Lots of vocabulary

I moved recently (kono goro) into a atarashii uchi (new house), so my life has been crazy busy. Now that I'm mostly settled, though, I have more time for Japanese, and I'm going to try to get better about learning new vocabulary every day. Six words a day is looking to be my norm.

I'm going to break down what I've learned in the last little while by category.

Days of the week

doyoobi - Saturday

nichiyoobi - Sunday

getsuyoobi - Monday

kayoobi - Tuesday

suiyoobi - Wednesday

I haven't learned the rest of them yet, but I will know them in a few days! I'm trying not to learn similar words at the same time so that I don't get confused. 

In no particular order:

Directions

right - migi

left - hidori

front - mae

Verbs

okimasu - to get up (this one I remember because it's similar to 'kimasu', which means to go... and to go, you first need to get up)

nemasu - to sleep

arimasu - there is

wakarimasu - to understand

machimasu - to wait (the dictionary form of this is matsu; the final syllable goes through a strange sound shift that I don't quite understand. However, I haven't really explained dictionary forms yet, so I will wait for more dissection of this until I do.)

Nouns

eigakan - movie theatre

basu tei - bus stop

byooin - hospital

tatemono - building

puuru - swimming pool

umi - sea

kippu - ticket

tenki - weather

hikooki - airplane

(o)miyage - souvenir

(o)tera - temple

tsukue - desk

tegami - letter (I remember this one because the end is the same as 'origami', which also has to do with paper)

kodomo - child

tabemono - food

nomimono - drink (the -mono ending seems to go with nouns)

Adjectives

furui - old

atarashii - new

muzukashii - difficult

hayai - early

goro - at about (time)

sakki - a little while ago 

Wow, when I put that all together, it seems like a lot of stuff. But it's taken me quite a while to learn it, I've just been lazy about blogging. I will get better, I promise!

Lesson 4 exercises

A. Change the tense of each sentence:

1. Mori san wa ikimasen. - Mori san wa ikimasen deshita.

2. Sakana o tabemasu ka. - Sakana o tabemashita ka.

3. Kore wa kissaten desu. - Kore wa kissaten deshita.

4. Watashi wa mimasen deshita. - Watashi wa mimasen.

B. Use proper question words.

1. Dono kutsu ga yasui desu ka. (which)

2. Dare ga makemashita ka. (who)

3. Doko e ikimashoo ka. (where)

4. Doko de terebi o mimasu ka. (where)

C. Translate into English.

1. Watashi wa tenisu ga heta desu. - I am not skillful at tennis.

2. Kore wa donata no kamera desu ka. - Whose camera is this?

3. Sumoo no hon wa omoshiroi desu. - The book on sumo is interesting. 

4. Dore ga watashi no koohii desu ka. - Which is my coffee?

D. Tell whether the adjectives are i-adjectives or na-adjectives.

1. ookii - i

2. shizuka - na

3. omoshiroi - i

4. takai - i

5. kirei - na

6. yuumei - na

7. shinsetsu - na

8. tsuyoi - i

E. Compliment your friend's new house.

1. a very magnificent gate - Totemo rippa na mon desu ne.

2. a very clean kitchen - Totemo kirei na kitchin desu ne.

3. a very quiet neighbourhood - Totemo shizuka na chiiki desu ne. 

F. Create questions with the following elements:

1. Question, you, present, like, sumo - Sumoo ga suki desu ka.

2. I, negative, past, eat, sushi - Watashi wa sushi o tabemasen deshita.

3. I, negative, drink, coffee - Watashi wa koohii o nomimasen. 

G. 

1. Dono kamera ga yasui desu ka.

2. Dore ga ii kamera desu ka.

3. Dono kuruma o kau n desu ka.

4. Dore ga ii kuruma desu ka.

Why I haven't been writing

Watashi wa Nyuu Yooku de ikimashita, dakara watashi kakimasen deshita! Kankoo ryokoo deshita. Watashi to watashi no tomodachi Cathy san kaimono o ikimashita. 

私わ　ニュウヨオクで　いきました　だから　私　かきません　でした！　かんこおうりょこおう　でした。

私と　私の　ともだち　カてえさん　かいものお　いきましあ。

I will write properly later. :)

This and that

Japanese has a larger collection of demonstratives (like this and that) than English does. They are referred to as 'ko-so-a-do' words.

Ko words indicate that the object in question is close to the speaker, or close to both the speaker and listener.

So words indicate that the object is close to the listener, but not the speaker.

A words indicate that the object is not near either the speaker or the listener.

Do words are question words.

kono kami - this paper (by me)

sono kami - that paper (by you)

ano kami - that paper (by neither of us)

dono kami - which paper

kore - this (by me)

sore - that (by you)

are - that (by neither of us)

dore - which

この　その　あの　and　どの　must be used immediately preceding a noun, while これ　それ　あれ　and どれ　can only be used by themselves (without a noun).

For example:

この　えいが　お　みました　か？

Kono eiga o mimashita ka?

Did you see this movie?

それ　わ　ぎゅうにゅう　か？

Sore wa gyuunyuu ka?

Is that cow's milk?

My first kanji!

Okay so this is totally cheating because I learned all these when I learned Mandarin and they all mean the same thing, but here are number from 1 - 10. 

一　二　三　四　五　六　七　八　九　十

I also learned the kanji for time, or hour (pronounce ji) 時.

For example:

Ima nanji desu ka? いま　なん　時　です　か？

Juuichiji han desu. 　十一時　はん　です。

(What time is it? It is 11:30.)

Katakana and some vocab

Hooray! I finished learning my katakana! I now know all of them, so I can read! Slowly... very slowly... and the Japanese habit of not putting spaces between words really messes me up because I can't tell what belongs together, but I can still read. And, I figured out how to type in hiragana and katakana on my computer without having to copy and paste every character... it's much more convenient. However, I'm not always sure whether words that I learn belong in hiragana or katakana (although probably most of them have kanji that I haven't learned yet...) so I'm writing everything in hiragana unless it's an obvious borrowing from English. 

My vocab of a few days ago:

ぎゅうにゅう　- gyuunyuu - cow's milk

まけます　- makemasu - to be defeated, to lose

かきます　- kakimasu - to write

この　ごろ　- kono goro - recently 

あっけない　- akkenai - short and simple

とります　- torimasu - to take, get, or obtain

Verbs and such

Some random verbs and things stolen from the university-sanctioned textbook (Genki, found  at http://www.amazon.ca/Genki-Integrated-Course-Elementary-Japanese/dp/4789009637/ref=sr_1_2?ie=UTF8&s=books&qid=1233992832&sr=8-2).

yomimasu - to read

mizu - water

maiban - every evening (like konban)

asa - morning

shuumatsu - weekend

konban - evening

doyoobi - Saturday

taitei - usually 

kikimasu - to listen/hear

hanashimasu - to speak/talk