I stumbled across this website while trying to find "Happy Anniversary" in Japanese for my parent's anniversary card. It really helped me get a better handle on Katakana, the Japanese alphabet for foreign words. I still need some practice, but I've already gotten a lot better and it's much more comforting to be able to read at least a few things in Japanese, since I'm constantly surrounded by words I can't read, let alone understand.
Katakana can be tricky though, since even if you can read the characters, you might still be clueless as to what the word is. You basically have to remember that the Japanese only have a set number of syllables to work with, so a lot of words end up with extra letters in them. Also, it's important to know that there are no "l"s in Japanese. L is usually replaced with some form of R, like "ri" or "ru" so remembering that tends to help. Context can also be useful for these situations.
I'm hoping to start on Hiragana soon so that I can read even more. Hiragana is the Japanese alphabet for Japanese words. It's about the same difficulty as Katakana I think, but I know absolutely no Hiragana, so I'll be starting from scratch.
2 comments:
Woah I had no idea you went to Japan! I am very jealous of you. Will you visit Akiharbra? Do you have the same cell phone number? If you do, I'll give you a call sometime. I'm sure I'll be up late very often. Gokouun o inorimasu with all your new adventures!
-tony
Hey Tony,
Yeah I'm in Japan now. I have been to Akihabara a few times. It's nice, but a lot of the stuff isn't meant for export, so the menus are all in Japanese.
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