Daily Thread: simple questions, comments that don’t need their own posts, and first time posters go here (April 21, 2023)

22 comments

1. 「あなたにしかできないことがありますよ」
   In this phrase, why is に used instead of no particle at all?

2. **Though i understood JP people says “きゅん/kyun” when they saw something is cute or lovely on social medias , but what does おなかの奥がきゅうううん means here?**
   **Hope someone can help me understand this correctly .**
   A character said a girl is beautiful, and she felt too embarrassing after that.
   Girl「あ、あうう……っ、見ないでぇ、見ないでぇ。ゆうしゃさまにじっと見られるとぉ……っ。おなかの奥がきゅうううんってぇなっちゃううう」

3. Do people ever start a thread to just free chat in Japanese together? Or is there a different sub that’s more appropriate for that?

4. Now that my sabbatical is over. I’m hoping to jump back into learning Japanese once again. As I was reviewing everything that I learned before my break. I’m starting to realize that I’ve forgotten quite a few kanji.

   Does anyone know of any pre-built Anki decks that cover all of the Kanji in Genki 1? (And maybe 2?) I’d like to catch back up to where I was before as quickly as I can. If one doesn’t exist, I’ll try to make my own of course. But for now, is a pre-made one exists, it would surely be higher quality than something I’ve cooked up.

5. Hello, I am new here and just started learning the fundamentals of Japanese pronunciation and written forms. After beginning to copy down the Hiragana and Katakana on my printed sheets, I noticed a slight difference between the written form that the sheet wants me to emulate, and the typed forms. I googled this difference and stumbled on [this reddit post](https://www.reddit.com/r/LearnJapanese/comments/2on4lf/differences_between_written_and_typed_kana/), but I was hoping someone could revisit this question: Is it better to emulate the hand-written or typed form of Kana/Kanji as a beginner? Some would label this pedantic, but I just see it as paying attention to the details and making sure I get things right as a beginner.

6. Question about using なら for contrast and how particles change.

   Working in Genki and have an example like this:

   Q: ロバートさんはけさ、コーヒーを飲みましたか

   A: 紅茶なら飲みましたが、コーヒーは飲みませんでした

   I don’t really understand the second half, why it’s using は instead of を。

   Later questions do the same thing, where it has a sentence like 東京は行きません　where I would have thought the particle should be に . Is this the famous は used for contrast I hear so much about? Or is something else happening unique to なら ?

7. Do you guys have recommendations for visual novels that can be read/played on mobile phone?

8. I’m looking to start learning Japanese from scratch and plan to teach myself, I was wondering if genki or minna no nihongo would be better for self teaching?

9. [deleted]

10. For people struggling with kanji out there. Just try to cross your first 500. If you learn them through vocab you after crossing a certain threshold you will be able to start guessing the readings of compounds significantly more reliably than pure luck. Even if the components have multiple possible readings, some combinations would just feel more right hence the better guesses. Also when you CAN guess the reading I would encourage you to do so, because if it turns out to be right you will retain it with much less effort.

11. What exactly does “ほごく” mean? On my guide paper it’s translated to my native language which I’m not very good at so i can’t understand it
    A bit of googling says it means “sanctuary” or “reserve”(for wild animals) and i’m just not so sure about the general definition of it

12. I don’t get the function of を in the sentence below. There doesn’t seem to be a verb for the object marked by を. In my dictionary きっかけ counts as an expression and not a verb. Can someone help me clear this up?

    松川先生との出会いをきっかけに、私の人生は変わった。

    [I got the sentence from Takoboto/Tatoeba list, so I don’t have further context.]

13. I signed up for the N3 in summer so I’m trying to get back into a routine, but I’ve been having difficulty what with having a young kid at home and work and so on.

    However, over the last two days I’ve caught up on the Anki deficit I had built up. Also I have been reading some short stories from my N3 graded reader. Finally I’ve been practicing listening questions on this app I had forgotten I had.

    With the listening I had forgotten that quite often you can not really understand what’s being said but you can still take a good guess just with key words and a bit of common sense lol.

    Maybe I can get it, but I’m expecting the winter exam to be more realistic.

14. Approximately when or at which level did you feel comfortable swapping your dictionary deffinitions to japanese??

15. Anyone know of apps/sites/subreddits/etc which provide writing prompts that focus on applying different grammar or vocabulary?

    For example it would say “Write something using や to describe a list of foods you like.” Then tomorrow might be “What does an elephant look like? Use そう to describe it.”

    The reason I ask is because I find that as I get further along, there’s grammar which I know when I read but might not remember as well when writing. Having rotating prompts to use that grammar or common phrases would help make sure I get more even coverage of output practice.

    My first thought is using bunpro as I’m already signed up there, but there’s more daily reviews than I want to write for right now.

16. How do you say “for the first time in X” in Japanese？For example would Xの中初めて・・・ make sense?

    Like あの地域には雨が2ヶ月間の中初めて降っていました。to say “It was raining in that area for the first time in two months.”

17. What is the point of doing anki decks like core 2k/6k?

    I’ve been studying Japanese for almost 3 months now. I do anki daily. 5 new words a day. I find it sooo hard to remember the meanings of the words. When I do my Pimsleur or wani kani though my brain makes the connection so much easier.

    I’m wondering why I should even keep doing anki? I will do sentence mining in a couple months. My excuse I feel is because I’m not really having an emotional connection with the words in anki. Is this normal? Should I keep doing anki? Is the purpose just so my brain can be primed a bit to say “hey I recognize this word?”

18. I’ve been listening to this song for quite a while and a part of the lyrics confuses me:

    常(とわ)と書いて　永久(とわ)の愛で
    護(まも)りたいと知ってよ

    and

    直(ただ)と書いて　無償(ただ)の愛で
    包みたいと知ってよ

    If I try to literally translate this part:

    I want you to know that I want to protect you with an everlasting love, that is written as “endless” (????)

    and

    I want you to know that I want to wrap you in a priceless love that is written as “free” (??????)

    —

    Song in question: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=STXl0n4abIo

    (1:06 and 2:33)

19. Can someone help me understand this article? Does it mention the actual reason why they are abolishing this legislation? The whole point of it is to help determine who a baby’s father is, correct? Am i missing a detail here?

    妊娠や出産の時期によって父親を推定している「嫡出推定」の制度をめぐり、再婚している場合は、離婚から300日以内に生まれた子どもでも、今の夫の子と推定することを盛り込んだ改正民法は、来年4月に施行されることになりました。

    明治31年から続く民法の「嫡出推定」の制度では、離婚から300日以内に生まれた子どもは前の夫の子と推定することなどが規定されていて、これを避けたい母親が出生届を出さず、戸籍のない子が生じる主な原因と指摘されていました。

    こうした課題を踏まえ、改正民法などでは、再婚している場合は、離婚から300日以内に生まれた子どもでも今の夫の子と推定するとし、これに伴って「前の夫」と「今の夫」で、法律上、父親が重複する可能性がなくなることから、女性に限って離婚から100日間、再婚を禁止している規定を廃止するなどとしています。

    改正民法は、21日の閣議で来年4月1日に施行されることが決まりました。

    改正民法が適用されるのは、原則として施行日以降に生まれた子どもで、女性の100日間の再婚禁止期間の撤廃も同日施行されます。

20. Can someone help me with the last part of this? I’m trying to say:

    “The beginning is difficult, because there are many things to learn” (talking about learning Japanese)

    Here’s my best attempt:

    始まりは難しい、多いことに勉強しますから

    Is this correct?

21. I was reading an article on Tofugu and came across this sentence ‘ ジェニーは先生である ‘. I was wondering why they are using both だ and ある here. Why not just ‘ ジェニーは先生だ ‘ ?

22. Is there a book for readings of common japanese names?