Daily Thread: simple questions, comments that don’t need their own posts, and first time posters go here (July 01, 2023)

14 comments

1. Im roughly N4ish and was interested in expanding my keigo knowledge, I primarily use Genki2, bunpro, and WK – are there any other good resources the focus deeper on keigo?

2. Saw this sentence on Jisho while searching around:

   私は彼女との約束を取り消した。

   Excluding の, I suppose the sentence would translate to something like “I cancelled a promise with her”, but then what additional meaning does の brings in this sentence? Would there be any grammatical mistake if の was actually excluded from the sentence?

3. I been doing a bunch of like 20 year old tests i found on the internet, as well as some kanzen master. Judging from those i know it decently well and would be likely to pass, but then i did a recent modern test and I didnt recognize as much of the words and grammar at all. In the old test and kanzen masteri recognize most of the stuff.
   Has it changed much over time, is it pointless to practice with such old material? where can i find more modern material? Im referring to N1 in my case.

4. Hello everyone 🤗 May I ask for your advice , I’m self studying N5
   This is my daily routine :
   Anki ( 2k/6k ) 6 New cards a day ( jlab’s ) 10 New cards
   1 Page of yotsuba
   Write at least 1 Sentence down as a dairy
   Listen to a podcast
   Watch YouTuber at least 20 min
   and I’m studying Genki 1 at my own pace.

   Any advice And am I on the right track?
   P.S .. when I listen to podcasts/ YouTube I understand like 30% I don’t really understand each sentence but I can get the hang of it by pictures.

5. 食べてばかりいないで少し運動した方がいいですよ。

   I’m struggling with the “ばかりいないで” part.

   As I understand it, ばかり means something like “only/always” doing something (in a critical tone), and ないで means something like “without” doing something.

   So this is my best guess: “Without only eating, you should exercise a little.”

   Will someone please clarify?

   Thanks!

6. Anyone here with Japanese tattoos ever taken the JLPT?

   I have a tattoo on each of my wrists and the rules say that you’ll be disqualified (red card) if you’re “writing numbers or characters on the cloth or any part of your body”.

   When I took the JLPT last winter I wore a sweatshirt and I didn’t even think of my tattoos maybe being a problem, but I’m taking the JLPT tomorrow as well and it’s going to be very hot, so I’d rather not have to wear long sleeved shirt.

   It’s not like I just got random Japanese words I wanna remember for the test (ミュージックどこまでも連れてって and ミュージックどこまでも寄り添って), but I don’t expect the instructors to give a shit about that.

   I’m thinking of buying some packaging tape to tape over my wrists and also bringing a long sleeved shirt just in case taping up my tattoos isn’t sufficient from the instructor’s point of view, but on the off chance that anyone here has some experience I’d really appreciate reading it.

7. What JLPT level would be enough to go to Japan and make some friends as an exchange student? The courses at the partner university are all in English, but I want to try and make at least some casual friends while staying there. I know that the JLPT doesn’t really test your production ability, but some sort of estimate would really help with my motivation and give me a more concrete goal.

8. I don’t have the means to take the upcoming JLPT, but I’d still like to benchmark myself using the [sample questions available on the official JLPT website](https://www.jlpt.jp/samples/forlearners.html). Since the JLPT has time limits, I was wondering what a fair time limit would be to complete the N2 questions so that I can simulate the pressure.

9. Sorry to beat a dead horse from [the other day](https://old.reddit.com/r/LearnJapanese/comments/14jxmkw/daily_thread_simple_questions_comments_that_dont/jpoxc3h/), but I’m a bit thick so I have some follow up questions.

   To make things simple, I’ll be referencing [this dictionary source](https://dictionary.goo.ne.jp/word/%E3%81%A6%E3%81%AF/), so please use it in your reply if it fits.

   ——

   ##Question 1:

   In 理解してはくれなかった , which usage of ては is this? Usage 2 seems the closest but I am not sure if it could be rephrased with たからには or if it matches the examples well.

   ——

   ##Question 2:

   Shin-Kanzen Master Grammar N1 describes the grammar point ～ようでは as ～のような良くない状態では、良くない結果になるだろう

   But I can’t actually find a Japanese resource online that actually defines ようでは besides teaching resources meant for foreigners. Is there a reason for this? Usually every tiny feature of the Japanese language is diligently catalogued and talked about by Japanese people looking to define their own usages (including the dictionary entry for ては I provided earlier), so it’s interesting that this one seems to have not been given any notice. Is my algorithm bubble messing with me?

   ——

   ##Question 3:

   What is the main difference between ～ようでは and Definition 1 of ては ? Please provide lots of example sentences where one or the other won’t work.

   ～ようでは being defined as ～のような良くない状態では、良くない結果になるだろう

   at first glance seems basically the same as ては Definition 1:

   １ 危惧・不都合などの感情をもたらす条件を仮定して示す。…たら。「けが人が出―大変だ」「死んではなんにもならない」

   Though one uses 結果 and the other uses 条件 , which to my poor brain don’t seem that dissimilar. What stands out to me is that my book specifics 良くない状態 as a condition for ようでは , but I’m not sure how relevant that is…

10. What’s the difference between 夕陽 and 夕日. They both appear to mean setting sun and they are pronounced the same. Any situation where we would use one over the other?

11. I bought an artbook of kawase hasui but it’s entirely in japanese and my idea was to take the summer to try and translate it. I don’t know a thing about japanese, so I am here to ask for an advice, should I try to learn japanese and translate it? try to find the “alphabet” (kana? style of kanji??? Sorry don’t know hahaha) and translate it literally? or maybe just use some app to translate it visually? Any other options?

12. Hello, very early beginner here. I’m very good with the kana but as I’m starting to learn grammar, I also want to learn vocabulary / kanji so I can piece together sentences myself as a form of practice. I seem to understand the difference between kunyomi & onyomi, but even though I’ve read “the kunyomi readings are usually used when kanji is compounded together”, I see kanji with kana on either side read in the kunyomi form. This made me wonder if a grammar rule was in play that I din’t know about, or if the onyomi reading is just what you *call* the kanji when it isn’t used in a sentence. Any ideas?

13. Hi, I have just finished my university degree learning Japanese and Spanish! I am due to go to Spain this year to teach English and wanted to self study Japanese this year before potentially coming back to Japan to teach English.

    I spent 4 months each in Spain and Japan last year. I had a two month gap between being in both countries where I tried really hard to self study and improve, I found that I enjoyed it more since I could study at my own pace than at university. So I am excited to study when and how I want. What is a schedule / method that worked for you?

    In my university classes in the UK, we covered genki, part of tobira, the Great Japanese 30 and in Japan, we used textbooks called 留学のための漢字の教科書 (intermediate) and 中級を学ぼう発現56.

    Should I go back to tobira, even if I have covered N1-3 grammar and vocab in the textbooks I have more recently studied?

    Due to learning online for a big portion of my course and not understanding certain grammar items/kanji (despite learning them early on), I should be at an N2 level, really I think I am around N3. What textbooks/resources would you recommend for self study?

    I think my technique for studying really backfired, when I was in first and second year, I rarely practiced properly. I used to look at kanji and sometimes not even write them out. I did the same with grammar, I never wrote out sentences for people to mark. Now I practice handwriting kanji on my tablet on Anki and write sentences to practice writing on Hellotalk, which people then mark for me. I also used to practice speaking with my Japanese friend on Zoom, which I would like to start again.

    All in all, I do still love Japanese. Despite being better and enjoying the other languages I study more, I don’t want to lose something that has been a great part of my life for 4 years.

    How do you all self study, what would you recommend to me?

    ありがとうございます！

14. Do all of Japanese Kanji look like traditional Chinese?