-genki de
Steve

“また明日ね”

I assume this is “mata ashita ne”? see you tomorrow?
I just noticed the kanji for tomorrow is “bright day”? I think that kanji is bright). can someone break this down for me a little? XD

i think mata = again
ashite = tomorrow

mata ashita ne = see you again tomorrow

Thank You Japanese pod for elaborating on the Suru verb! that helped clear my confusion on its usage. Hope you can include various forms of suru in the next lesson.

Kono “site” ga Saiko desu!!!

jp-san, I was more asking about the kanji “bright day”, I was just curious whether this was the normal way of saying tomorrow or a special way

Hi Nathan,

about the answers, u said they are the same, but I noticed a difference in particles:

What are you doing? / I am studying Japanese.
何をしていますか。／日本語の勉強をしています。
-the answer above uses “no”

What are you studying? / I am studying Japanese.
何を勉強していますか。／日本語を勉強しています。
-the answer above uses particle wo “o”

please enlighten me.

domou arigatou gozaimasu!

Hi,
I’m new to the podcast and have only been enjoying it for a week now. I must say that by far, this has been the most helpful learning tool I have found yet for learning to speak Japanese. I’ve been in Japan now (Chiba) longer then I care to admit, and have found learning very, very difficult. My listening comprehension is improving, but my speaking ability is still at the basic level.

I’m a 42 year old male, and I’m afraid getting these neurons and synapses re-arranged in a manner to be able to construct Japanese sentences in my head is taking a herculean effort. Has anyone else experienced this? My vocabulary is decent, and my listening comprehension is improving, but speaking is still not coming yet…

Anyway, thanks for producing such a useful podcast… You guys are now tops on my iPod playlist and get played on the drive in to the office and home from work!

Kerry

PS… one little question… your opening tag line says:
Ohayo Tokyo, Konbanwa New York, Konnichiwa London. However, the timing doesn’t work out like that.

When it is 6am in Tokyo it is is 4pm in New York and 9PM in London… Shouldn’t it say instead “konichiwa NY, Konbanwan London?

Vicky-san, some terms for you!
テニスボール tenisu booru - tennis ball
テニス試合｛しあい｝tenisu shiai - tennis match
テニスのプロ tenisu no puro - tennis pro Is this you?
テニスの天才 tenisu no tensai - tennis genius, natural
テニスラケット tenisu raketto - tennis racket
テニスの試合に勝つ tenisu no shiai ni katsu - to win the tennis match
テニスに最適｛さいてき｝の日 tenisu ni saiteki no hi - great day for tennis!

Have a good one!

Kerry-san, welcome to JapanesePod101.com! Thanks for posting, and please keep the participation coming! Yes, our opening. Rock and a hard place, as O-hayou Tokyo just sounds too good! Great to have you, and looking forward to hearing from you often!

Nathan-san, you are an expert!

In this lesson, Peter said:
なつこ、あなたのserveですよ。

However, when Natsuko explained the term “serve” in japanese, she said サアブ, I checked the dictionary, there is no such word. The word serve is spelt as サーブ.

I just want to ask you guys, is “serve” spelt as サアブ or サーブ.

hi.
just one question…when kaze answer to the telephone he says “Moshi moshi, kaze desu kedo”.
This “kedo” is giving me trouble. So far we’ve seen it can be used as “but” and to soften requests..but why is it used now to say who you are at the phone?

thanks if anyone can help!:???:

I’d like to know what the “kedo” is for as well. I always hear the word “kedo” used to mean something other than “but.”

I love this site!
You guys are great!!
I had been looking for a site to help me with my Japanese (which, btw, was very bad at the time ) When I found your site it was like my savior Now to practice my Japanese, I use it on my mom
All that happens is that she gets annoyed though!

, wathashi wa nihongo ga daisuki desu.,ogenki de, sayo mahesha