Now when I say this, I’m specifically referring to how the first 10 days of the month have specific names. Like the 4th of the month being よっか、or the 6th being むいか。I’m having trouble remembering these, and was wondering if y’all had any tips.
No, I can’t help you with that. It helps if you know the ひとつ、ふたつ、みっつ way of counting, since they’re related.
よっつ->よっか むっつ->むいか etc. ついたち is the odd one out.
Add it to an anki deck focusing on days of month. 🙂
As u/Educational-Pause-23 says, these are mostly related to the old Japanese numbers. It’s normal to struggle with them for a while.
Here are the tips that helped me:
– ついたち: It may help you to remember that ついたち is an old word originally derived from つき (“moon”, i.e., month in this context) + たち (“start”) – ふつか. I’ll teach you a new vocabulary word: ふつかよい (“hangover”) — literally, two-day (alcohol) intoxication. – It helps if you remember that, for some of the old Japanese numbers, multiplying by two keeps the same hiragana row at the start: – みっか and むいか (3 and 6) – よっか and ようか (4 and 8). よっか is related to よん (one of the ways to say the number 4). – (Note: for the ～つ counters, this also applies to ひとつ and ふたつ (1 and 2), but for days of the month, 1 is superseded by ついたち.) – なのか is related to なな (the old Japanese number 7 still in use today) – ここのか begins with the same consonant as きゅう for 9 (even they’re unrelated, this is useful as a mnemonic) – とおか begins with a /t/ sound, just like “ten”.
So that leaves out 5, which I just brute-force memorized as the remaining case.
3 comments
*mnemonic
No, I can’t help you with that. It helps if you know the ひとつ、ふたつ、みっつ way of counting, since they’re related.
よっつ->よっか
むっつ->むいか
etc.
ついたち is the odd one out.
Add it to an anki deck focusing on days of month. 🙂
As u/Educational-Pause-23 says, these are mostly related to the old Japanese numbers. It’s normal to struggle with them for a while.
Here are the tips that helped me:
– ついたち: It may help you to remember that ついたち is an old word originally derived from つき (“moon”, i.e., month in this context) + たち (“start”)
– ふつか. I’ll teach you a new vocabulary word: ふつかよい (“hangover”) — literally, two-day (alcohol) intoxication.
– It helps if you remember that, for some of the old Japanese numbers, multiplying by two keeps the same hiragana row at the start:
– みっか and むいか (3 and 6)
– よっか and ようか (4 and 8). よっか is related to よん (one of the ways to say the number 4).
– (Note: for the ～つ counters, this also applies to ひとつ and ふたつ (1 and 2), but for days of the month, 1 is superseded by ついたち.)
– なのか is related to なな (the old Japanese number 7 still in use today)
– ここのか begins with the same consonant as きゅう for 9 (even they’re unrelated, this is useful as a mnemonic)
– とおか begins with a /t/ sound, just like “ten”.
So that leaves out 5, which I just brute-force memorized as the remaining case.
edit: add some points, clarification