Learn how to extend invitations and how not to answer them when speaking with a potential mother-in-law
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| INTRODUCTION |
| Peter: Peter here. |
| Naomi: Second Chance to Make a First Impression. |
| Peter: Well in today’s conversation Miu and Haruya are going back to the house. |
| Naomi: Right. |
| Peter: Well things didn’t go that well right. |
| Naomi: No. |
| Peter: Disaster. |
| Naomi: Yeah. |
| Peter: 最悪でした。 (Saiakudeshita.) It was terrible. How do you say, in English we have a train wreck? It was just an utter disaster. Do you have a word for that in Japanese? |
| Naomi: I can’t think of any word other than 最悪 (Saiaku) right now. |
| Peter: Yeah well it was, it was bad. So now he is coming back and today is what day? |
| Naomi: 今日は28日、土曜日です。 (Kyō wa 28-nichi, doyōbidesu.) It’s the 28th. |
| Peter: Okay and that date is significant for...well, a reason you will find out I think in a couple of lessons right? |
| Naomi: Uh-hum! |
| Peter: So in today’s conversation, Miu and Haruya came back home. They are now in the living room with Miu’s mother. |
| Naomi: Right. |
| Peter: In this conversation, Haruya and Miu’s mother are talking. |
| Naomi: そうです。 (Sōdesu.) |
| Peter: What’s the grammar point? |
| Naomi: ませんか。 (Masen ka.) Verb plus ませんか (Masen ka) for example, 歩きませんか (Arukimasen ka) |
| Peter: Shall we take a walk. So again another way of inviting. We are also going to go over want to. The auxiliary adjective たい (Tai) talking about want to do something. |
| Naomi: そうですね。水が飲みたい。 (Sōdesu ne. Mizu ga nomitai.) |
| Peter: Want to drink water. Now the conversation is between Haruya and Kiri, Miu’s mother. So we are using what kind of Japanese? |
| Naomi: Polite Japanese. |
| Peter: Okay here we go. |
| DIALOGUE |
| 天道 きり (Tendō kiri):飲み物は何にしますか？ (Nomimono wa nani ni shimasu ka?) |
| 大空 晴夜 (Ōzora seiya):あ、、、な、何でもいいです。 (A..., na, nan de mo ii desu.) |
| 天道 きり (Tendō kiri):じゃ、紅茶を飲みませんか。 (Ja, kōcha o nomimasen ka.) |
| :お砂糖とミルクは？ (O-satō to miruku wa?) |
| 大空 晴夜 (Ōzora seiya):あ、、、、どちらでもいいです。 (A..., dochira demo ii desu.) |
| 天道 きり (Tendō kiri):（プッ）晴夜（はるや）さん...。飲みたいの？飲みたくないの？ ((pu) Haruya-san.... nomitai no? nomitakunai no? (warai)) |
| 大空 晴夜 (Ōzora seiya):あ、す、す、すみません。じゃ、水を下さい。水が飲みたいです。 (A, su, su, sumimasen. Ja, mizu o kudasai. Mizu ga nomitai desu.) |
| （ゴクゴクゴク プファッ） ((gokugokugoku pufatsu)) |
| 大空 晴夜 (Ōzora seiya):あ、手伝いましょうか。・・・あ、お刺身ですか。 (A, tetsudaimashō ka.... A, o-sashimi desu ka.) |
| 天道 きり (Tendō kiri):そう、ピラニアのえさ。 (Sō, pirania no esa.) |
| Naomi: もう一度お願いします。ゆっくりお願いします。 (Mōichido onegaishimasu. Yukkuri onegaishimasu.) |
| 天道 きり (Tendō kiri):飲み物は何にしますか？ (Nomimono wa nani ni shimasu ka?) |
| 大空 晴夜 (Ōzora seiya):あ、、、な、何でもいいです。 A..., na, nan de mo ii desu. |
| 天道 きり (Tendō kiri):じゃ、紅茶を飲みませんか。 (Ja, kōcha o nomimasen ka.) |
| :お砂糖とミルクは？ (O-satō to miruku wa?) |
| 大空 晴夜 (Ōzora seiya):あ、、、、どちらでもいいです。 (A..., dochira demo ii desu.) |
| 天道 きり (Tendō kiri):（プッ）晴夜（はるや）さん...。飲みたいの？飲みたくないの？ ((pu) Haruya-san.... nomitai no? nomitakunai no? (warai)) |
| 大空 晴夜 (Ōzora seiya):あ、す、す、すみません。じゃ、水を下さい。水が飲みたいです。 (A, su, su, sumimasen. Ja, mizu o kudasai. Mizu ga nomitai desu.) |
| （ゴクゴクゴク プファッ） ((gokugokugoku pufatsu)) |
| 大空 晴夜 (Ōzora seiya):あ、手伝いましょうか。・・・あ、お刺身ですか。 (A, tetsudaimashō ka.... A, o-sashimi desu ka.) |
| 天道 きり (Tendō kiri):そう、ピラニアのえさ。 (Sō, pirania no esa.) |
| Naomi: 今度は英語を入ります。 (Kondo wa eigo o hairimasu.) |
| 天道 きり (Tendō kiri):飲み物は何にしますか？ (Nomimono wa nani ni shimasu ka?) |
| Kiri Tendo:What do you want to drink? |
| 大空 晴夜 (Ōzora seiya):あ、、、な、何でもいいです。 A..., na, nan de mo ii desu. |
| Haruya Oozora: Oh, anything’s fine. |
| 天道 きり (Tendō kiri):じゃ、紅茶を飲みませんか。お砂糖とミルクは？ (Ja, kōcha o nomimasen ka. Oshatō to miruku wa?) |
| Kiri Tendo: Ok, so how does tea sound? Do you need sugar and milk? |
| 大空 晴夜 (Ōzora seiya):あ、、、、どちらでもいいです。 (A..., dochira demo ii desu.) |
| Haruya Oozora: Um, either way is fine. |
| 天道 きり (Tendō kiri):（プッ）晴夜（はるや）さん...。飲みたいの？飲みたくないの？ ((pu) Haruya-san.... nomitai no? nomitakunai no? (warai)) |
| Kiri Tendo:(giggle) Um, Haruya…Do you want to drink or not? (laughs) |
| 大空 晴夜 (Ōzora seiya):あ、す、す、すみません。じゃ、水を下さい。水が飲みたいです。 (A, su, su, sumimasen. Ja, mizu o kudasai. Mizu ga nomitai desu.) |
| Haruya Oozora:Oh, I’m sorry. Ok, water please. I want to drink water. |
| 大空 晴夜 (Ōzora seiya):あ、手伝いましょうか。・・・あ、お刺身ですか。 (A, tetsudaimashō ka.... A, o-sashimi desu ka.) |
| Haruya Oozora:Oh, need some help? Oh, is that sashimi? |
| 天道 きり (Tendō kiri):そう、ピラニアのえさ。 (Sō, pirania no esa.) |
| Kiri Tendo:Yeah, some chum for the piranhas. |
| POST CONVERSATION BANTER |
| Peter: Naomi Sensei |
| Naomi: はい。 (Hai.) |
| Peter: 晴夜さんのこと、どう思いますか。 (Seiya-san no koto, dōomoimasuka.) What do you think of Haruya? |
| Naomi: He is pretty nervous again. ドキドキですね～。 (Dokidokidesu ne ~.) |
| Peter: Yeah. |
| Naomi: He doesn’t listen to the mother very well like when the mother asked if you want sugar or cream in his tea, he said どちらでもいいです (Dochira demo īdesu). “I don’t care.” |
| Peter: Right? もし、私がお母さんだったら、 (Moshi, watashi ga okāsandattara,) if I am the mother, 怒っています (Okotte imasu) I would be angry. |
| Naomi: But Kiri was nice enough to laugh about it. |
| Peter: Right. He was so あいまい (Aimai) like vague. |
| Naomi: そう、ですね。 (Sō,desu ne.) Yeah first he said 何でもいいです。 (Nani demo īdesu.) |
| Peter: Anything is okay. It was like, would you like something to drink? Umm any way, anything is okay. |
| Naomi: Would you like sugar or cream? |
| Peter: Ah…either one is okay. |
| Naomi: はははは。ちょっとね。ドキドキですからね。 (Wa wa wa wa. Chotto ne. Dokidokidesukara ne.) |
| Peter: Yeah but there are different ways of dealing with it. The second chance doesn’t look like it’s going very well. じゃあ、がんばって、晴夜。 (Jā, ganbatte, seiya.) Good luck Haruya. Okay let’s take a look at some of the vocab. |
| VOCAB LIST |
| Peter: First word. |
| Naomi: 飲み物 (nomimono) |
| Peter: Drink, beverage. |
| Naomi: のみもの、飲み物 (Nomi mo no, nomimono) |
| Peter: Next. |
| Naomi: 紅茶 (kōcha) |
| Peter: English tea. |
| Naomi: こうちゃ、紅茶 (Ko ucha, kōcha) |
| Peter: Next. |
| Naomi: 何でも (nan demo) |
| Peter: Everything, anything. |
| Naomi: なんでも、何でも (Nan demo, nandemo) |
| Peter: Next |
| Naomi: 砂糖 (satō) |
| Peter: Sugar. |
| Naomi: さとう、砂糖 (Satō, satō) |
| Peter: Next |
| Naomi: ミルク (Miruku) |
| Peter: Milk, cream. |
| Naomi: ミルク、ミルク (Miruku, miruku) |
| Peter: Next. |
| Naomi: 水 (mizu) |
| Peter: Water. |
| Naomi: みず、水 (Mizu, mizu) |
| Peter: Next. |
| Naomi: 手伝う (tetsudau) |
| Peter: To help, assist. |
| Naomi: 手伝う、手伝う (Tetsudau, tetsudau) |
| Peter: Next |
| Naomi: 刺身 (Sashimi) |
| Peter: Sliced raw fish. |
| Naomi: さしみ、刺身 (Sa shimi, sashimi) |
| Peter: Next |
| Naomi: ピラニア (pirania) |
| Peter: Piranha. |
| Naomi: ピラニア、ピラニア (Pirania, pirania) |
| Peter: Next. |
| Naomi: えさ (esa) |
| Peter: Feed, bait. |
| Naomi: えさ、えさ (Esa, esa) |
| VOCAB AND PHRASE USAGE |
| Peter: All right Naomi Sensei, let’s take a closer look at some of the phrases and vocabulary in this lesson. There is some really good stuff in here. Three – a couple of points I think she wanted to talk about because I use them regularly. |
| Naomi: 何ですか。 (Nanidesu ka.) |
| Peter: This is good. You will have to wait and see. What do we have first? |
| Naomi: First I’d like to see the phrase 飲み物は、何にしますか。 (Nomi mo no wa, nani ni shimasu ka.) |
| Peter: What would you like to drink? Now this is a bit tricky because if you translate it literally it’s what beverage do you want to do? |
| Naomi: Do you want to do what? |
| Peter: Actually it’s kind of like an expression we’d use. Let’s or let’s do Italian. |
| Naomi: あ～、本当？ (A ~, hontō?) Oh really. So you have the same kind of expression in English. |
| Peter: Kind of but it’s not used to the degree it is in Japanese. In Japanese, everything is ～にする。 (~ Ni suru.) |
| Naomi: ん～、そうですね。 (N ~, sōdesune.) Let’s take a look at the word 飲み物 (Nomimono) first. |
| Peter: Now this is a compound right? |
| Naomi: はい。 (Hai.) |
| Peter: We have a verb in its masu stem plus |
| Naomi: もの (Mono) |
| Peter: So 飲み物 (Nomimono) comes from the verb to drink which is |
| Naomi: 飲む (Nomu) |
| Peter: And its masu stem. |
| Naomi: 飲み (Nomi) |
| Peter: Plus |
| Naomi: 物 (Mono) |
| Peter: 飲み物。 (Nomimono.) There are a couple of other compounds that use this structure too. They are |
| Naomi: 食べ物 (Tabemono) |
| Peter: Food. |
| Naomi: 着物 (Kimono) |
| Peter: Clothes but usually this is associated with the nice kimono. |
| Naomi: Like a Japanese style clothes right? |
| Peter: Yeah next. |
| Naomi: 乗り物 (Norimono) |
| Peter: A vehicle, train, bus, ship, plane. Next we have |
| Naomi: にします (Ni shimasu) |
| Peter: To do but in the case when it’s preceded by a noun, noun plus にする (Ni suru) it means to get that. For example |
| Naomi: 私はラーメンにする。ピーターは？ (Watashi wa rāmen ni suru. Pītā wa?) |
| Peter: ぎょうざにする。 (Gyōza ni suru.) |
| Naomi: ぎょうざだけ？ (Gyo u zadake?) |
| Peter: だけです。 (Dakedesu.) So let’s just go back to that conversation. First we had |
| Naomi: 私は、ラーメンにする。 (Watashi wa, rāmen ni suru.) |
| Peter: I will get Ramen. |
| Naomi: ピーターは？ (Pītā wa?) |
| Peter: Peter and you, literally and Peter. I said, I will have ぎょうざ (Gyo u za) which is fried. Usually it’s kind of associated with Fried Dumplings. In Japan, it’s – they are fried. |
| Naomi: Yeah. Stir fried. |
| Peter: Yeah stir fried dumplings. Then Naomi said |
| Naomi: ぎょうざだけ？ (Gyo u zadake?) |
| Peter: Just fried dumplings and I said, yes just that. So again, especially when you go to eat, 何にする (Nani ni suru) casual 何にしますか (Nani ni shimasu ka) what you are going to get. |
| Naomi: Yeah or どこにする (Doko ni suru) where shall we go. |
| Peter: Yeah so usually before you go to the restaurant, どこにしますか、どこにする (Doko ni shimasu ka, dokoni suru) or as in the case of today’s grammar point. |
| Naomi: イタリアンにしませんか。 (Itarian ni shimasen ka.) |
| Peter: Shall we have Italian. |
| Naomi: Grammar point. |
| Peter: So it could be like this. You know Naomi and I are talking. Naomi sensei どこにしますか。(Doko ni shimasu ka.) where shall we go? |
| Naomi: ん～。イタリアンにしませんか。 (N ~. Itarian ni shimasen ka.) |
| Peter: Shall we have Italian? ああ、いいですね。私は、パスタにする。 (Ā, īdesu ne. Watashi wa, pasuta ni suru.) I am going to get pasta. え、なおみ先生は？ (E, Naomi sensei wa?) |
| Naomi: ピザにする。 (Piza ni suru.) |
| Peter: She is going to get pizza. So you could see the kind of development. Now, before we go to today’s grammar point which we just touched on, I wanna go over two points here. In the conversation, he says 「じゃあ、水をください。」. (`Jā, mizu o kudasai.') |
| Naomi: はい。 (Hai.) |
| Peter: Should he have used お水 (O mizu) to make it a little more polite? |
| Naomi: そうですね。 (Sōdesu ne.) Since he’s talking to his girlfriend’s mother, yeah, I think he should have put お (O) in front of it. |
| Peter: It struck me a little rude. |
| Naomi: It’s not that bad, but, yeah, I’d say, it’d be better. |
| Peter: お水。 (O mizu.) And, recently, especially in restaurants, there’s another word for water, or 水 (Mizu). That is? |
| Naomi: おひや。 (O hiya.) |
| Peter: おひや (O hiya) which is お (O) followed by the character for “cold”. |
| Naomi: ん～、でもね、 (N ~, demo ne,) I personally never use it. It’s more like (ancient time female) language thing. I think. |
| Peter: But usually just at restaurants; like I never say that to my friends. So, if you hear that word, they’re talking about water. And finally my favourite word is えさ (Esa) which is a “feed” as in like “pet feed” or “feed for...some kind of pet”. |
| Naomi: そうですね。 (Sōdesu ne.) Food for pet. Food for animals. |
| Peter: Okay. Let’s take a look at today’s grammar point. |
Lesson focus |
|---|
| Peter: Today’s grammar point is, Naomi Sensei. |
| Naomi: ませんか。 (Masen ka.) |
| Peter: Verb plus ませんか (Masen ka) and this phrase is used to extend an invitation. Now, what’s interesting in the previous lesson, we also went over, we reviewed a pattern that did the same as I think. ましょうか (Mashou ka) is also extending an invitation. However, with ましょうか, (Mashou ka,) inside of that expression is a little more that you would prefer to do that, where ませんか (Masen ka) leaves a little more room for negotiation. So let’s have an example. |
| Naomi: 紅茶を飲みませんか。 (Kōcha o nomimasen ka.) |
| Peter: Would you like to have tea or English tea. Again here the subject is omitted because the mother was talking to Haruya. So there was no need to say you or in English, it |
| would be, would you like to have some tea but in Japanese, really the literal translation is, want to drink tea. There is no subject in there, but of course it’s implied. So, let’s just go through the sentence. First, we have the object which is |
| Naomi: 紅茶 (Kōcha) |
| Peter: Marked by the object marking particle. |
| Naomi: を (O) |
| Peter: Followed by |
| Naomi: 飲みません (Nomimasen) |
| Peter: The negative present polite form of |
| Naomi: 飲む (Nomu) |
| Peter: To drink. So 飲む (Nomu) becomes |
| Naomi: 飲みません (Nomimasen) |
| Peter: This is followed by |
| Naomi: か (Ka) |
| Peter: Sentence ending particle indicating a question. So 紅茶を飲みませんか。 (Kōcha o nomimasen ka.) |
| Naomi: はい。 (Hai.) |
| Peter: Would you like to have tea? |
| Naomi: Yeah and that could be a good pick up line, too. |
| Peter: Naomi Sensei, now my Japanese teacher also told me this. I have never.. |
| Naomi: Yes. |
| Peter: You know on a street a guy running after a girl ねえねえねえ、紅茶を飲みませんか。 (Nē nē nē, kōcha o nomimasen ka.) |
| Naomi: 私、おじいさんにこれ言われたことあります。 (Watashi, ojīsan ni kore iwa reta koto arimasu.) |
| Peter: So wait! So an old guy actually said this to you? |
| Naomi: Yeah. |
| Peter: Did it work for him? |
| Naomi: No. |
| Peter: Yeah so it’s not going to work for you too. What did he say to you? |
| Naomi: すみません、お茶を飲みませんか。 (Sumimasen, ocha o nomimasen ka.) |
| Peter: Yeah that’s just not going to work. Excuse me, would you like to have some tea? |
| Naomi: そうですね。 (Sōdesu ne.) |
| Peter: Yes, but this is a very, very polite way and of course, it doesn’t have to just be a pick up line. Here it’s just a very polite way for the mother to ask Haruya, if you would like something to drink. Interesting here there are several aspects which are pretty interesting. Is it a little formal now? |
| Naomi: あ～、そうですね。 (A ~, sōdesune.) |
| Peter: So the mother is being polite which is good but it’s also here it’s kind of like the distance is still there between them. So yeah he is not doing well. |
| Naomi: そうかな。 (Sō ka na.) I think he is trying very hard because he offers to help her right? 手伝いましょうか。 (Tetsudaimashou ka.) |
| Peter: Shall I give you a hand which is a really great expression. This is a really good one. |
| Naomi: I think this phrase is really handy. |
| Peter: Also you use お手伝いすることありますか。 (Otetsudai suru koto arimasu ka.) |
| Naomi: Is there anything I can help? That’s a bit complicated grammar, right? I recommend 手伝いましょうか。 (Tetsudaimashou ka.) |
| Peter: If you want to know the expression I said kind of in detail, you can stop by and leave a comment. I actually prefer this one. It makes me look much better in the eyes of a parent. そう思わないですか。 (Sō omowanaidesu ka.) Don’t you think so? |
| Naomi: かもね。 (Kamo ne.) |
Outro |
| Peter: That is going to do for today. |
| Naomi: じゃ、また。 (Ja, mata.) |
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