Mina-san,

Hope all had a good weekend, and start off a good week with this great edition of survival phrases

Yoroshiku onegai shimasu!

Michael-san,

The special hello is only done in the beginner lessons, but I’ll say a special hello to you!

Lizzie will be soooooo disapointed she missed Yoshi!

Great gift giving phrases. We should all now rush over to Takase-sans house with cheesecake to try them out.

Is Yoshi-san’s interest in traditional or modern Japanese architecture? I had a very interesting conversation about the construction of japanese temples when in Kyoto. Something about ‘frogs legs’, (kaeru ashi) I think, which was how the vertical posts joined the horizontal members to provide a degree of bracing, whilst still allowing enough movement to allow the temple to survive earthquakes. So I now have something to ‘Ask Yoshi’

(Bother, I scoffed all the cheesecake)

Liz21さん、
　　　Shoes are toes toward the door. Ready for a quick escape.
John

Michael-san,
Oishii deshou ka ne?

Yoshi Yoshi Yoshi…blah blah blah…

How many times do I have to remind you Lizさん that you’re married.

Daniel Beck,
My husband and I will welcome Yoshi to our home.

Choosing that all important welcoming speech

How about:

家賃、ただいま払わせていただきます。

Hi Mina-san!

お早うございます！Good morning!

Alan-san,

It’s really interesting! The frog legs. There are so much we can learn from the past. It’s amazing to think about how smart people were in the past. Now I’m surrounded by all the technology but how much do I know? Things used to be so simple but very sharp.

Liz-san,

I would love to come visit you and your husband someday. I’ve only seen the picutres of Frank Lloyd Wright’s architectures. They were so original. I remember the picture of the stairs that lead to water because it was so impressive.

And about taking off your shoes, you would like to take them off with your toes pointing toward inside the house first, then you get up, turn and kneel down to turn the shoes around, so that you don’t show your bottom to the host directly. You can also put them aside so that your shoes are not in anyone’s way. But this is a very polite way. I also heard you might want to take your shoes off, toe pointing inside the house and leave them just like that in some places because fixing your shoes pointing out could mean you don’t want to stay there so long. I think it’s case by case. If you feel not safe there, you might want to escape without putting your shoes on anyways.

Jason-san,

I like your speech!

*magnificent

Liz-san,

Thanks for the comment!

Katie-san,

I have a good story about socks situation. I went to my really good friend’s mom’s funeral when I was in high school. I was really sad and crying, and of course it was a Japanese style funeral, so it was held inside the building and I had to take my shoes off. I was wearing black school uniform and white socks. (So it was obvious because of the color contrast) Anyways, my socks had some holes and you could see my heel and toes. It was really embarrassing and awkward. So you want to make sure unless you don’t care, or I think no socks is just fine, maybe even better in situations like mine. You just want to wash your feet once in a while!

Katie-san,
Hahahaha!

@Rene
Yes that’s it

Hugo-san,

Thanks! and I like The Rock!

Patrick-san,

Yes, even when you exchange business cards for instanse, you should use both hands to be polite, giving and recieving. And I think it’s ture that all the gifts are wrapped in papers most of the time. But of course there are exceptions, too. You don’t have to wrap things in casual situations but isn’t it nice to recieve something wrapped nicely even for a small gift? It’s like a little surprise when you open it. And useally, if you buy things from a store they can wrap them for you if you told them it’s a gift, well most of the time. It’s just like other countries I think. And we do pretty good job wrapping over here because we are all trained in falling papers since we were kids!

Oi~! I’m new here. This was the first audio lesson-thing that I listened to. You guys are good teachers. I just wish you’d slow it down more on the important vocabulary words(Because I’m writting them down.).

Anyways, thanks!

~~Zero~~