Aja on 27/9/2007 at 21:45
It's not difficult to learn the hiragana alphabet; I can write all forty-some characters, and I've only been at it since the beginning of the month.
Demagogue - were you the one who mentioned in a previous thread about teaching English in Japan? I haven't decided how much time I plan to spend there, but if I wanted earn some money on the side, that would undoubtedly be the route to take.
And otaku, as I understand the term, are people who fetishize Japan as some sort of ideal society. There's a big difference between a cultural interest and a rabid and desperate obsession with the comics/cartoons/j-pop.
catbarf on 27/9/2007 at 22:59
Quote Posted by RocketMan
What I meant was this:
The word "ma" in chinese has a bunch of different meanings....two of them are "horse" and "mother". Now you don't want to call someone's mom a horse right? So you have to SING the word. The "ma" has a different phonetic sound to it if you mean mother. This is quite common in chinese. We have some words in english like there, they're, their and lets ignore the fact that they're spelled differently. We still don't have to phoneticize them differently. Its the context of the sentence that determines their meanings.
I understand exactly. My point was merely that every language has it's confusing bits- my example was how in English, we have ten different words that all mean the same thing.
Shug on 27/9/2007 at 23:24
Quote Posted by Aja
It's not difficult to learn the hiragana alphabet; I can write all forty-some characters, and I've only been at it since the beginning of the month.
This is true, but unfortunately knowing the basic hiragana 'alphabet' pretty much gives you no real world application. To read even the most basic of signs you'll need to start on the 3,000 odd kanji in general use :D
I studied Japanese for about six years, but pretty much cut it after high school and have now brain-dumped most of it, sadly. Reading is definitely the most difficult part, as Japanese has a very solid sentence structure making it relatively easy in a speaking/listening sense.
For instance, time is specified early in the sentence and the verb always rounds it off, which can make things interesting in long sentences where you need to wait 'til the end to find out exactly what's going on.
RocketMan on 27/9/2007 at 23:33
Man the sentence structure is THE most difficult part of it for me. I am extatic however about there being no gender for nouns, no plurality, conjugation is simplified, etc. I have a crappy memory however and memorizing verbs/nouns/adjectives so i can actually say stuff worth while has been a real challenge
demagogue on 28/9/2007 at 02:50
Re: Chinese vs Japanese, my opinion is it's sort of a wash, Chinese wins on grammar and keeping it simple; Japanese on writing and pronunciation. To me I guess it comes down to prefering reading comics and doing business in Tokyo (where I have lots of friends) than reading sutras and doing business in Beijing.
By the way, I made a mnemonic chart for the first about 1000 kanji. It's on my other computer, but I'll upload it somewhere for you to look at, and anyone else if they want, when I can get internet access for it. It was helpful for me.
Quote Posted by Aja
Demagogue - were you the one who mentioned in a previous thread about teaching English in Japan? I haven't decided how much time I plan to spend there, but if I wanted earn some money on the side, that would undoubtedly be the route to take.
Yeah, I did JET, which if you're going to teach in Japan is definately the way to go. I actually was teaching in Seoul at a crappy cram school at the time I got accepted to JET in a rural place. I asked my friends about it, and they were unanimous, get out of this random school and go for the bigger fish. And they were right. If you get JET, do it ... great money, great contacts, and there's a "higher power" you can appeal to if you're about to get screwed (which isn't true for cram schools).
Quote:
And otaku, as I understand the term, are people who fetishize Japan as some sort of ideal society. There's a big difference between a cultural interest and a rabid and desperate obsession with the comics/cartoons/j-pop.
Literally it means "house", like "homebody" ... a person that just never leaves their house and is always staying alone inside playing with their little obsessions. In Japan itself, it's almost always negative, applying just to underground obsessives, starting with cameras, train sets, and scifi and now applying more to "dame" stuff, "forbidden" stuff, the more shameful the better ... AV and lolicon ... that kind of culture.
In the West it has a little better connotation just because no one really uses the term properly and they throw it out anytime Japanese culture comes up, whatever it is, even like comics and anime (which no one in Japan is going to call otaku because it's so normal; everybody reads comics) ... So it starts applying to anyone that's generally Japanophile & likes learning about the culture.
It's like it's two completely different concepts between using the term in Japan and in the West.
Aja on 28/9/2007 at 03:05
It sounds as though most JET applicants are placed in rural communities. So long as I had occasional access to the metropolitan areas, I'd be satisfied.
Scots Taffer on 28/9/2007 at 03:59
I have a friend who's been teaching English as a foreign language out in Japan for over two years now, Aja, if you want put in touch, I'll try my best but he's a sporadic arsehole at communicating.
Stitch on 28/9/2007 at 05:24
Quote Posted by Scots Taffer
I'll try my best but he's a sporadic arsehole at communicating.
You have a lot of friends like that!
Scots Taffer on 28/9/2007 at 05:28
Friendly kicks in the snatch only go so far, mind you. Offers of accomodation can be RETRACTED.
Shug on 28/9/2007 at 05:36
There are very few parts of Japan that I would consider properly "rural", to be honest
edit: he may be falling asleep in you, but i wouldn't call that 'accommodation' to be honest
