I used to think NHK stuff is boring until my Japanese teacher shared it with me today. They tried to “animenize” some dry topics like environmental topics. I find it quite cringe to watch the actor, but also much more fun if they didn’t do that.
There are so many て form songs on YouTube, but this is the one I learned in class a couple of years ago and I couldn’t find the exact one. So I’m recording it for backup purposes in case my memory fails me.
うつる->って
ぶむぬ->んで
く->いて ぐ->いで
す->して
くる->きって
する->して
例外 (れいがい)→行って
て form songmeowbrown
For る verbs like 食べる, all you do is replace る with て so no need to memorize.
I wonder how everyone else learned their て forms 🤔
Here’s my fake business card (명함) to help with the exercise in the lesson I’m taking:
제이름은 미아우브라운입니다. Myname is meowbrown. 제 직업은 블로거입니다. My job is a blogger. 사무실전화번호는 02-1824-7195입니다. (pronunciation: 공이에 일파리사에 치릴구오임니다. Officephone number is… 핸드폰번호는 010-3379-9154입니다. (pronunciation: 공일공에 삼삼칠구에 구이로사입니다. Mobilenumber is… 이메일은 hello@meowbrown.com입니다. (@ 골뱅이, . 점 pronounced as 쩜) Email is… 주소는 서울시 종로구 광화문로 142입니다. Address is…
Question: Do Koreans really carry over the sound for phone numbers when they speak? I’m wondering whether the teacher is trying to make us practice the carry over pronunciation or is this normal in Korea 🤔 The reason I can’t ask the teacher is because it’s an online course, that’s a difference between having a 1:1 session.
my friend and i were going to study a language together and wound up having to cancel our plans due to scheduling pressures, but! through research we came across a really cool resource for reading in a TON of languages: bloom library!
as you can see, it has a lot of books for languages that are usually a bit harder to find materials for—we were going to use it for kyrgyz, for example, which has over 1000 books, which was really hard to find textbook materials for otherwise. as you can see it also has books with audio options, which would be really useful for pronunciation checking. as far as i can tell, everything on the site is free as well.
Checked it out and the catalogue is great for Indonesian and German. Not much for Japanese and for Korean it seems to be all in the category of spiritual at the moment.
Today I will be reviewing the Japanese conversation podcast ことのは (Kotonoha) by Yamamo-sensei and Kibi-sensei. They have episodes for all levels, separated by JLPT level N5-N1 and labeled so you can determine which episodes best suit your level or challenge yourself with a higher level.
Do I currently listen to this podcast?: Yes, I like this podcast a lot and listen to it frequently.
General Overview
Good For Levels: Beginner | Intermediate | Advanced
In this series, Yamamo and Kibi, two Japanese language teachers based in Japan, speak on a variety of topics in a conversation style of podcast. The conversation-style format is good for training your ear to listen to questions and responses, and every day banter between two speakers. They talk about Japanese culture and their own personal experiences which gives listeners an insight to the particulars of daily life in Japan.
Length of Episodes ★★★★★
The podcasts are usually around 20-30 minutes long. This is ideal for a commute or when you have some down time. They cover 2-3 subtopics within each topic they pick, so the conversations are very interesting and catch my attention and they don’t seem too short or too long. They plan out each conversation topic carefully and keep it interesting and informative.
Level of Engagement ★★★★★
The conversation format is very engaging because they cover 2-3 subtopics within the main topic and structure the conversation to focus on each point of the topic. They keep the listener engaged with carefully planned-out topics and conversations, and there is obviously a lot of work that goes into their podcast. They match the vocabulary and pace of speaking with the level they are targeting, but even in the higher level podcasts I believe beginners would be able to catch the general flow of the conversation and challenge themselves to understand the content.
Episode Frequency ★★★★★
New podcasts come out once a week, and with the planning that goes into each episode it’s a very good pace. There is also a lot of episodes already produced so you can go through them fairly quickly without running out of material.
Overall ★★★★★
This podcast is designed by two Japanese language teachers to convey information about Japanese culture completely in Japanese. The episodes are labeled by JLPT difficulty and I find the label system to be very accurate. It is a good podcast with which to practice your listening skills for every day conversation and to learn a bit more about Japanese culture.
Thanks for the detailed review, exactly what I’m looking for. I’ll listen to this episode today!
I take classes once a week so it usually starts with my teacher asking:
では、週末は何をしましたか？ What did you do on the weekend?
何が予定がありますか？ Do you have anything planned?
先週は何をしましたか？ What did you do last week?
Main reason is 語彙が足りない
語彙 (ごい) が足りない (たりない): Not enough vocabulary
Examples
I had a health checkup recently, I know health is 健康 (けんこう) but don’t have the words to say checkup. If I knew the word, it’s just 健康診断 (しんだん) に行きました。It make sense to not know all of the words such as 採血 (さいけつ) or 血液 (けつえき) 検察, but at least I can say something like 血を取られた, but at that time I can’t even remember 血。
Saying I need to travel around the end of February, all I can remember is 二月中旬 (ちゅうじゅん) and not have the vocabulary for 下旬 (げじゅん), which is supposed to be a pretty common word when talking about my activities.
Explaining things that’s too hard for me
Recently, I’ve watched 陰の実力者になりたくて (The Eminence in Shadow) and am having trouble to explain what the anime is about. I feel it’s okay-ish for not being able to say it in Japanese because I’m even having a hard time saying it in English.
The main character is actually really strong, but has severe 中二病. He also has a hobby of acting like a background character that you usually see in anime. I tried to explain the “what you see usually” part as: like being the first one to get injured, and stuff like that.
It’s hard for me to explain it clearly, I should’ve focused on how the main character hides his powers and stop there.
