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Practice

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community.japanese
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Re: Practice

Postby community.japanese » September 26th, 2013 6:45 am

rupenpatel702727-san, マイケルsan, くろくまsan,
kon'nichiwa!
Thank you very much for great explanations, マイケルさん&くろくまさん!
You make my work super easy :mrgreen: (lucky me!)

rupenpatel702727-san, it seems you're far better than Google Translate and maybe using it would
make you confuse. Your sentences (私はこえがしずかです & 私はともだちのうちにとまります)
are both correct, but 私はしずかなこえをもちます is not correct.
This sentence is a literal conversion from English and that's basically how Google Translate (or any
other auto translation softwares) works. You have better understanding about how Japanese works :wink:
I think, I'd probably say 私は、こえがちいさいです。in more natural way.
We often say こえがちいさい or こえがおおきい to refer to quite or loud voice. :D

As to とまります vs とまっています, both くろくまsan and マイケルsan explained very correctly and
I believe my job here is done :mrgreen: :lol:

Natsuko (奈津子),
Team JapanesePod101.com

rupenpatel702727
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Re: Practice

Postby rupenpatel702727 » September 26th, 2013 7:18 am

I haven't actually studied the te-form for verbs yet (i have just done the lesson for adjectives N3 E15). I'm quite the beginner as you can tell :D

So I would need to use this te form (+imasu) to say I stay at someones house? I guess when I learn that form, it'll become easier.

But, I have learnt the formal past tense!

私はともだちのうちにとまりました

watashi wa tomodachi no uchi ni tomarimashita

I think that's right

Many thanks for helping me. I'll be sure to ask more questions in the future!

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mmmason8967
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Re: Practice

Postby mmmason8967 » September 26th, 2013 5:22 pm

rupenpatel702727 wrote:So I would need to use this te form (+imasu) to say I stay at someones house? I guess when I learn that form, it'll become easier.

You use it during the time you're staying at someone's house. It's used for the current, ongoing situation. If you stay at a hotel, ホテルにとまっていますこ (the ~te form plus imasu) is what you'd say between the time you check in and the time you check out. But you're right: once you learn about the ~te-form of verbs, the ~te imasu structure will seem much, much easier!

I think English can cause a bit of confusion because we say things like "Next week I'm going to Chicago and staying at a friend's house". We use the present tense (I'm staying) but in fact we're talking about the future. You have to think about what you mean before you try to say something in Japanese, which is the thing that machine translators such as Google Translate aren't very good at.

But, I have learnt the formal past tense!
私はともだちのうちにとまりました
watashi wa tomodachi no uchi ni tomarimashita
I think that's right

Me too! :wink:

マイケル

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Re: Practice

Postby community.japanese » September 27th, 2013 10:58 am

rupenpatel702727-san, マイケルsan,
the past tense sentence is perfect! :oiwai:

Thank you very much for a wonderful explanation, マイケルさん :kokoro:
You're right; English and Japanese often take different tenses to say the same thing.

Japanese "te imasu" mostly indicates the on-going event.
So, like Michael-san's explanation, unless you're already in the place you're staying at,
とまります would serve for your plan in the future or your routine. :wink:

Natsuko (奈津子),
Team JapanesePod101.com

rupenpatel702727
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Re: Practice

Postby rupenpatel702727 » September 29th, 2013 2:33 pm

Hey guys,

I was thinking about how you would say you like something in Japanese.

It's very easy to say for example: 私は魚が好きです

But what if you wanted to say that you're a person that likes fish?

Could you say:

魚が好きな人です
(sakana ga suki na hito)

(a person that likes fish)

I think this may be ok, because i think the clause 魚がすき is modifying hito to talk about what is liked. I'm not sure, since I haven't covered this yet.

Could we then say, ボブは魚が好きじゃなかった人
(Bobu wa sakana ga suki ja nakatta hito)

(Bob is a person that didn't like the fish)

Is this correct?
:D
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mewes6190
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Re: Practice

Postby mewes6190 » September 30th, 2013 9:58 am

Rubenpatel-san,
こんにちは。

rupenpatel702727 wrote:Could we then say, ボブは魚が好きじゃなかった人
(Bobu wa sakana ga suki ja nakatta hito)

(Bob is a person that didn't like the fish)

Is this correct?
:D
ルペン


Hmm, I think it's wrong, but it's hard to say why. For one, the tempi are unclear. From my gut, I would say that Bob IS a guy who DID NOT like the fish. So it should be: ボブは魚が好きじゃなかった人です。 in the first place.

But then I have a problem with your english sentence too. "Bob is a person that didn't like the fish" "that" is a specific pronoun, while "a" is a non-specific pronoun. It should be "Bob is the one who didn't like the fish" or "Bob is a person which didn't like the fish"

But in these sentences, again, the japanese version would be much more abbridged,because much is known. So, the first one would be more like ボブさんは魚が好きじゃなかった。"Bob didn't like the fish".
The second, more un-specific one, would be more ボブさん、魚が嫌いです。or ボブさん、魚が嫌いな人です。
The last one would be untypical for japanese, I think, because it's known that ボブさん is a person, so it would be unneccessary to repeat that he's a person. Japanese usually leaves out such information as far as I know.
Also untypical, I think, is the translation of "person who didn't like" by 好きじゃなかった。 Since the Japanese has an own verb for it, I would think it much more natural, to say 嫌いだ or 嫌いでした.

Those are my thoughts about it... I hope I didn't get anything wrong... o.O

Best
Kurokuma

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Re: Practice

Postby community.japanese » October 1st, 2013 6:38 am

ルペンさん、くろくまさん、
very interesting! Thank you for a great insight, くろくまsan! :D

Actually, [person] は、魚が好きな人です。 kind of sentence is not very natural in Japanese.
However, interesting thing is that this usage of ~人 is controversial "recent young people's language" for
some time. Old people (including :mrgreen: :mrgreen: ) usually don't like this expression, like when
a young girl says 私って、~な人だから、・・・・
I personally think we should use rather 人間 than 人 in this case. In any way, it's not normal or
natural to describe ourselves as if we're "third person" (i.e. seeing ourselves from the distance).

One of the biggest and most typical aspect about Japanese is "point of view".
When we describe/say something, we have our points of view "inside" the main item (topic) of
the sentence. If we start a sentence with 私は, it's about "myself". That's the strongest and most definite
word to keep the focus (= point of view) in 私 and it can't be removed from there.

This is about what kind of language you want to learn and use.
If you want to learn a real correct natual language, you might need to understand how that language works
and what's the natural way in that language. If you anyway want to say the way you want,
as long as it's grammatically correct, you can say that.

That being said, both
魚が嫌いな人です。
and
ボブは魚が好きじゃなかった人です。
are "grammatically" correct. We just don't say those things in those way.
Now focusing on the second sentence, Kurokuma-san's insight was very interesting and I agree.
There're possibilities to say;
ボブは、魚が好きじゃない人です。
ボブは、魚が好きじゃない人でした。
ボブは、魚が好きな人じゃありませんでした。
Second version is actually rather natural and would be used in certain occasions.
It sounds like Bob is a dead person and you're talking about him remembering that he didn't like fish.
Still, I'd probably say ボブは、魚が好きではありませんでした(OR好きじゃありませんでした)。
The third one is the most natural way, though.

Natsuko (奈津子),
Team JapanesePod101.com

rupenpatel702727
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Re: Practice

Postby rupenpatel702727 » October 1st, 2013 9:30 am

Thanks alot :D

I learnt about saiko today, which means the best or most extreme.

The pdf gives: このコーヒーは最高においしい

(Kono kōhī wa saikōni oishii.)-This coffee is the most delicious.

That sentence, I can understand, but can we use "saiko ni" to talk about other things?

I'm not sure what we can use saiko ni with.

e.g. is この女性の声は最高に静かです
(Kono josei no koe wa saikō ni shizukadesu)

This woman has the quietest voice

What can and can't we use saiko with?

ありがとうございます
ルペン

mmmason8967
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Re: Practice

Postby mmmason8967 » October 1st, 2013 12:45 pm

ルペンさん
That's another good question! I'm not really sure of the answer but I tend to think that 最高 means the maximum or the extreme in an upward direction, so it would only work for the upper extreme, not the lower one. For example, I think 最高 works for maximum temperature but not for minimum temperature, for most expensive but not for cheapest, or for best but not for worst.

The quietest voice seems to me to be the voice with the minimum volume or minimum loudness, so I don't think that 最高 will work. But it's just my impression--I don't know for sure.

Your sample sentence makes me ask a question. The sentence is 「女性の声は最高に静かです」 and I wonder if you can use 最高に with 静かです. 最高に is an adverb; can you use an adverb with a na-adjective? It seems OK to me to use an adverb with an i-adjective because they're very verb-like, but na-adjectives are more noun-like so I'm not sure an adverb would work (even if you also use です).

マイケル

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Re: Practice

Postby community.japanese » October 2nd, 2013 7:43 am

ルペンさん、マイケルさん、
it's indeed a good question! :D

mmmason8967 wrote:I'm not really sure of the answer but I tend to think that 最高 means the maximum or the extreme in an upward direction, so it would only work for the upper extreme, not the lower one. For example, I think 最高 works for maximum temperature but not for minimum temperature, for most expensive but not for cheapest, or for best but not for worst.

Your analysis is spot-on really. The kanji for "saiko" does mean "most/extreme" and "high" (最 and 高).
As a recent usage of 最高, we tend to add this 最高に even to bad things, but I believe that's a misuse.
(for example, 最高に気持ち悪い meaning the most "gross"...)

Regarding "quietest voice", we might use different expression, like
この女性の声ほど静かな声を聞いたことがありません。
この女性は本当に声が静かです。
We also use the expression 声が小さい very often. And again, young people today might say 最高に声が小さい
but I believe this could be "recent corrupt Japanese".


Natsuko (奈津子),
Team JapanesePod101.com

rupenpatel702727
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Re: Practice

Postby rupenpatel702727 » October 19th, 2013 12:06 pm

I've made some sentences! They're pretty much at the boundary of what I can do as an absolute beginner. Could someone please take a look and see where I've gone wrong. I've translated them into english so its clear what I meant to say.

Also when replying could you keep the Kanji to a minimum? Unfortunately my grasp on kanji is not yet good enough to keep up with you guys (yet). :D

私はこえが小さいです

(I have a quiet voice)

私のさいふをおとしました

(I dropped my wallet)

ごみばこにゴキブリがここのついます!

(There’s nine cockroaches in the bin!)

でもゴキブリはおいしくてじゆうなです!

(but cockroaches are tasty and free!)
obligatory weird sentence

私はえいごのえいががだいすきですでも日本ごのえいががきらいです。日本分かりません。であろうゴキブリのえいがはさいこうです!!

(I love English movies but I dislike Japanese ones. I don’t understand Japanese. I think cockroach films are the best!!)
here I struggled with the idea of contrastive wa and using ga to separate two sentences

このかいしゃはサイズが小さいですでもたくさんスタッフがいます。いつもくわえてこのかいしゃおきゃくさまじゃない。

(This company is tiny but it has so many staff. In addition, it’s usually doesn't have customers!)
Here i had no idea how to say "in addition" so i used a dictionary. I have no idea if its correct. I also struggled with "usually", in terms of sentence placement :shock:

スタッフじゃない。かれらはロボットです。

(They’re not staff. They’re robots.)

ありがとう!
ルペン

mmmason8967
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Re: Practice

Postby mmmason8967 » October 19th, 2013 7:12 pm

rupenpatel702727 wrote:私はえいごのえいががだいすきですでも日本ごのえいががきらいです。日本分かりません。であろうゴキブリのえいがはさいこうです!!

(I love English movies but I dislike Japanese ones. I don’t understand Japanese. I think cockroach films are the best!!)
here I struggled with the idea of contrastive wa and using ga to separate two sentences

Probably the easiest way is to start off with two separate sentences:-

いぬがすきです。 ⇒ I like dogs.
ねこがきらいです。 ⇒  I don't like cats.

To make a contrastive statement, the first step is to make sure you use は, not が:-

いぬすきです。 ⇒ I like dogs.
ねこきらいです。 ⇒  I don't like cats.

The next step is joining the two sentences together. There are two ways to say "but". One way uses でも and the other uses が. If we use でも it must come at the start of a sentence. For example:-

いぬすきです。でもねこきらいです。
I like dogs. But I don't like cats.

If we use が it will join the two sentences and make them into one. For example:-

いぬすきですが、ねこきらいです。
I like dogs but I don't like cats.

マイケル

mmmason8967
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Re: Practice

Postby mmmason8967 » October 19th, 2013 9:36 pm

ルペンさん wrote:日本分かりません。

I don’t understand Japanese.

It doesn't say "Japanese" but I'm pretty sure that's just a typo. :wink:

であろうゴキブリのえいがはさいこうです!!

(I think cockroach films are the best!!)

であろう is the volitional form of である, which is the literary or more formal version of です. I'm not really sure how you use it: I think it probably should come after the verb. But I think it's the wrong word anyway. であろう means something more like "I bet" or "it's likely" whereas you want to say "in my opinion".

The phrase you want is ~to omoimasu. You probably haven't come across it yet. It's pretty straightforward to use, but there's a small catch. The easy part is that you just say whatever is you want to say (e.g. ゴキブリのえいがはさいこうです) and add とおもいます to the end. The small catch is that what comes before とおもいます has to be in plain form. The plain form of です is だ so the end result is:-

ゴキブリのえいがさいこうだとおもいます。

Substituting kanji for the coloured words:-

ゴキブリの映画最高だといます。

マイケル

mmmason8967
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Re: Practice

Postby mmmason8967 » October 19th, 2013 10:14 pm

ルペンさん wrote:私はこえが小さいです

(I have a quiet voice)

私のさいふをおとしました

(I dropped my wallet)

ごみばこにゴキブリがここのついます!

(There’s nine cockroaches in the bin!)

They look correct to me, although technically the counter for cockroaches is hiki so I think it ought to be きゅうひき rather than ここのつ. I don't think ここのつ is wrong, though.

でもゴキブリはおいしくてじゆうなです!

(but cockroaches are tasty and free!)
obligatory weird sentence

じゆう is a na-adjective but you only include the na when it comes before the noun it's modifying. In this kind of "X wa Y desu" sentence where "Y" is a na-adjective, you don't include the na.

But I think じゆう means "free" as in "free speech" (i.e. freedom or liberty) whereas you probably meant "free" as in "free beer" (i.e. no cost). The word you want is むりょう, or 無料 in kanji, meaning "no charge".

マイケル

rupenpatel702727
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Re: Practice

Postby rupenpatel702727 » October 22nd, 2013 9:01 am

ありがとう!

Thank you for your help mason-san! :D

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