Hiragana has one more part to further complicate it, but still not adding any more new characters. What we’ll be talking about today is described in several different ways. I was taught Contracted sounds, but it can be called double consonant hiragana, or just double hiragana. Take the 1st entry in the chart below- きゃ (kya. ) You’ll notice that the や (ya) is smaller than the き (ki) this is what tells the reader that it’s a contracted sound.

きゃ Kya
きや Kiya
^ at first glance, they appear to be the same, but there are different meanings & pronunciations.

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I know it’s been awhile, but I’m back & ready for the next part! Today I’ll be covering age, along with asking & answering how old you are.

On the basic level, you say the number of years you are the then add さい (sai.)  If you’re 10 yeah old it’d be じゅうさう (juusai)

As always, there are exceptions. 20 when counting is nijuu, but as an age it gets a special name. Hatachi is used to describe 20-year-olds (this is like turning 18 in the U.S.) since this is the age when people are officially adults.

In Japan at the beginning of the year a person will turn 20, there’s a big celebration for all of them, even though it my not be their birthday yet. Read more »

I went to SITACON this year, and came back with a Sitacon T-shirt, some kawaii buttons & a new d10 set. Woot! There was lots going on, but I did get to talk to the people from OCRemix. Cool people they are.

I did take some pics of some nifty cosplayers though:

She got her kimono from her Aunt when she was living in Japan. Rock On!

And of course, the legendary Vash the Stampede!

Today, I came back to my room to find that my oldest betta, Bubbles, had crossed the rainbow bridge. My boyfriend, the sweetheart he is, offered to let his betta, Kalec, come hang with Momo & Downey to keep us company. I would have taken him up on his offer, but I’m not sure yet what happened to bubbles (other than that he is no longer living …) so I’m being super careful with his tankmates. I wouldn’t want anything to happen to any of them, in case Bubbles had something contagious to other fish.

In remembrance of Bubbles I have made this compilation of pictures set to “To Zanarkand” from FFX .

http://video.sanriotown.com/video/7c756c3cf92f0ce8

じかん (Jikan - Time) is the next section of numbers we’ll be covering. This post will cover hours & half past. (i.e 4:30)

Fist things first: Questions & Answers.
What time is it?
Ima nanji desu ka?
いま なんじ です か?

It is ___.
___ desu.
___です.

To get the hour, basically take the number & stick じ (ji) on the end.
3:00 would be さんじ (sanji). Ji is kind of like adding “o’clock,” but it literally means hour.

**Take note of 4,7 & 9. They use these specific forms of the numbers.

To get half-past you just add はん (han). Han actually means half.
4:30 is よじはん.

Also, to differentiate between am/pm you’d use gozen for am & gogo for pm.

3:00 am
gozen sanji desu
ごぜん さんじ です

5:30 pm (This one makes me laugh)
gogo goji han desu
ごご ごじ はん

If you are in the video game section of most stores you’ll see at least 1 of the My _____ Coach games for DS. They have SAT prep, other languages , a version to increase your vocabulary, and even a weightless coach.

IGN gives a release date of 10/14, and at 29.99 it seems like agood deal in comparison ot electronic disctionaries & all that.

Here’s some Key Points from Amazon:

Key Features

Explore Japan as each point of interest opens up your vocabulary

• Lesson plans take place within interesting locations ranging from Tokyo to the country side
• Useful information for first time Japanese speakers planning to visit the country
• The world map is identical to the Japanese map and the locations of the country

Learn to pronounce sounds unique to Japanese by comparing your voice to a native speaker

• Voice recording and playback feature of the DS allows the player to compare his or her accent to a native Japanese speaker
• Ability to listen and compare phrases not just words but also phrases as well

Develop your calligraphy skills as you trace over animations showing the proper way to write in Japanese

• Write Japanese characters using the DS stylus and touch screen
• Stroke order and comparison ability allows players to properly write hiragana / katakana / kanji

Participate in mini-games that will test your grasp of the structured lessons featured in the game

• 12 mini-games reinforce lesson plans and the ability to write in Japanese
• Variety of mini games ranging from whack-a-mole, word search, bridge builder, and kanji writing

Use the built in reference tool to look up useful words and phrases

• Japanese Dictionary and phrasebook with over 12,000 Japanese words and hundreds of useful phrases
• Strong reference points and serves as an independent tool from the game that’s very practical and useful

This won’t be the only resource you’ll need to learn Japanese, (like someone said on the gamestop site) but it’ll be a fun way to supplement the other tools you’re using now. This game won’t make you fluent in Japanese, but it’ll help for sure.

Now we can count from 1-20, 20-100, 100-1000 & 1000-10,000. This post will cover the 10-thousands.

I mentioned before that in Japanese there’s a separate unit for Ten-Thousands. It took me a bit to wrap my head around it.  Say we have a huge number like 98,765.
In English, we’d read it 98 thousand, 7 hundred, 60, 5.

In Japanese it’s essentially read like this: 9 Ten-Thousand, 8 Thousand, 7 Hundred, 60, 5.

To me, it’s really hard to think that there’s something else to put in there. It almost makes sense, because Japanese currency ￥ (Yen, or えん [en] in Japanese) is usually listed in much larger numbers than we’re used to with dollars.
￥100 is about $1.00 give or take.
If our big number above was  ￥98,765… it’d be $987.65 roughly.

1,000.	sen	せん
10,000.	ichiman*	いちまん
20,000.	niman	にまん
30,000.	sanman	さんまん
40,000.	yonman~	よんまん
50,000.	goman	ごまん
60,000.	rokuman	ろくまん
70,000.	nanaman~	ななまん
80,000.	hachiman	はちまん
90,000.	kyuuman	きゅうまん

Using this new list, lets look at the big number again, & break it down:

90,000	kyuuman
8,000	hassen
700	nanahyaku
60	rokujuu
5	go

So all together 98,765 would be read:
きゅうまん はっせん ななひゃく ろくじゅう ご
kyuuman hassen nanahyaku rokujuu go

It’s alot to take in, but I found for myself that breaking it down helps.

I learned a nifty phrase today, which ‘ve heard many times (watching anime lol)  and finally know what it means.

がんばって ください - Please try your best
ganbatte kudasai

In finding this out I’ve found that ganba がんば is “go for it” or “keep at it”

I just need to keep telling myself this & everyone else trying to learn Japanese.
がんばって ください!!

Over the last bunch of posts, there’s been lots of numbers!(1-20, 20-100, 100-1000!)  And this one will be no exception, hehe. Now We’ll be doing 1,000-10,000!

I’m pretty sure the next will be the last *strictly* numbers post for a while. We’ll get to time & age soon.

Like with the rest if the Japanese numbers there’s a system. With the exception of 1000 (which is せん [sen] all by itself,)  you take the number & stick せん (sen) to the end of it. 2000 is にせん (nisen), and 5000 is ごせん (gosen). And also like the others, there are irregulars. Keep an eye out for 3000 さんびゃく (sanzen) & 8000 はっぴゃく (hassen)

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I’m really hoping that these 日本語 Japanese posts are helping people. The reason I keep doing them is two-fold: 1) I get to share something that I know & I think others would like to know as well.  2) It’ s a killer review for me as well. I keep doing posts & setting them to auto post day after day. I have a few finished everyday & I keep adding more. Just gotta pace myself.

So today we had our midterm. It was tricky, but I think I did well. We has to write some single words in Hiragana, which made me think. It’s kinda hard. >.<  Further on in the test, there were questions that had to be answered in Hiragana. Oy!

So overall, tricky, but not too bad.