日本語 Japanese Ask Questions Thread 7

If you have a question about the language, ask it and fellow 4channers might see it and answer it for you.
日本の方からのご協力も大歓迎です。


■USEFUL TOOLS

Rikaichan
http://www.polarcloud.com/rikaichan/
A pop-up dictionary for Firefox that shows readings and definitions when you hover over words.

Rikaikun
https://chrome.google.com/webstore/detail/jipdnfibhldikgcjhfnomkfpcebammhp
Same as above, but for Chrome.

Anki
http://ankisrs.net/
Flash card program mainly useful for vocab and kanji repetition. Can sync decks between computers and your phone.


■WEB-BASED DICTIONARIES

ALC
http://www.alc.co.jp/
Offers a web interface to the Eijirou dictionary, made for use in translation work.

kotobank
http://kotobank.jp/
Pretty good for J-J lookups. J-E/E-J definitions from Progressive.

Tangorin
http://tangorin.com/
The best interface to Jimu Buuriinu-sama's EDICT, which is a mess, so don't use this unless you have to.

weblio 類語辞典
http://thesaurus.weblio.jp/
It's an extensive thesaurus.

(If you want the best J-E/E-J dictionary, get an EPWING copy of Kenkyusha.)


■MEDIA

D-Addicts
http://d-addicts.com/forum/torrents.php
It's a horrible community, but it's THE go-to for drama series. Many variety shows turn up there as well.

JPopsuki
http://jpopsuki.eu/
It's a private music tracker with an extensive selection of just about everything.

KeyHoleTV
http://www.v2p.jp/video/english/
An application that lets you stream live TV in shit quality.

Tokyo Toshokan
https://www.tokyotosho.info/
anime anime anime anime anime


■PREVIOUS THREADS

See >>2 for links.

http://www.thewebcomiclist.com/o/8538

is 愛よ something or is it a special use of よ?

「愛よ消えないで」
「この愛よ叶うなら嬉しいよ」

>>322
よ is the imperative for nouns: 少年よ我に帰れ, 少年よ神話になれ, 少年よ大志を抱け (少年よ is really common but you can use anything)

>>322
2: (after a noun) used when calling out to someone;

>>323
It's actually more of a vocative, which goes with the imperative (帰れ,なれ,抱け)

          ∧＿∧ fap fap
　fap 　　　（　´Д｀/"lヽ
　　　　　　/´　　　（ ,人）　  ／￣￣￣￣￣￣￣￣￣
　fap 　　（　 ） ﾟ　 ﾟ|　　|　＜ VIVA MEXICO-mexico!!!
　　　　　　＼ ＼__, |　 ⊂llll　＼＿＿＿＿＿＿＿＿＿
　　　　　　　 ＼＿つ　⊂llll
　　　　　　　 （　　ﾉ　　ﾉ
　　　　　　　　|　（__人_） ＼

まんこ

>>316
When the author wants it to.

Can anyone explain me something about giving/receiving verbs?

I know that:

Ageru is when I give someone else something,

Kureru is when someone gives me something,

Morau is when i have someone do/give something for me.

This is basically what it means, but what if i saw 2 strangers/family members exchange items, let`s call them A and B.

which verb should i use in the case of A gives B something, still ageru?
And what about B gives something to A?

Feel free to add if i miss anything, thanks

>>329
You might be getting more technical than need be.

Kureru - when you or someone in your in-group receives [He GAVE me]
Ageru  - when ANYONE gives to ANYONE (of equal or lower status)[I GAVE him]
Morau  - when ANYONE receives from ANYONE (general) or when you or someone in your in-group receives something [The boy received / I received]

          ∧＿∧ fap fap
　fap 　　　（　´Д｀/"lヽ
　　　　　　/´　　　（ ,人）　  ／￣￣￣￣￣￣￣￣￣
　fap 　　（　 ） ﾟ　 ﾟ|　　|　＜ VIVA MEXICO-CABRONES!!!
　　　　　　＼ ＼__, |　 ⊂llll　＼＿＿＿＿＿＿＿＿＿
　　　　　　　 ＼＿つ　⊂llll
　　　　　　　 （　　ﾉ　　ﾉ
　　　　　　　　|　（__人_） ＼

what is the difference between these verbs:

壊れる
倒れる
割れる

dont they all mean, break, desotry? when are they used?

thanks guys

What is it like learning the language? I need as much info as possible from people who have learned or attempted to learn Japanese.

>>332
Yes, they "mean" that but even in English "break", "destroy", "smash", and "tear" all have different "meanings"

The distinction is easily discernible if you just search each on jisho. 

But, if you're too lazy or stupid to do that:

壊れる - general "break", though common for machines, physical things that would break in that sense
倒れる - more closely "fall", as in a boxer who goes down or even a business going bankrupt
割れる - "break" or "torn" as into pieces, like ice or paper, anything fragmentary

>>332
Yes, they "mean" that but even in English "break", "destroy", "smash", and "tear" all have different "meanings"

The distinction is easily discernible if you just search each on jisho. 

But, if you're too lazy or stupid to do that:

壊れる - general "break", though common for machines, physical things that would break in that sense
倒れる - more closely "fall", as in a boxer who goes down or even a business going bankrupt
割れる - "break" or "torn" as into pieces, like ice or paper, anything fragmentary

>>333

I'm still learning. It's a lot of fun.

スープはやっぱりチキン味だ。
In this sentence, is 味 pronounced as あじ or み?

>>337
aji

What does "CV" mean in Japanese?  I see it used in ways that I wouldn't see curriculum vitae used in English.

>>339

Would be nice if you gave more context as to where you saw it, but one place it is commonly used is "Character Voice", as in CV:平野綾, etc.

How do I spell shachoo?

>>341

社長
しゃちょう
シャチョウ
Shachou

hello /lang/

Hello /lang/
I was reading the previously posted Learn Japanese by Tae Kim and I came across this:
"Negative: Same as i-adjectives, replace 「い」 with 「くて」.
This rule also works for the polite 「です」 and 「ます」 endings."
How the hell I change です and ます to the negative te-form?

>344
You're parsing the page wrong. The "negative" line is its own thing. That part about "this rule" is just general, and it's the reason for the two examples that follow.

He probably could have formatted it better, and put a space after the negative, like this.

    Positive: Conjugate the verb to its past tense and replace 「た」 with 「て」 or 「だ」 with 「で」. This is often called the te-form even though it could sometimes be 'de'.

    Negative: Same as i-adjectives, replace 「い」 with 「くて」.

    This rule also works for the polite 「です」 and 「ます」 endings.
    Examples
        学生です → 学生でした → 学生でして
        買います → 買いました → 買いまして


Generally even in polite sentences you simply use なくて. Technically you can say ませんでして, but this is rarely used.

You know I don't think I've ever seen でして, ever. It's always だって / であって.

>>346
Dunno what to tell you, it's relatively common in polite speech. Also, だって is not the same as でして. That would be で/であって.

>>346
It exists. It's not common. Get over it.

Oh, thank you >>345
I don't have anyone to help me with this kinda of thing, sometimes my constructions seem a quite odd and i can't check if I'm right in a reliable way. ha ha ha
I knew about this thread but sometimes I'm quite ashamed of my posting style, because of that I'm afraid to ask a lot of questions ha ha ha

I've only recently gotten the confidence to compose more than a sentence or two, so I've been screwing around on 2channel a bit for some practice. PS3 Journey thread, search for アメリカ人旅ビト for my posts:

http://toro.2ch.net/test/read.cgi/famicom/1354971264/765-

The folks in the thread laid it on thick with the "Duuuude your Japanese is amaaaaaziiiing!" so I've gotten kind of a big head and I'd like to have it deflated with any nitpicks you folks could graciously offer.

It's a bit embarrassing that I spend a lot of my posts talking about myself instead of the thread topic. Maybe it would have been better had I not called attention to the fact that I was a gaijin.

Personally I feel like I rely on けど and したら a lot and wonder if it makes my Japanese sound a bit samey. Also I have a bit of a complex against introducing myself as the sentence topic. I wonder if any of these could be read easier with the addition of an 俺は.

>>349

Ask more questions. This thread hasn't seen much action lately. There's nothing wrong with not knowing something, and asking questions is good as long as you've made a basic effort to understand the problem (which I believe you have).

On reflection maybe saying HEY GUYS I WROTE ALL THIS SHIT PROOFREAD PLZ wasn't helpful, especially in an ask questions thread. Forgive my rudeness. I have to go right now but I'll be back in a few hours with some proper questions about my Japanese.

>>350
>"Duuuude your Japanese is amaaaaaziiiing!"

Apparently you've never been to Japan.

You mix a lot of informal and formal, written and colloquial forms/grammar and its pretty awkward. You can tell you're not a native but I suppose that's to be expected when you post with the name you did.

Indeed I have not! But I am well aware of the stories of how Japanese is the WORST most CRAZY DIFFICULT language EVER and even we Japanese have trouble with it how could a poor foreigner even hope to COPE with its EXTREME awfulness! (笑)

Thanks for the critical words. It hurt to be told, but I guess somewhat awkward is the best I could expect from my dabbling. I like to think, though, that is at least not altogether unpleasant to read.

This marks the third time I have been told by a fellow (I assume) gaijin not to mix polite and casual forms. I posed the question to a Japanese of whether this was really all that important, at least on internet junk like 2channel, and was told "don't worry about it". Maybe he was just being polite, like the ですます he used in his response.

Lacking the will to do any REAL study, I'm pretty much just able to regurgitate the shit that I'm always reading. I guess I'm okay with that for now. I'll just have to be careful not to get too full of myself and act like a tard. 「日本語下手」は外すべき made me smile so hard.

Anyway, specific questions:
http://toro.2ch.net/test/read.cgi/famicom/1354971264/765-794

* #771 was the てぇ～ too much? I don't know what I was thinking.

* #776 I got the impression from my IME that ひと旅した wasn't natural, but I typed it anyway. Maybe I had ひと狩りしようぜ in my head? I saw someone else say just 旅した, I guess I should have said that.

* バグにかかった. I've never actually put any real effort into studying conjugation, I believe I need passive here, came up with かかれられた or かかられた but I got the weird feeling that it wasn't right. I can't even explain why. I have a feeling this sticks out like a sore thumb さすがに外人の日本語だなー仕方ないなーと思われそうだ

* 空まで真上へ飛んだ. Jisho says 真上 means "just above; right overhead". I wanted to say "straight up", is it okay?

* The description of where I flew when I caught the bug was a bit technical and I have no idea how clear (muddy) it sounded. How would you have described it? Here's what it looks like: http://i.imgur.com/gdYCZ2W.png

* #788 I got this really damn strong feeling the moment I posted that I should have said 似てるかによる instead of ～かより. Should the か be there? "Yeah it sort of sounds like a bird." I'm not really sure how to word this.

* I wanted to say that I HAVE seen "sing", but not nearly as much as "call" or "cry". I think the も might have been counter-productive in that regard. Sort of reads to me like I said that I've seen "sing" (but that I haven't seen "call" or "cry").

* #791 探したらいいのを見つかれる. Awkward? I'm reading 探したらいい and that reads like something and then I see the のを and it trips me up and I have to re-parse. And I wrote the fucking thing!

* #794 自然に使いそう redundant?

* Why did I even make the 冗句 joke. Again I am so sorry.

私は日本から来ました。
Hi, I'm from Japan.

I have a question about English number agreement.
Which thread shoud I use? Can I ask here?

◇◇◇◇◇◇◇◇◇◇◇◇◇◇◇◇◇◇◇◇◇

Id like you to proofread these.

"Have you ever met an involved parent who want their student to be a begger?"
"We never see a parent who force their children to be a ‘begger’."
What sort of parent do you think would want their children to be a begger?

A native speaker said the following.

>unless the children merge and become one,
>it should be plural. At least, I'm fairly certain.

#771
Too much or no, you sound like a girl or a douchebag.

#776
>ぜ
Unless you're being ironic, ぜ died in the 90's. Other than that, do you mean 一人旅? Travelling alone?

>バグにかかった
It works.

>真上
Usually "directly above" something. Using まっすぐ is probably the most natural.

>なんかちょっと鳥の鳴き声に似てる
This is fine

>アリ
Just say aru.
>singなら見たこともある
This is possible to understand through context but it requires some thought. 「Sing」という言葉も使われるのを見たことある etc. or simply 「Sing」も見たこと（が）ある

探したら、いいのを見つかれる　
Or instead or nominalizing with "no", just say what you mean. This isn't English, where its "bad form" to repeat words.

自然に使いそう
Fine.

...take a break form the internet and just study more.

Hey lang, how would you say in japanese ``Drink the medicine X times a day/week/month``?

ようこそ。
まずは、文法の訂正ですね。

>"Have you ever met an involved parent who want their student to be a begger?"
「Have you ever」だから「したことある」と聞いているんですね。そういう文法だと、日本語と同じように文の動詞は過去形にします。結果は「wanted」となります。そして、「begger]はミススペルです。正しいのは「beggar」

"We never see a parent who force their children to be a ‘begger’."
この文章は前の文脈とつながっているなら、問題点は同じですね。過去に起こったことについての会話だから、動詞はそれに応じて変わります。

「We never see」は「We never saw」に
「who force 」は 「Who forced」に

それか、"We have never seen a parent who forced..."という構成も可能です。

数の一致の点には、最初の文章の「student」は下の二文の「children」を表す場合には、学生は一人いるという事実に従って、「children」は「child」となります。そうではない場合、文脈や意味が重なっていない場合、「children」でいいです。

>>357
「薬を（period）（times)回服用する」

>>354
The point being that Japanese will always complement your Japanese no matter how much shit it sucks. If you can say a few words, you'll receive the same reaction someone with a Master's would.