Dialogue

Vocabulary (Review)

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Lesson Transcript

INTRODUCTION
Eric: Hi everyone, and welcome back to JapanesePod101.com. This is Business Japanese for Beginners Season 1 Lesson 4 - Greeting Your Japanese Boss in the Morning. Eric here.
Natsuko: こんにちは。 なつこです。
Eric: In this lesson, you’ll learn how to greet your boss in the morning. The conversation takes place at an office.
Natsuko: It's between Linda and her boss, Mr. Takahashi.
Eric: The speakers have a boss-subordinate relationship, so Linda will be speaking to her boss using formal Japanese, and the boss will be using informal Japanese. Okay, let's listen to the conversation.

Lesson conversation

Linda: 課長、おはようございます。
Takahashi: あ、リンダ、おはよう。
Linda: 今日は、暑いですね。
Takahashi: 本当に、朝から、暑いね。
Eric: Listen to the conversation one time slowly.
Linda: 課長、おはようございます。
Takahashi: あ、リンダ、おはよう。
Linda: 今日は、暑いですね。
Takahashi: 本当に、朝から、暑いね。
Eric: Listen to the conversation with the English translation.
Linda: Good morning Sir.
Takahashi: Hi Linda. Good morning.
Linda: Isn’t it hot today?
Takahashi: Yes it is, it’s hot and still just the morning..
POST CONVERSATION BANTER
Eric: Natsuko, in Japanese companies people tend to address their boss or co-workers by their last name rather than their first name.
Natsuko: That's true. And when we talk to our colleagues or boss, we can also add their title to their names.
Eric: Titles…?
Natsuko: Yes. For example, if my boss is a manager, 課長, and his family name is Takahashi (高橋), I would call him 高橋課長.
Eric: I’ve heard that. You can attach titles to foreign names too, right?
Natsuko: Yes. We can say, ギャランテ社長, for example.
Eric: It means “my or our president, Mr.Galante”.
Natsuko: You can also refer to someone just by their title. For example, in our dialog Linda simply called him 課長.
Eric: I see. This kind of address is often used to get your boss’s attention in the office.
Natsuko: Like 課長~ or 社長!
Eric: For 社長, “company president,” it should be OK, since there’s only one president in the office usually, but for 課長... I guess there could be several managers in one office.
Natsuko: Ah... in that case, family name plus 課長 would be better.
Eric: Good to know. Okay, now onto the vocab.
VOCAB LIST
Eric: Let’s take a look at the vocabulary from this lesson. The first word is..
Natsuko: おはよう [natural native speed]
Eric: Good morning! (informal)
Natsuko: おはよう[slowly - broken down by syllable]
Natsuko: おはよう [natural native speed]
Eric: Next we have..
Natsuko: おはようございます [natural native speed]
Eric: Good morning.
Natsuko: おはようございます[slowly - broken down by syllable]
Natsuko: おはようございます [natural native speed]
Eric: Next we have..
Natsuko: 暑い [natural native speed]
Eric: hot
Natsuko: 暑い[slowly - broken down by syllable]
Natsuko: 暑い [natural native speed]
Eric: Next we have..
Natsuko: 本当に [natural native speed]
Eric: really, truly
Natsuko: 本当に[slowly - broken down by syllable]
Natsuko: 本当に [natural native speed]
Eric: Next we have..
Natsuko: 朝 [natural native speed]
Eric: morning
Natsuko: 朝[slowly - broken down by syllable]
Natsuko: 朝 [natural native speed]
Eric: Next we have..
Natsuko: から [natural native speed]
Eric: from
Natsuko: から[slowly - broken down by syllable]
Natsuko: から [natural native speed]
Eric: And last we have...
Natsuko: ね [natural native speed]
Eric: isn't it? (sentence ending particle)
Natsuko: ね[slowly - broken down by syllable]
Natsuko: ね [natural native speed]
KEY VOCAB AND PHRASES
Eric: Let's have a closer look at the usage of some of the words and phrases from this lesson. The expression for this lesson is..
Natsuko: おはよう
Eric: which means “Good morning!” in an informal way. Please note that this expression is used only in informal situations, such as with your friends and family, and your close co-workers.
Natsuko: DO NOT say おはよう to your boss or client because it’s informal.
Eric: But your boss would use this to you since you're their subordinate.
Natsuko: Here’s a pronunciation tip.[ ohayō]. We usually prolong the last [yō] sound.
Eric: Usually?
Natsuko: Right. You’ll sometimes hear people say [ ohayo] with a short [ yo] at the end.
Eric: Ah yes, I’ve heard that.
Natsuko: It’s a very casual greeting used between friends who are close.
Eric: So it’s OK to say [ ohayo] to your close friends, right?
Natsuko: That’s right.
Eric: OK. Can you give us a sample sentence using [ohayō]?
Natsuko: Sure. ひろこ、おはよう!
Eric: ..which means “Hi Hiroko, good morning!” Okay, what's the next expression?
Natsuko: おはようございます
Eric: which means “Good morning!” in a polite way.
Natsuko: おはようございます is more polite than おはよう
Eric: The word ございます increases the politeness level of the phrase. To your friends or close colleagues, you can say…
Natsuko: おはよう。
Eric: But to your bosses or clients, you have to say…
Natsuko: おはようございます。
Eric: To mean “Good morning”. Now Natsuko, what about strangers, passersby, neighbors, or people you don’t know very well? Which expression should we use?
Natsuko: You have to be polite to those people. So... of course it’s おはようございます。
Eric: Can you give us a sample sentence using this word?
Natsuko: Sure. ひろこさん、おはようございます。
Eric: .. which means “Hi Hiroko, good morning.” Okay, now onto the lesson focus.

Lesson focus

Eric: In this lesson, you will learn how to greet your boss in the morning.
Natsuko: You can greet your boss simply by saying おはようございます!
Eric: which means “Good morning!”.
Natsuko: Listeners, please pay attention to the pronunciation. It has a long [ō ] sound in it. [ohayō gozaimasu.]
Eric: Natsuko, you said that [ ohayo ] with short [o] sound is acceptable between friends, but when greeting your boss it’s not acceptable?
Natsuko: No. You have to prolong the [o] sound and say [ ohayō gozaimasu.] to your boss.
Eric: Let’s take a good look at this lesson’s dialogue, Linda said….
Natsuko: 課長、おはようございます。
Eric: “Good morning sir.” Linda calls Mr. Takahashi by his title and says good morning.
Let’s give our listeners some more examples. If you want to greet the general manager, you’d say…
Natsuko: “general manager” is 部長 in Japanese. So 部長、おはようございます。
Eric: It means “Good morning Sir. or Ma’am”. After they greeted each other, Linda and Mr. Takahashi talked about the temperature. I guess talking about the weather and temperature is a universal topic after greeting.
Natsuko: I agree. It’s the safest topic for making small talk. In the dialogue, Linda said 今日は暑いですね。
Eric: “It’s hot today.”
Natsuko: Here, we have 今日 meaning “today”, は、the topic marking particle, and the い-adjective 暑い, which is a weather word that means “hot.”, plus the copula です and ending particle ね.
Eric: You can replace this weather word with any other to say..
Natsuko: 今日は寒いですね。
Eric: “It’s cold today.” The sentence pattern here is..
Natsuko: 今日は、[describing weather word] ですね。
Eric: “Isn’t it [descriptive weather word] today?” 
Natsuko: 今日 means “today”. は is a topic marking particle.
Eric: then you add a word describing the weather or temperature. For example, “hot” in Japanese is...
Natsuko: 暑い.
Eric: Next, we have copula です meaning “is”. Lastly we have the sentence ending particle ね. It works as a tag question.
Natsuko: So this [ですね] here means “isn’t it?”.
Eric: Can we hear the sentence again?
Natusko:今日は、暑いですね。
Eric: “It’s hot today, isn’t it?” Natsuko, how would you say “It’s cool today, isn’t it?”
Natsuko: Replace 暑い meaning “hot” with 涼しい meaning “cool”.
Eric: So…
Natsuko: 今日は涼しいですね。
Eric: “It’s cool today, isn’t it?” Ok, let's give our listeners sample sentences with the grammar pattern we introduced in this lesson.
Natsuko: Sure. 課長、おはようございます。今日は、寒いですね。
Eric: “Good morning, Sir. It’s cold today, isn’t it?”
Natsuko: 部長、おはようございます。今日は、いい天気ですね。
Eric: “Good morning, Sir. The weather is good today, isn’t it?”

Outro

Eric: Okay, that’s all for this lesson. Thank you for listening, everyone, and we’ll see you next time! Bye!
Natsuko: またねー

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