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30 October 2022 04:51

I found this video: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=b-x_EIPVhJE
to be quite interesting, in a Japanese class you might be told to say 「もう一度う言ってください」to ask someone to repeat what they said, but that's only appropriate in a classroom setting, if you are talking "in the real world", people won't usually talk that way, and because of Japanese customs and culture, it might come off as rude in some situations

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16 June 2022 02:35

this is from Episode 1 of ヲタクに恋は難しい [Wotaku ni Koi wa Muzukashii] "Love is Hard for Otaku", around 00:19:27 in the episode

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16 June 2022 02:30

I want to learn a little bit of video editing, just enough to make clips, not to get a job doing that, so I wanted to add some clips with words or phrases, something like this

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26 April 2022 01:06

I will be unemployed soon (I won't be in financial distress though), so I'll see if I can start posting again, though I won't promise any set schedule

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01 March 2021 06:36

くれ can be substituted for ください when making a "desperate plea", or just being close to the person (or trying to "close the distance")

for example

in Overlord Season 2, Zaryus proposes to Crusch by saying

結婚してくれ [けっこんしてくれ] "marry me"

without くれ it would be "get married" but くれ makes it a personal request, it's not just "get married" but "get married [to me]"

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01 March 2021 06:27

the ている/ています thing works for other verbs as well

for example, in Goblin Slayer, episode 3, around minute 12:25

the Priestess says: そんな、せめて決める前に相談とか [そんな、せめてきめるまえにそうだんとか]
which means something like "that's not fair, at least, before deciding, please consult" or "that's not fair, you should consult (me) before making a decision"

Goblin Slayer responds: しているだろ
which means "I'm doing it now", this could be more explicit adding 今 [いま], as in 今、してるだろ, but it should still be clear

だろ is "the informal to the point of almost being rude" version of でしょう which means something like "isn't it" or "am I not", by itself it doesn't mean anything, but it's similar to ね (as in いい天気ですね [いいてんきですね])

for example 好きだろ [すきだろ] means "you like, don't you?" it could be "you like her, don't you?" or "you like it, don't you?" depending on the subject of the conversation

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01 March 2021 06:16

to say that someone is doing an action, you use the て form and います (formal)/いる (informal)

for example

彼女はりんごを食べる [かのじょはりんごをたべる] "she eats an apple", it can also mean "she is eating an apple"

but if you want to be explicit that she is eating the apple right now, you'd say

彼女はりんごを食べている [かのじょはりんごをたべている]

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12 February 2021 20:14

for all of the い adjectives (like 白い [しろい] meaning "white")

there are X-くない forms to them, meaning "not X"

for example

白い車 [しろいくるま] means "white car"

and

白くない車 [白くない車] means "a car that is not white"

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05 February 2021 23:12

a lot of swear words in English are related to sex, like "fuck" or "bitch"

in Japanese, they do exist, but they are rarely used, at least in conversation, maybe they're used in novels? (I'm not sure)

for example

calling someone 部数 [ぶす] "ugly" or 禿 [はげ] "bald" or "baldy"

is more common

another way people "talk down" or offend others is by deliberately using pronouns that aren't respectful

like calling someone 貴様 [きさま] or お前 [おまえ]

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03 February 2021 01:00

it does have a kanji by the way, I forgot to use it, it's 分かんない [わかんない]

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03 February 2021 00:58

けど and でも can both mean "but" or "however" but I think けど is more common when "talking out loud" like I was doing

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30 January 2021 21:12

適当 [てきとう] is a rare case of a word that can mean something, and something that is opposite of its other meaning

it can mean "appropriate" or suitable"

and it can also mean something like "sloppy", "careless", or "careless"

for example

適当な語で空所を満たせ [てきとうごくしょをみたせ]

means "fill the blanks with approriate/suitable words"

and

適当なことを言う [てきとうなことをいう] means "make irresponsible comments" or colloquially "talk out of one's ass"

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29 January 2021 21:52

I'm back, just not on a regular schedule, at least not yet

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20 October 2020 06:20

I don't mean to abandon the channel, but a close family member died recently, and I haven't had the time or energy to post here, or to practice or study Japanese, I will be back, just not right now

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04 September 2020 07:36

アダマンタイト級冒険者でしかお引き受けできない案件でしょう

is read

アダマンタイトきゅうぼうけんしゃでしかおひきうけできないあんけんでしょう

I think with longer sentences like this, it gets easier to understand why having kanji is useful, with only hiragana, it's difficult to know where a word ends, and a new one begins, there's also a certain elegance to having a lot of meaning packed into a few characters

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08 August 2022 06:32

I'd recommend reading this: https://docs.google.com/document/d/10bRzVblKVOsQJjTc2PIi1Gbj_LrsJCkMkh0SutXCZdI/edit#, it's quite comprehensive, the article linked in there as "Zipf's law" is particularly interesting (to me), I want to get good enough at Japanese to be able to understand native speakers, in both "normal" and "nonstandard" speech, to understand anime and manga, but not necessarily than the most difficult dialects, like regional dialects, and understanding how much more difficult it is to do that than to simply be able to hold a conversation is very important

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16 June 2022 02:31

それな！

means something like "that's it!"

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28 April 2022 02:08

the bot is going to be down, there have been some issues with the server where it's hosted

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01 March 2021 06:53

some verbs don't mean that someone is currently performing an action, for example 結婚する [けっこんする] "to marry" in its ている (結婚している [けっこんしている]) form means "I am married" or "he/she is married"

this is also the case with 生きる [いきる], which means "to live", and 生きている [いきている] means "I'm alive", rather than "I'm living"

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01 March 2021 06:31

when using this ている form, you can omit the い and it's still understandable, for example, in KonoSuba, episode 3, around minute 17:45, Kazuma says

喜んでる？ [よろこんでる？] "she's enjoying it?" when seeing his party member enjoying getting hit by cabbages

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01 March 2021 06:17

in the previous example, 彼女はりんごを食べる can also mean "she eats apples" as in someone who eats apples vs someone who doesn't eat apples

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12 February 2021 20:17

you can do this with other い adjectives

like 美味しい [おいしい] meaning "delicious" or "tasty"

美味しい食べ物 [おいしいたべもの] "delicious food" or "tasty food"

美味しくない食べ物 [おいしくないたべもの] "non-delicious food" or "non-tasty food"

though, it isn't necessarily *bad* food

think of a single scale of

-5 to 5

where 5 is delicious, and -5 is bad

美味しい would be a 5 or very close to 5

美味しくない would be somewhere between 0 and 5, but not too close to 5

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05 February 2021 23:12

or using あなた (which isn't actually used in conversation, with possibly the only exception of a woman talking to her husband), this is actually used for scolding someone

like saying 何してるんだ？ [なにしてるんだ] vs あなた何してるんだ？ [あなたなにしてるんだ？]

the first one is "what are you doing?" the second is more like "do you realize what are you doing?"

in textbook grammar they are both the same, but in conversation people usually don't use あなた

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03 February 2021 01:01

意味 [いみ] means meaning, as in "the meaning of that word"

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03 February 2021 01:00

わかんない is a sort of contraction of わからない, it's probably more common in spoken Japanese than in written Japanese

you might have heard it in anime, but I think it's more rare in manga? (maybe not?)

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03 February 2021 00:57

I was reading some manga, and I saw some kanji that I didn't know the meaning of, but I had seen before

I thought

あの漢字見た事あるけど意味がわかんない [あのかんじみたことあるけどいみがわかんない]

"I've seen that kanji, but I don't know it's meaning"

here I use the た form of the verb 見る, and 事ある [ことある] to mention something I've done before (or not done, if using the negative of ある, which is ない)

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29 January 2021 21:53

you might remember this from Wotaku ni Koi wa Muzukashii, episode 6, about 2 minutes in, Narumi says this to Hirataka

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29 January 2021 21:52

喧嘩売ってる？ [けんかうってる?] literallly means "are you selling a fight?"

but is used to mean "are you looking for a fight?"

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12 September 2020 01:35

alright, the new semester has started, so I've been a little irregular with new stuff, I'll have a 3-day weekend starting tomorrow, so I'll be going over some common words, which I think will be useful

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04 September 2020 07:30

しか can mean "nothing but"

for example, in episode 3 of Overlord Season 3, minute 13:45, the clerk says

アダマンタイト級冒険者でしかお引き受けできない案件でしょう

アダマンタイト級冒険者 = "adamantite-plated adventurer(s)
で = indicates a means here
しか = only with [the previously mentioned]
お引き受け = "undertaking" in this case, it's the request done to the adventurer(s)
できない = negative form of "can" or "able to" (so "cannot" or "not able to")
案件 = "matter" or "case"
でしょう = kind of like ですね, that is, like saying "right?" at the end of a sentence, but this is more formal, and could be taken as "I believe"

so the sentence is more or less

"I believe for this matter nothing but adamantite-plated adventurers are able"

if taken literally, a more natural translation would be

"I believe only adamantite-plated adventurers are able to undertake this matter", or "I believe only adamantite-plated adventurers can take this request" (taking into consideration the context of an adventurer's guild receiving requests)