Lost in Transliteration

...because translation is used too much, and the Japanese do a lot of transliteration (phonetic translations), but that's enough on the title, I'll get to that in a few moments.

So, yesterday I ate at a restaurant called "Joyfull" (yes, I noticed that too). I had chicken doria and I found out that in Japan, you can eat pancakes at lunch. On the way across town I noticed a store called "Joshin," and while that may not sound interesting to you, talk to any kid seventeen or under and they might think that funny (to josh is [I think slang for] to kid or joke). And while buying bread for tomorrow's breakfast we ran into an old Rotary member, who owned the bakery. There was a nice chat where I understood a little of what he was telling me, and my host mother helped translate the rest, then on the way out, he gave me a small cake as a gift.

Anyways, here's why I really wrote this entry: I'm offering my two bits on learning Japanese. First I'll start by saying I hope this help you oji-san, oni-san and one-san.

It should be noted that I'm the kind of guy who like to take things apart first, see how things interact, then put it back together to work as I want it to. So my approach may be more mathematical than yours.

Japanese is a language designed to be useful more-so than scientific. This is how I seperate languages that have phrases like, "imagotalktoamanaboutahosre," and ones that have words that build a sentence like, "I will now leave to return once I have fulfilled a basic physiological need." I'm explaining this because in Japanese, usually if something is understood, it's unnecessary, and while many of they're key phrases can be taken apart, they still don't fully explain their use.

Here are the books I'm using. My dictionary is the Random House Japanese-English English-Japanese Dictionary. It's good for its purpose. It offers good translations and catalogues japanese words using the roman alphabet (romaji). It gives you the english word, the japanese word in romaji, and then the japanese word in japanese (kanji or kana, no furigana, but that's where the romaji comes in). It also has a chart in the introduction of all the kana characters. It's a pocket size dictionary (i.e. too big for your pocket) and the only problem I have is that some kanji are too small to make out in size ten font. I advise neither for nor against this book since all the dictionaries I've seen are the same.

For Kanji I'm using Kanji & Kana revised addition from the Tuttle library. It's very good for kanji, it has over two-thousand which can be looked up by stroke count, components, or pronounciation. It also offers history and explaintions of the japanese writting style and hiragana and katakana. All in all, a very good book. My only trouble with it is it's six by nine inch size (bigger than most of my pockets). It's way of looking up kanji by component is extremely useful if you're like me and still don't know exactly how to count the storkes properly (there really does seem to be an art to it) and don't want to look through the full pages of kanji of six to eleven strokes (which is exactly what this language would give my otherwise [bad pun]). Highly suggested.

For verbs I have another Tuttle book: The Complete Japanese Verb Guide. I like this book, it explains Japanese verbs very well and once through the introduction of how to use Japanese verbs, it offeres the proper conjugation (in the Beshrelle style) of about six hundred along with examples at the bottom of the page. It offers the kanji and kana form of the verb at the top of the page and romaji for the rest (which is fine because if you know the original spelling of a verb, you just need to add its fixes in hiragana). The only problem with this book is that it lacks an index, instead, the verbs are in alphabetical order in romaji (but you could use a dictionary for finding the verb then look it up). Also, its the same size as Kanji & Kana. I still suggest it, and I might write an index myself just for the practice.

Unfortunately, the only Tuttle book on adjectives and adverb was more of a work book with many fill-in-the-blanks. So, instead, I got The Handbook of Japanese Adjectives and Adverbs (coincidentally, I just noticed this book to has [a few] fill in the blank, but I reread the reviews, I got the right book). Anyways, some of you might be wondering why I'm suggesting a book on descriptive words rather than a dictionary, well, that's because japanese adjective and adverbs conjugate. This books is not exaclty what I wanted, but seeing my options, it's probably the best choice. The book is stangely indexed, but I'll get past that. Anyways, you'll benefit from a book on the subject. Suggested.

Next on the list is a novel. That may sound weird, but James Clavell's Shogun is an amazing book. It offers a mostly true story about the beginning of the Edo period. It's an amazing story, well written and the main character is an Englishman who is learning the language. About every twenty pages or so it has a few sentences of japanese and while this is mostly formal japanese for thing like "You are forbidden to enter this ship," it's still interesting to see. But the main reason I highly suggest this book as your next read (not as a resource) is that it provides a western perspective and eastern explinations on many issues in Japan. If you have the time to read eleven-hundred pages, this is a good book for you.

And last and least is Japanese for Dummies. Its title really does offer a good description of the book. If you want to learn to speak Japanese for your week long vacation (rather than buy a phrase book), this might be for you. It's everything shortened into one book. It explains how to introduce yourself, give your contact information, eat out, shop and travel in japanese. It was a nice starting point for me, but very shortly afterwords it became little more than a nuissance. Some of you may find this book useful and interesting, but in my case, I'm trying to learn the language as a whole, and this book offers little as a reference book compared to the other members of this list (with exception, of course, to Shogun), especially since it's designed for (continental) American readers with pronounciations that are close to, but not, romaji and no kana or kanji. The books only use to me are it's lists of numbers, particles, et cetera. Not very suggested, judge for yourself.

For more books, you should check out amazon.com, it has many. The custom reviews are helpful, as is the ability to peek inside the book, and if you don't like the one you're looking at, underneath the description is a list of similar books. Scroll through and find one you do like. Also, I bought my books on adjectives and my books on verbs in Japan (after looking them up on amazon) and I found that it would have been cheaper to buy them online and have them shipped internationally (they cost thirty, ten for shipping internationally, and here they cost fifty).

Also, if you really want to get into it, all the manga I've seen offer furigana making them great reading material unlike my modern japanese literature textbook at school which offers difficult kanji definitions for difficult kanji. And fansubbed japanese television shows and movies are a great way of learning names, pronounciation, key phrases, and even a few cultural tips (only subtitles done by fans offer explainations, shows dubbed or subbed by corporations will be Americanized, and many fansubbed shows are available, and currently legal for download). I would like to suggest video games, but it's a catch twenty-two of if you don't know japanese than you can't understand enough to play them, and if you do understand them than you already know japanese (or it's been Americanized).

Well, that's all for now.