Mina-san,

Today’s location is お月様・おつきさま・otsukisama - hello to all of our listeners on the moon!

Yoroshiku onegai shimasu!

みんあさん、元気？

今日、ぼくはしつもんがあります。

In today’s dialogue, we have the word “yasashikute”. Well, I remember that the first reason for using “kute” in an adjective is to say other “i” adjectives in a row.

What I don’t remember is that if it can be added even though there are no other adjectives, just to make conversation informal.

I’ve seen this construction in other situations and there were no other adjectives to justify the use of “kute” and I think it was already covered in a previous lesson, but I don’t remember which one it was.

Something else I didn’t understand was the word “shiteta” in the sentence “mae no kare wa itsumo iraira shiteta kara ne”. I can understand it comes from the verb “suru”, right? But I don’t understand how it was conjugated.

And last is: in the sentence: “kare wa ikemen dakara motemote de”, I didn’t understand why particle “de” was added in the end of the sentence.

So, that’s it.

みんあさん、ごうも！

じゃあね　:???:

Joao san

The use of kute with an i adjective which is on its own is to imply that there are other ways that you could describe the thing you are talking about.

Here’s an explanation of the teta verb ending from http://japanese.about.com/library/weekly/aa121600b.htm
“~ teta” or “~ teita” is the past progressive. “~ teta” is more colloquial. It is used to describe past habitual action or past states of being. To make this form, attach “~ta” or “~ita” to “te form” of the verb.”

I think de at the end of the sentence refers to a ’cause of an effect’ so she is worried because he is popular. cause = popular, effect = worry.

I hope I helped im sure someone will have a more understandable explanation.

Harv-san.

どうも有り難うございます！

You really really helped me out a lot. Thank you.

I was reading the explanation on the site you indicated me and I remembered “teta” now. I think I didn’t pay much attention to that on the dialogue

It is used when “verb + te + iru” to indicate progressive. The point is that “i” from “iru” was dropped to make it informal.

This way we would have for eg. miteru (for “is watching” - instead of mite iru) or miteta (for “was watching” - instead of mite ita).

That’s it, right?

About particle “de”, it was really new for me, I didn’t know it could be used this way.

Now ’bout “kute”, it’s still a litlle confusing for me.

Anyway, thank you very much for your initiative in helping me out.

Stu-san, よろしくおねがいします。

I personally believe it’s better to start studying kanji right away. Otherwise you would have to start studying Japanese all over again after you’ve “finished it”!!!

Also, kanji can sometimes help you memoraze some new words. Peter-san gives lots of examples in the lessons and it’s been definitely useful for me.

Also, characters repeat, so once you’ve learned one you can learn where to squeeze them in in some other words.

Well, this is my opinion. Also, try to use kana as much as possible instead of rouma-ji and if planning to buy a dictionary, try one with kana entries, they are really helpful.

Cya all

Hi People!!! Peter Galante…..I have a quick question. On the kani close up would you happen to know where I can find the correct way to write the japanese characters? I would like to write them as I listen to it on my ipod. If you would point me to the right direction I would gladly appreciate this. Thank You!
Or if anyone knows anything about this….

Top to Bottom first and then left to Right…..

Stu-san

Using a kana based dictionary is very simple. All you need to know is hiragana and katakana. Also, the order of the words will follow Japanese alphabet, i.e. a, i, o, e, u, ka/ga, ki/gi, ku/gu, ke/ge, ko/go, ta/da, etc.

I have a Japanese-English/English-Japanese dictionary like this. Eg.: if you wanna know the meaning of the word “chair” you go to the English entry and you’ll find the translation いす. See, it’s not complicated at all.
Jesse-san

I have some books teaching how to start the strokes. It’s kinda hard to explain it without seeing the pics, but usually Japanese characters start from top to bottom / left to right. When one stroke transpasses all the others, this should be done last (like in the kanji for 車, this vertical one that crosses all the others is the last one done.

The character for 日 for eg. is made of 4 strokes. The first one is the one which starts on top horizontally and goes down vertically (this is considered ONE stroke - and I believe this is the only one that really surprises people in a first contact with kanjis), then comes the other vertical one and then the last two horizontal ones.

Also, when you have diagonal strokes, you start first with the one going right to left and then with the one going left to right (considering you strart writing from top to bottom). Eg. for the kanji 人　(try to see this kanji written in a different way, my computer writes it in a way that makes you think both strokes have the same size), but the big stroke (right to left) is the first and the short one (left to right) is the second.

Also there are some common strokes that are easy to memorize. And sometimes you should also pay attention to the radicals.

This book I have is called Nihongo no Kiso, from what I remember. I’m traveling right now and don’t have these books here with me, but when I come home I can give you more details about this. Or maybe someone knows some sites where you can find this.

Hope I could help a little.

Bye

Stu-san thanks for the help. yeah sure I would like to know the name of the books. I’m sure I can find them on the internet somewhere. I know what you mean about explaining how to write it without actually seeing it done. Thanks again!

sorry for the mistake Joao Paulo

Jesse san,

There are some great animations on the Web showing how to write the Kanji (even with brush!) My favorite is:

http://kanjialive.lib.uchicago.edu

More limited lists can be found at:

http://www.joyo96.org/Grade_1.html
http://www.joyo96.org/Grade_2.html

But then it take a long time to practice…

For those who asked about the book (Jesse…), it’s “Use Your Memory” by Tony Buzan. It’s a book about making your memory unbelievable amazing, and has a language section in it whichw was what i was referring to.

http://amazon.com/s/ref=nb_ss_gw/102-5045510-8928147?url=search-alias%3Daps&field-keywords=use+your+memory

Hope that helps

P.S., Joao Paulo: thanks for the help.

P.S. Peter Galante, the 1st of my messages was for you and your team! thanks

Jean-Michel-san

That Kanji Alive program is very impressive. It’s a pity it’s not standalone and not a web tool. You should post that link in the resources forum.

great podcast. I like gitaigo and giongo. The sound symbolism is so different from English. Hard to guess at meanings based on the sounds though I think.

I was thinking of working for JP101

神様、どうか私たちに力を与え賜え。。。

それで目が点になる。素っ頓狂。

The mp3 link is not working (404?)

thanks jpod101 for another great lesson! anyway, just wondering, it seems like there is an error in the answer for the 2nd (last) Content Question (in Learning Center) for this lesson. it asks “who is popular” in Japanese, but it says the answer is: 前の彼氏….isn’t the correct answer 新しい彼氏 ?