Learn whether you should use 'o-genki' or 'genki'
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| Hi everybody! Hiroko here. Welcome to Absolute Beginner Questions Answered by Hiroko, where I’ll answer some of *your* most common Japanese questions. |
| The question for this lesson is… What's the difference between O-GENKI and GENKI? |
| When you ask “how have you been?” to someone you haven’t seen for a while, you can use “o-genki desu ka”, “genki desu ka” and just “genki?”. |
| The “o” is an honorific prefix and is used for other people only. “O-genki desu ka” is the most polite expression of these three and is used to people you don’t know well or people in higher positions. |
| “genki desu ka” is more polite than ”genki?” and is used by people in higher positions to people in lower positions. For example, teachers to students and superiors to subordinates. |
| “genki?” is the most casual and is used among friends. |
| When you are answering these questions, you should not use ‘o’, even though the question is “o-genki desu ka”. The reason is that you should not use a respectful expression to refer to yourself. When you are answering this kind of question, please say ‘hai, genki desu.’ |
| I hope this makes sense to you and you’re able to use "o-genki” and “genki” correctly from now on! |
| Do you have any more questions? Leave them in the comments below and I’ll try to answer them! |
| またね！ |
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