So I've finally got round to actually starting to learn Japanese. Been working on memorising Hirigana for the past couple of days. Got about 60-70 characters down so far.
Reading through a VN and come across a 4 character line that hadn't been translated, but found I was able to read it. Very simple (おはよう - "Ohayou" - "Morning"). Still, my first time actually trying to properly learn another language (especially one not based on the Roman alphabet) so even such a small achievement feels very satisfying.
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Don't write stuff in romanji. It will slow down your learning. Only write in hiragana. Practice your hiragana alphabet and you'll get there. Also try katakana as it is essential
- Sharif and Oshino Shinobu
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Okay, give me a sec to try to work through that. Just started a few days ago, so it still takes me a bit to recognise the characters.
Thanks for the advice. I'm starting with Hirigana until I feel like I've got it all down fairly reliably, then add Katakana in and work through it until I've got both of them, then move along to learning the actual language structure and kanji side of things. -
Hmm, kanji isn't essential as it always has a direct conversion to hiragana. I would learn sentence structures and the rules of Japanese. Also words like how to great yourself and the different particles that you can use. Then once you have have a conversation about who you are and what you do then learn kanji numbers and learn dates and days aswell as how to say the time. Learn foods and drinks. All this after you have mastered hiragana and katakana. I would recommend an app called hellotalk it's a social media where you can speak with people that are learning your language and that speak the language you want to learn. You can do posts and give a shot at writing a thread in Japanese and people will correct you
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Now I had always thought that it had a わ but in Japanese if you say it with a わ you might be thought of as stupid. In Japanese you don't have わ as a particle. Instead it is は pronounced as わ. So when you see a は on its own either at the ending of こんにちは or in between two words say わ
It's one of those silly rules that English seems to have alot of
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I said
HeIlo
I am Kaya
Do you like sushi?
Obviously you know what すし and すきです means. But when you see か and the end of the word か means a question. なに を のみますか (what do you drink?)
みず のみます だよ
(I drink water)
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Ah, yeah. Now that you mention it, that seems fairly obvious. Focusing on the writing so much that I forgot things that I picked up on speaking/listening when asking a question. Got fairly close I guess.
Once I've got the Kana down, vocabulary and sentence structure and the general rules of the language are going to be a big deal. I'm finding the lack of spaces in Japanese a bit confusing already. It kind of blends into one
Thanks for your help
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Ah, that sucks. Some times a text book can't be beaten.
I've just downloaded a load of apps to work through Kana memorisation for now. It's fairly easy to just go over them quickly that way whenever I have time. I'll have to look around for some good sources for learning about the structure, rules and overall vocabulary. I'm thinking a book may actually provide a better source for that than a lot of free internet resources.
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It's a great idea if you can make time for it everyday, I suggest the app "memrise" and look for hiragana and katakana course, having daily exposure helps a lot.
I recognize much faster than before and it so so satisfying being able to read karaoke subs, best part being they'll always have Furigana over the Kanji so I can still read lol.
Though I haven't continued learning new vocabs this year, one being crazy busy with finals and not being sure i'll end up in Japan or Canada gahh, when I started few years back, I did it with the intention of studying in Japan and it would be my tiny head start plus it was quite satisfying knowing I am doing something productive haha.