Learn how to read months and dates in Japanese
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| Jessi: Time, Months and Dates. Hi everyone. Welcome to appendix lesson 3. |
| Naomi: In this lesson, you will learn how to say dates and months in Japanese. |
| Jessi: We recommend that you review appendix lesson 1 and learn the numbers to get the most out of this lesson. We will start with the dates first as in the first, the second, the third and so on. |
| Naomi: The words for days 1 through 10 don’t follow a pattern. They have to be memorized. |
| Jessi: Right. So let’s go through those. I will give the English first and Naomi-sensei will give us the Japanese. Here we go. The first |
| Jessi: The first. |
| Naomi: 一日 (tsuitachi) |
| Jessi: Second |
| Naomi: 二日 (futsuka) |
| Jessi: Third |
| Naomi: 三日 (mikka) |
| Jessi: Fourth |
| Naomi: 四日 (yokka) |
| Jessi: Fifth |
| Naomi: 五日 (itsuka) |
| Jessi: Sixth |
| Naomi: 六日 (muika) |
| Jessi: Seventh |
| Naomi: 七日 (nanoka) |
| Jessi: Eighth |
| Naomi: 八日 (yōka) |
| Jessi: Ninth |
| Naomi: 九日 (kokonoka) |
| Jessi: Tenth |
| Naomi: 十日 (tōka) |
| Jessi: Now, the days after the 10th follow a certain pattern. The word for day |
| Naomi: 日 (nichi) |
| Jessi: Comes after the number. So for example, the 11th is |
| Naomi: 十一日 (jū ichi-nichi). 十一 (Jū ichi) is 11 and 日 (nichi) is the counter. So 十一日 (jū ichi-nichi) means the 11th day. |
| Jessi: And the 12th is |
| Naomi: (Jū ni-nichi) is 12 and 日 (nichi) is the counter. So 十二日 (jū ni-nichi) is the 12th day and so on. |
| Jessi: However, there are a few exceptions here too. |
| Naomi: That’s right. The voice for 14th, 20th and 24th are irregular. |
| Jessi: Right. So let’s cover those really quickly. The 14th is |
| Naomi: 十四日 (jū yokka) |
| Jessi: The 20th is |
| F2:二十日 (hatsuka) |
| Jessi: And the 24th is |
| Naomi: 二十四日 (ni-jū yokka) |
| Jessi: So remember those three exceptions. Now, how do we ask what’s the date or what day of the month is it? |
| Naomi: 何日ですか？ (nan-nichi desu ka?) 何日 (Nan-nichi). What day of the month? 何 (Nan) means what, 日 (nichi) is the counter and ですか (desu ka) makes it a question. |
| Jessi: Now, let’s move on to the months. The months are really straightforward. |
| Naomi: Yes they are. |
| Jessi: To say the month, all you have to do is add the word 月 (gatsu) to the number of the month. Let’s go through them starting with January. |
| Naomi: 一月 (ichi-gatsu) |
| Jessi: February |
| Naomi: 二月 (ni-gatsu) |
| Jessi: March |
| Naomi: 三月 (san-gatsu) |
| Jessi: April |
| Naomi: 四月 (shi-gatsu) |
| Jessi: May |
| Naomi: 五月 (go-gatsu) |
| Jessi: June |
| Naomi: 六月 (roku-gatsu) |
| Jessi: July |
| Naomi: 七月 (shichi-gatsu) |
| Jessi: August |
| Naomi: 八月 (hachi-gatsu) |
| Jessi: September |
| Naomi: 九月 (ku-gatsu) |
| Jessi: October |
| F2:十月 (jū-gatsu) |
| Jessi: November |
| F2:十一月 (jū ichi-gatsu) |
| Jessi: December |
| Naomi: 十二月 (jū ni-gatsu) |
| Jessi: Not too bad right? |
| Jessi: Umm… |
| Jessi: For the months, you should note that April uses (shi) instead of (yon) and September uses (ku) instead of (kyū). Now Naomi-sensei, how do we ask what month it is? |
| Naomi: 何月ですか? (Nan-gatsu desu ka?) (Nan-gatsu) means what month and (desu ka) makes it a question. So (Nan-gatsu desu ka) |
| Jessi: What month is it? If we wanted to ask both the month and the date together, we can ask |
| Naomi: 何月何日ですか? (Nan-gatsu nan-nichi desu ka?) |
| Jessi: (Nan-gatsu) means what month and (nan-nichi) means what date. |
| Naomi: Right. (Nan-gatsu nan-nichi desu ka) means what is the date. |
| Jessi: Now that we know how to say the months and the dates, let’s combine them and say a few dates. So please listen closely. January 1st would be |
| Naomi: 一月一日 (Ichi-gatsu tsuitachi) |
| Naomi: (Ichi-gatsu) is January (tsuitachi) is the 1st. |
| Jessi: August 15th would be? |
| Naomi: 八月十五日 (hachi-gatsu jū go-nichi). (Hachi-gatsu) is August, (jū go-nichi) is the 15th. |
| Jessi: December 30th would be? |
| Naomi: 十二月三十日 (Jū ni-gatsu san-jū-nichi). 十二月 (Jū ni-gatsu) is December and 三十日 (san-jū-nichi) is the 30th. |
| Jessi: Right. So note that like in English, the month always precedes the date in Japanese. Well, that’s all for this lesson. See you next time. |
| Naomi: じゃ、また。 (Ja mata) |
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