Bloody homos
There are a billion and one homonyms in Japanese (because Japanese just doesn't have enough sounds) which can lead to confusion even amongst native speakers.
To give you an example, let's look at the word "kougi" (pronounced like the dog "corgi").
My dictionary gives 14 entries:
講義 [こうぎ: KOUGI] lecture.
抗議 [こうぎ: KOUGI] protest, objection.
厚誼 [こうぎ: KOUGI] your kindness
公義 [こうぎ: KOUGI] justice, equity
好宜 [こうぎ: KOUGI] warm friendship
好誼 [こうぎ: KOUGI] warm friendship
交宜 [こうぎ: KOUGI] friendship, amity
交誼 [こうぎ: KOUGI] friendship, amity
巧技 [こうぎ: KOUGI] skill, fine workmanship
公議 [こうぎ: KOUGI] just view, public opinion
広義 [こうぎ: KOUGI] wide sense, broader application
高宜 [こうぎ: KOUGI] (your) kindness or favour (favor)
高誼 [こうぎ: KOUGI] (your) kindness or favour (favor)
公儀 [こうぎ: KOUGI] imperial court, shogunate government, authorities, public affairs, official, government
Thanks to the wonderful invention of kanji (Chinese characters), you can easily distinguish the meanings when you're dealing with text. In conversation you can usually distinguish from the context of the conversation, but in times when there is confusion Japanese people tend to explain the kanji for the word to get the meaning across.
This is done by:
a)Writing kanji in the air with your finger. I cannot for the life of me read this squiggly air Kanji.
or
b)Explaining what kanji the word consists of by relating them to unambiguous words. For example if one was to try to explain the word 特異性 (toku-i-sei) you could say weeell it's "toku" as in "tokubetsu 特別", "i" as in "kotonaru 異なる", and "sei" as in "seishitsu 性質". And in doing so the person would be like aaah I getcha now.
I learnt this word "特異性 tokuisei" only recently in my online Japanese class. I knew "異性 isei" already as "the opposite sex" and "特 toku" means special, so my first thoughts were wtf? the third sex? But no, no, the last ”性 [せい: SEI] (1) sex, gender, (2) nature, characteristic.” takes the meaning of (2) and not (1). "special", "different", "characteristic" = 特異性 [とくいせい: TOKUISEI] singularity, peculiarity, idiosyncrasy.
Lovely.
I had an encounter with these bloody homos at school;
Student: "Do you want to buy an ochaken (お茶券)?"
Me: "ochaken（お茶犬）?
Student: "Yeah we're selling them at the school festival"
Me: "You're selling ochaken（お茶犬） goods at the festival?"
Student: "No not ochaken（お茶犬）, ochaken (お茶券). The tea ceremony club is serving tea and if you want to attend to have to buy a ticket."
Me: "Oh, ok then."
-----------------
I boughts an iphone last weekeeend. It's bloody marvelous and I keep buying applications for it, though most of them are pretty cheap. Got a few fun games, some useful reference apps and language learning tools. Next on my list is the Arnold Schwarzenegger soundboard :D
I'm looking at getting a Korean dictionary as well, but I'm really torn as to whether to get a Japanese-Korean or English-Korean dictionary. Korean and Japanese words are a hell of a lot similar so it may make more sense to link new words to my Japanese vocabulary, but on the other hand if there are words I don't know in Japanese it's a pain to have to look them up. The price of both is about the same, and they have native recordings of Japanese and English words respectively (no Korean as it's designed for Korean learners).
It's kinda fun learning a new language again, I'd forgotten how hard it is at the start, there's so much I don't understand, and sounds seem alien and impossible to remember. But as with anything, if you stick at something, you'll improve. I've found that with a lot of things; Japanese, teaching, Judo. Things you used to find impossible you suddenly find you can do with ease. It's those little baby-steps that motivate me.
Tonight I took babysteps by memorizing the Korean days of the week...handily similar to Japanese ones because they derive from the same Chinese characters 〜曜日= 〜ようび (youbi) in Japanese and 〜요일 (yoil) in Korean
일요일 ilyoil 日曜日 にちようび nichiyoubi
월요일 wolyoil 月曜日 げつようび getsuyoubi
화요일 hwayoil 火曜日 かようび kayoubi
수요일 suyoil 水曜日 すいようび suiyoubi
목요일 mokyoil 木曜日 もくようび mokuyoubi
금요일 keumyoil 金曜日 きんようび kinyoubi
토요일 toyoil 土曜日 どようび doyoubi
Sorry I don't know how to romanize Korean cos there's a billion vowels I bothered to look up how to romanize Korean so you'll see that all the days of the week end in 〜ようび (youbi) for Japanese and 〜요일 (yoil) for Korean both deriving from 〜曜日.
Before 曜日 you can see different characters for different days.
日 means sun - Sunday.
月 means moon - Monday.
火 means fire - Tuesday.
水 means water - Wednesday.
木 means tree - Thursday.
金 means gold - Friday.
土 means soil - Saturday.
Sun and Sunday, moon and Monday are clearly similar to one another, but 火 and Tuesday, 水 and Wednesday are also related.
Let's look at 火水木金土. 星 means star.
火＋星＝ 火星 kasei - the planet Mars
水＋星＝ 水星 suisei - the planet Mercury
木＋星＝ 木星 mokusei - the planet Jupiter
金＋星＝ 金星 kinsei - the planet Venus
土＋星＝ 土星 dosei - the planet Saturn
Ok so if you look at the etymology of Tuesday you will find that it derives from Tiu's day with Tiu being the God of War. Who else is a god of war? Why that would be Mars. Mars->火星->火曜日= Tuesday.
Saturn and Saturday are obvious but if you look up all the others you'll find they follow this pattern. And in fact a lot of languages do, just take a look at this wikipedia page.
Ok enough babble.
edit: I'm going to introduce days of the week in class with the help of this TMBG's song. It's so catchy my bf keeps singing it, hopefully my kids will too.
To give you an example, let's look at the word "kougi" (pronounced like the dog "corgi").
My dictionary gives 14 entries:
講義 [こうぎ: KOUGI] lecture.
抗議 [こうぎ: KOUGI] protest, objection.
厚誼 [こうぎ: KOUGI] your kindness
公義 [こうぎ: KOUGI] justice, equity
好宜 [こうぎ: KOUGI] warm friendship
好誼 [こうぎ: KOUGI] warm friendship
交宜 [こうぎ: KOUGI] friendship, amity
交誼 [こうぎ: KOUGI] friendship, amity
巧技 [こうぎ: KOUGI] skill, fine workmanship
公議 [こうぎ: KOUGI] just view, public opinion
広義 [こうぎ: KOUGI] wide sense, broader application
高宜 [こうぎ: KOUGI] (your) kindness or favour (favor)
高誼 [こうぎ: KOUGI] (your) kindness or favour (favor)
公儀 [こうぎ: KOUGI] imperial court, shogunate government, authorities, public affairs, official, government
Thanks to the wonderful invention of kanji (Chinese characters), you can easily distinguish the meanings when you're dealing with text. In conversation you can usually distinguish from the context of the conversation, but in times when there is confusion Japanese people tend to explain the kanji for the word to get the meaning across.
This is done by:
a)Writing kanji in the air with your finger. I cannot for the life of me read this squiggly air Kanji.
or
b)Explaining what kanji the word consists of by relating them to unambiguous words. For example if one was to try to explain the word 特異性 (toku-i-sei) you could say weeell it's "toku" as in "tokubetsu 特別", "i" as in "kotonaru 異なる", and "sei" as in "seishitsu 性質". And in doing so the person would be like aaah I getcha now.
I learnt this word "特異性 tokuisei" only recently in my online Japanese class. I knew "異性 isei" already as "the opposite sex" and "特 toku" means special, so my first thoughts were wtf? the third sex? But no, no, the last ”性 [せい: SEI] (1) sex, gender, (2) nature, characteristic.” takes the meaning of (2) and not (1). "special", "different", "characteristic" = 特異性 [とくいせい: TOKUISEI] singularity, peculiarity, idiosyncrasy.
Lovely.
I had an encounter with these bloody homos at school;
Student: "Do you want to buy an ochaken (お茶券)?"
Me: "ochaken（お茶犬）?
Student: "Yeah we're selling them at the school festival"
Me: "You're selling ochaken（お茶犬） goods at the festival?"
Student: "No not ochaken（お茶犬）, ochaken (お茶券). The tea ceremony club is serving tea and if you want to attend to have to buy a ticket."
Me: "Oh, ok then."
-----------------
I boughts an iphone last weekeeend. It's bloody marvelous and I keep buying applications for it, though most of them are pretty cheap. Got a few fun games, some useful reference apps and language learning tools. Next on my list is the Arnold Schwarzenegger soundboard :D
I'm looking at getting a Korean dictionary as well, but I'm really torn as to whether to get a Japanese-Korean or English-Korean dictionary. Korean and Japanese words are a hell of a lot similar so it may make more sense to link new words to my Japanese vocabulary, but on the other hand if there are words I don't know in Japanese it's a pain to have to look them up. The price of both is about the same, and they have native recordings of Japanese and English words respectively (no Korean as it's designed for Korean learners).
It's kinda fun learning a new language again, I'd forgotten how hard it is at the start, there's so much I don't understand, and sounds seem alien and impossible to remember. But as with anything, if you stick at something, you'll improve. I've found that with a lot of things; Japanese, teaching, Judo. Things you used to find impossible you suddenly find you can do with ease. It's those little baby-steps that motivate me.
Tonight I took babysteps by memorizing the Korean days of the week...handily similar to Japanese ones because they derive from the same Chinese characters 〜曜日= 〜ようび (youbi) in Japanese and 〜요일 (yoil) in Korean
일요일 ilyoil 日曜日 にちようび nichiyoubi
월요일 wolyoil 月曜日 げつようび getsuyoubi
화요일 hwayoil 火曜日 かようび kayoubi
수요일 suyoil 水曜日 すいようび suiyoubi
목요일 mokyoil 木曜日 もくようび mokuyoubi
금요일 keumyoil 金曜日 きんようび kinyoubi
토요일 toyoil 土曜日 どようび doyoubi
Sorry I don't know how to romanize Korean cos there's a billion vowels I bothered to look up how to romanize Korean so you'll see that all the days of the week end in 〜ようび (youbi) for Japanese and 〜요일 (yoil) for Korean both deriving from 〜曜日.
Before 曜日 you can see different characters for different days.
日 means sun - Sunday.
月 means moon - Monday.
火 means fire - Tuesday.
水 means water - Wednesday.
木 means tree - Thursday.
金 means gold - Friday.
土 means soil - Saturday.
Sun and Sunday, moon and Monday are clearly similar to one another, but 火 and Tuesday, 水 and Wednesday are also related.
Let's look at 火水木金土. 星 means star.
火＋星＝ 火星 kasei - the planet Mars
水＋星＝ 水星 suisei - the planet Mercury
木＋星＝ 木星 mokusei - the planet Jupiter
金＋星＝ 金星 kinsei - the planet Venus
土＋星＝ 土星 dosei - the planet Saturn
Ok so if you look at the etymology of Tuesday you will find that it derives from Tiu's day with Tiu being the God of War. Who else is a god of war? Why that would be Mars. Mars->火星->火曜日= Tuesday.
Saturn and Saturday are obvious but if you look up all the others you'll find they follow this pattern. And in fact a lot of languages do, just take a look at this wikipedia page.
Ok enough babble.
edit: I'm going to introduce days of the week in class with the help of this TMBG's song. It's so catchy my bf keeps singing it, hopefully my kids will too.