Smart.fm and the Death of a Free Learning Tool
I haven't been on it for a while, but smart.fm used to be one of my favorite websites to study Japanese. One I'd been meaning to return to recently. But it looks like that is not to be. Smart.fm is switching over to iKnow.jp (which it already was before, I think) and charging a monthly fee at the door.
Free, the site seemed invaluable, but for ¥1000 a month it seems superfluous. It is an annoying shock to see that the service is just going behind a pay-wall with nearly no warning. More or less Read more [...]
Things I've learned in Japan: combover
Things I’ve learned in Japan: “Barcode” is Japanese-English for “combover.
日本で習ったの物：バーコードは英語で「combover」。
Related items
How American movies change when they are exported
Translation has always been interesting to me. It is interesting to me how something like a movies are translated. Even before making it to the theater the movie can be changed dramatically through translation. The name of the movie can reshape the expectation and focus of the movie for example. While not lingual, the movie poster can also be “translated” for a different audience.
Meryl Streep's It’s Complicated is an example of those two things happening at once. The result is that the Read more [...]
Japanese in Your iPhone (or iPod Touch)
The Japanese dictionary app called, simply enough, Japanese is being updated. Version 2.0 is coming out soon. The developer, CodeFromTokyo, has said the app will be submitted to Apple this week.
I've been studying Japanese seriously for about a year now, I've already spent about a week with a beta version of 2.0 and I feel like it is safe to say that this app is an amazingly useful study companion. Why?
Japanese is based on Jim Breen's freely available EDict, like a pile of other apps. What makes Read more [...]
One of My Favorite Kanji
In English the etymology for poetry is Greek. It comes from "poiesis" meaning maker (kind of boring). Or It comes from the Latin "poeta," used as a general term for creative literature (amazingly boring).
詩 (し - shi) means poem or poetry. Of course I like poetry so automatically I'm a fan of the kanji, but my fondness isn't as superficial as that. 詩 is 言 and 寺 stuck together. 言 means "say" and 寺 means "temple." It is a beautiful combination.
All things considered, 詩 wins first Read more [...]
A Brief Explanation of Why People Use Kanji and Not Just Hiragana
Kanji were created long before Hiragana. Kanji come from China. When they were imported the Japanese added their own pronunciation to them, which is one reason why Chinese and Japanese sound different. Japanese Kanji have at least two pronunciations the On-yomi and Kun-yomi. The on-yomi is the Chinese reading and the kun-yomi is the Japanese reading.
Hiragana was used by women because most of them weren’t taught to read Kanji. This was the only way they could write and read. And some women wrote Read more [...]
Tomorrow あした and あす (ashita and asu)
Since I've lived in Japan I've only every noticed 明日 (tomorrow) pronounced as あした (ashita), but while studying today I came across a new reading, あす (asu). One of the constant painful joys of Japanese is the many ways you can read kanji. The readings can change depending on what way it is being used, who you are using it with, and what kind of shoes you are wearing.* I think of it as revenge for the English language's arbitrary sound rules (think "read" and "read" or "sight," "site," Read more [...]
A Strange and Hateful Thing to Say
豆腐の角に頭をぶつけて死ね
(とうふのかどにあたまをぶつけてしね: Tofu no kado ni atama wo butsuke te shine)
Supposedly this is our equivalent to "take a long walk off a short pier," but the literal translation is "bash your head against the corner of a block of tofu and die." I don't know, it just seems far more mean to wish someone death by tofu-head-bashing. Also, I've never really thought of telling someone to walk off a pier as wishing the person to die. You just Read more [...]
The Difference Between くれる and もらう
When you look in a dictionary くれる and もらう seem to be the same on the surface. This one had me completely perplexed, it was like a horrible riddle, wrapped in an enigma, swaddled in a punch to the kidney. After looking for a while I finally was able to hunt down an answer about the difference. Today I verified my understanding with my boss. Turns out it's not so bad.
The main difference is where the emphasis is placed. One places emphasis on the giver, the other places it on the receiver. Read more [...]
