Episode 5 – Japanese Made Easy

Full Episode Audio (download link is to the right of the volume icon)

Exercises Only

Hi Greg here. Welcome to Japanese Made Easy Episode 5. Before doing some review let’s learn some vocabulary we can use in todays lesson.

These are easy cognates, and all are places where we can get food or drinks.

スタバ　スタバ I always order a Large White Moka with ice when I go to

スタバ In English we say Starbucks, in Japanese the common way to say it these days is a shortened

スタバ

マクドナルド I used to eat Big Macs at マクドナルド For clarity you can use the longer version of Mc Donald’s but these days the shorter version is popular

マック マック

You and a friend were just talking about grabbing some coffee.

Walking in a shopping area, you come around the corner and notice a Starbucks. How would you point it out to a friend?

スタバある。 スタバある。

You and a friend head to Mc Donald’s. You go to where you thought it was located, but to your surprise it’s not there. How would you bring up and mention the fact that… There’s no McDonalds, that McDonald’s doesn’t exist in a particular location?

マックない。マックない。

Two more.. These aren’t restaurants, but we can still buy food and other things there..

コンビニ コンビニ

Actually, there used to be a Mc Donald’s where you went, but it was converted into a 711 コンビニ

And again this cognate is really shortened. We’d say convenience store, in Japanese they are dropping the store part, and shortening the convenience part, leaving us with just

コンビニ And finally…

スーパー スーパー When I go grocery shopping for things like fruit, vegetables, milk, eggs, and things like that. I go to a

スーパー Can you think of what word this is in English?… the Japanese version it’s just the first part of the longer English version

スーパー Did you get it? Supermarket.　

In Japanese, try saying “Convenience store and a supermarket”

コンビニとスーパー　コンビニとスーパー

Point out to a friend that there’s a convenience store and a supermarket exists.

コンビニとスーパーがあるよ。

For that one you may have noticed that “ga” wasn’t dropped. Keep in mind that there is no requirement to drop or not to drop them. As sentences get longer, particles won’t be dropped as much because they provide clarity in meaning. For quick sentences that are just a couple words, were there is little chance for confusion, they are more likely to be dropped.

All right we’re going to learn a new particle but first we need a new verb, or action word as I like to call them… First just listen..

行く（いく）　行く

See if you can figure out the meaning from context.

Your friend asks what you’re plans are for the day. You say… I need some new shoes so I’m gonna 行く to the shoe store. Or…

A guy says to his friend… I want to grab a doughnut.

Do you want to 行くwith me?

His friend says, “Sure where do you want to 行く?

He says… Let’s 行く to my favorite donut shop, Mr. Doughnuts.

So in English we say “go”. In Japanese they’d say..

行く

By the way, Mr. Doughnuts, or in Japanese…

ミスタードーナツ　is an actual doughnut chain store in Japan. In fact I went to the one in Kyoto station when I was last there.

When talking about it people tend to shorten it to just

ミスドー ミスドー

Ok, so now we have a bunch of country names, and places we can work with and we learned the Japanese word for go.

One thing to keep in mind about Japanese word order is that verbs always go at the end. If you recall iru and aru are the verbs for existence, and they were always at the end of the sentence. So just listen to the following sentences in very casual Japanese and let the pattern sink in.

Chris says, I feel like having some coffee, so he picks up his car keys and heads out the door saying…

スタバ行く。 スタバ行く。

and asks… Do you want me to bring you back a coffee or something? You say “Nah.. I could use a burger though.” Chris says.. Ok, after

スタバ… マック行く。Then he asks, “You want a Bic Mac or what?” You say… Ya know, never mind. I need to pick up some groceries anyway so later..

スーパー行く。 スーパー行く。

This is pretty simple really, keeping in mind that this is very casual Japanese, we are just saying the place, and go or will go as the dictionary form of verbs is also future tense. For these the idea was that the person was about to leave, and so

スタバ行く。would be along the lines of “I’m going to go to Starbucks.”

For this type of future tense we can use the dictionary form of verbs, and notice we haven’t used any pronouns. In Japanese when who is doing what is clear, they are usually dropped.

If there are two people in the room, and one person says directly to the other “Starbucks go” and it’s not a question, it’s pretty clear that the speaker is the one that is going, and so “I” isn’t necessary.

Ok, you give it a try. With just two words, say the casual Japanese equivalent of “I’m going to go to McDonalds.”

マック行く。Try saying, I’m going to go to the convenience store.

コンビニ行く。 コンビニ行く。

I’m going to go to the grocery store, or supermarket.

スーパー行く。

Keep in mind, in very casual Japanese it’s common to drop particles. That being said, I want to introduce another particle so let’s switch to polite Japanese.

As always, instead of rules it’s best that you be guided to figure out the pattern on your own which approximates how we all internalized grammar when we are young.

In Casual Japanese we heard…

マック行く。Speaking politely…

マクドナルドに行きます。マクドナルドに行きます。 Casual

コンビニ行く。Polite

コンビニに行きます。 コンビニに行きます。Casual

スーパー行く。Polite

スーパーに行きます。 スーパーに行きます。

Ok, you give it a try. With just that and having yet to explain anything see if you can get the next ones right.

First, casual Japanese. “I’m going to go to Starbucks.”

スタバ行く。and polite.

スタバに行きます。 スタバに行きます。

Casual Japanese… I’m going to the United States.

アメリカに行く。and polite…

アメリカに行きます。

You may have noticed, for the “I’m going to Starbucks.” example, the “ni” particle was dropped. But in the “I’m going to the U.S.” example, “ni” wasn’t dropped.

アメリカに行く。

This is really a feel thing. The difference in the communication of the idea “Gonna run over to Starbucks real quick.” vs. “Gonna run over to the United States real quick.” The structure is the same, but the feel is entirely different.

So, the tendency in Japanese is that this bigger event that requires planning vs. running an errand, will use the particle for clarity.

Nothing to worry about really as a student, as you can always use particles if you want. It’s just something to be aware of if you encounter it and are wondering.

Let’s break a couple of these down and see what’s going on.

スタバに行きます。Literally just Starbucks, the particle “ni” and then the action word “go” or 行きます

As I mentioned for an English speaker who is just getting started with Japanese, this sentence will feel fairly incomplete, and it’s worth mentioning again.

In Japanese if who we are talking about is understood, the pronoun is often dropped. So if translating スタバに行きます。into natural English, the speaker would have said.. “I’m going to Starbucks.”

Text books for beginners will usually include the pronouns in sample sentences, for example… I, he, she, you, but really it’s not natural to include them any where near as much as we do in English, and the sooner you get used to dropping them as Japanese people would, the better, because it does feel strange at first.

————————– Tip Of The Day ——————————

I invite people to write in with questions and comments, and one came in recently that I’d like to share. A listener wrote in saying a little bit about themselves and had a couple questions about life in Japan, they mentioned “I’m really enjoying the podcast.” Thank you for that. And.. the main question was..

“I’m not sure if I should learn polite or casual Japanese. ” “Which should I be focusing on?”

Good question. It depends really on what your plans are for the language. If you are a complete beginner and are coming to Japan for a brief stay, say.. maybe a week or two and don’t plan on continuing to study after your trip. I would focus on polite Japanese as that is what you will want to use with most adults that you encounter out in public, and with people that you are introduced to.

If you are going to stay longer term, learn them both, and give them equal practice time. If your plan is to be a speaker of the Japanese language, then being able to switch between polite and casual Japanese falls under that umbrella. You need to be able to do both, and one really doesn’t have priority over the other in my opinion.

Simply, when learning new words or constructions, make sure to practice both side-by-side, so it’s not a matter of one or the other.

On a side note, by the end of this podcast you will have a firm grasp on how to change polite to casual, and casual to polite generally speaking. So just continue doing that and you’ll be fine. I hope that helps.

————————– Tip Of The Day ——————————

I guess by now you are starting to pick up on the pattern for this usage of “ni”. So let’s look at the SLT.

SLT stands for Super Literal Translation

and will help us to understand and use particles correctly in Japanese.

Imagine, you and a friend who doesn’t speak any Japanese are at the airport and you run into a Japanese guy who is a business acquaintance. You ask where he’s headed. He replies…

カナダに行きます。

Your friend who doesn’t speak Japanese asks you, “What did he say?” How would you translate

カナダに行きます。 into English for your friend? You’d likely say.. “He said, “He’s going to Canada.”

Ok, so that’s just a translation. A literal translation for the purpose of studying as we do here in the podcast would be…

Canada, then the particle “ni”, then will go.

But a Super Literal Translation, will be even deeper. We’ll get to the core of what the particle is telling us as well.

So let’s replace “ni” with the Super Literal Translation.

カナダに行きます。would be…

Canada, is the target location of the following action word, will go.

One more time…

Canada, is the target location of the following action word, will go.

That seems like a lot so lets dial it back just a bit. If the person had said…

アメリカに行きます。The Super Literal Translation I’d give this is… America, then in stead of に, is the target location of, go.

You get the idea right? For the sake of understanding and again, not confusing “ni” with other particles that we might use, we replace it with

“is the target location of the action word“

Where you headed? Polite Japanese.. Tell them, “I’m going to Mexico.”

メキシコに行きます。 メキシコに行きます。

I bet you got that no problem, and the super literal translation, shortening it a bit..

Mexico, target location of , go.

We haven’t learned the following Japanese yet, but watch how we can now just plugin the idea of “ni = target location of the action word.”

Speaking of money, to put it in a wallet. This would be phrased,

“Wallet に put in.” wallet is the target location of the action word, put in.

To write on a piece of paper, “Paper, に write.”

Paper is the target location of write.

Continuing with polite Japanese, tell somebody you are going to Australia

オーストラリアに行きます。 オーストラリアに行きます。

What’s the short Super literal translation? Australia, target location of, go.

Tell somebody you are going to New Zealand.

ニュージーランドに行きます。 ニュージーランドに行きます。

I want to mention and stress the point again that this is just　one particular usage of the “ni” particle.

There are other usages that have nothing to do with this one. So just as we learned a specific use of “ga”, we want to do the same with “ni”. That is understand it, and then practice it when speaking so it becomes second nature before we add any other usages of the same particle.

Let’s add some well known cities in Japan. First lets listen to get a feel for the pronunciation.

東京(とうきょう)　東京

大阪(おおさか)　 大阪

京都(きょうと)　 京都

東京, 大阪, 京都

As I mentioned in the last episode, for Japanese Mastery Method members,

this will be review and you should already know the SLT for ni, but this casual vs polite practice is worth doing.

Ok, polite Japanese… Tell somebody you are going to Tokyo

東京に行きます。 東京に行きます。

Osaka

大阪に行きます。 大阪に行きます。

Imagine your friend is a photographer and travels around taking photos. You ask him what city he’s headed next. In casual Japanese, without dropping the particle because it’s not just an errand, but more along the lines of traveling, how would he say “I am going to Kyoto.”

京都に行く。

Casual Japanese say. “I’m going to the supermarket.”

スーパー行く。Same thing but polite.

スーパーに行きます。 And what’s the Super Literal Translation or SLT? Supermarket or grocery store, target location of, go or will go.

Why… do we want to remember the SLT? The reason is, that when you start to learn a variety of particles, and more and more separate usages of the same particle, we can self check the usage by replacing the particle with the corresponding Super Literal Translation.

Alright, polite Japanese, tell somebody you are going to the supermarket and convenience store.

スーパーとコンビニに行きます。 スーパーとコンビニに行きます。

Literally we had, grocery store, and convenience store, are the target location of the action word, go.

Somebody is going to McDonald’s and Starbucks

マクドナルドとスタバに行きます。And quick note, not a rule, just a feeling… we are using the longer version of McDonald’s when speaking politely because it feels a bit more formal than the somewhat slangy feeling shorter version.

マクドナルドに行きます。

Ok almost done. You expect to see a supermarket but it’s no longer there. In polite Japanese, how would you point out or mention that the supermarket doesn’t exist..

スーパーがありません。And the same thing but casual

スーパーない。

Since that’s no longer a shopping option you decide to continue down the street to where you know there is a convenience store. You get near and.. wait.. what? It’s gone too, now it’s a tire store.

Still casual, point out and mention… There’s no convenience store

コンビニない。

An older man says in Japanese, “What’d you say?”

Tell him in polite Japanese.

コンビニがありません。

Casual Japanese… Your friend Pat who used to work at the

コンビニ　is no longer there… Mention it out loud.. basically, bringing it up to anybody who might be listening or talking to yourself even…

パットいない。。。The old man puts his hand to his ear again and says.. “What’d you say there?” Politely tell him…

パットがいません。

Alright awesome job. Your speaking homework for this lesson is to practice telling actual people, or imaginary people where you are going.

Try to remember all the places we’ve learned so far. But also, use any other places you might know in Japanese, and because pattern and construction practice are really the key to fluency and fast smooth speaking, you can substitute places you don’t know in Japanese.

Anything is fine.. like if you don’t know the word for “aquarium” still you can practice the pattern.. “Aquarium に行きます。” When you eventually learn these words you’ll be able to just plug them in.

As usual I’ve made an extra practice version of todays lesson. You can grab that over at Japanese Made Easy.com and I’ll see you in the next episode.