Mnemonics

mne·mon·ics /nɪˈmɒnɪks/ Pronunciation Key - Show Spelled Pronunciation[ni-mon-iks] Pronunciation Key - Show IPA Pronunciation –noun (used with a singular verb) the process or technique of improving or developing the memory.

Or you could say, "How do you remember that?"

A discussion of kanji and the various ways that *I* remember them!

賛 as in '賛成' (さんせい). You will need to zoom in on this kanji (Rikaichan will work wonders in that department). When I look at this kanji, for whatever odd reason, the top part resembles sparkling eyes and the lower portion a smiling mouth. This is the face your father or mother might show you when they're happy about something you've done, and the kanji means something very close to this.

老 as in '老いる' (おいる). For me, the lower portion is all it takes to conjure up the correct meaning. The lower stroke curves down and right giving me the impression that this kanji is weathered with age. And funny enough, it means 'old, aged'.

誌 as in '雑誌' (ざっし). A three-part tear down for recognition: the left side is '言う' or 'to say', so we know this has to do with literature or speaking. The upper right is 土 for 'ground, soil, earth' giving us 'words on the ground' or 'words on the street'. The next is 心 for 'heart', but it means heart more in the metaphysical sense of 'emotional stuff' in this context. Put them all together: street words near to your heart. 雑誌 happens to mean 'magazine'. What better place to find a bunch of words sold on the street that are near to your heart? 誌 can mean 'magazine' on it's own in fact ~

〜をはじめとする

Here is another grammar point from my favorite book (not):

〜をはじめとする。

And an example sentence for kicks:

新幹線をはじめとする交通機関が雪のためストップしています。

I can't find a good English translation for this. My best effort is:

The Shinkansen, along with all other forms of transportation, are stopped due to the snow.

My wife (bless her) explained it to me in using chocolate:

チョコレートをはじめとする、甘い物は女性の好物です。

Which loosely can be translated as:

Girls like sweets, but chocolate comes first.

Or something like that.

If anyone has any hard translation for をはじめとする please comment and let's all learn!

Kanjiroushi

Welp, I got my iPhone. Yay!

The first thing that I did was try to find some software applications or websites to help me study Kanji on the go.

One of my favorites for my old PDA was King Kanji from Gakusoft. That application kept me company on my 40-minute commute to and from work in Japan. I would draw the characters and take the little tests until my eyes bled. I passed though.

So what is a student of Japanese supposed to do without a stylus? However will we learn the stroke order without practice?

So far, I've been unable to locate any meaningful Japanese writing utility for the iPhone.

I did find the useful iChinese application posted on TUAW - but I'm not studying Chinese, so it's a step off to the left.

I contacted the creator of iChinese and asked him if it was feasible to create the same application with the　常用 set broken down into the various levels. I went a step further and said I'd pay him good money to come up with a Lookup-by-Kanji method for searching a dictionary instead of by radical. Now *that* would be useful.

He got back to me a couple of times with questions and I gave him all the links I could find. Hopefully he'll come back with something brilliant soon.

The most useful app for studying Japanese that i can find so far is Kanjiroushi. You should check it out. It leaves a bit to be desired from a navigation standpoint, and the mock-tests aren't very good for meaning, but it definitely helps you figure out the on-yomi and kun-yomi on-the-fly and has a fairly usable dictionary lookup utility.

~ば〜ほど

Here is a grammar structure that I can't find a good English translation for. Perhaps the 3 readers who frequent this blog might help me shed some light on exactly what I'm looking at here:

酒を飲めば飲むほど酔っ払うものだから、飲み過ぎていけません。

"If you drink alcohol more and more you will get drunk, so you shouldn't drink too much."

That's essentially the translation, backed up by my super-slick wifetionary. However, I told her as I'm writing here, I don't get a clear translation from the 〜ば〜ほど structure. It's kind of rubbish to me.

Yes I can memorize changing the first verb to the conditional, adding ば, then changing the second to the plain form and add ほど. That part is easy. The tough thing is getting a better translation of the term than 'more and more'. This is going to wear on my nerves day in and day out.

Surely there is something more eloquent out there? Perhaps some readers could help out with comments?

I want an iPhone =(

I really really really want an iPhone. I hope that once the SDK goes live (SOMEtime this year guys...) someone will port my favorite Firefox extension to the iPhone (my fav is Rikaichan)

I also want a kanji practice program like I used to have on my PDA. But more than just drawing the kanji correctly and having the program give me the thumbs up, I want to be able to search by kanji drawn.

"Make the program yourself!" you say... if only... if only...

Here's looking forward to the iPhone SDK, the 3G version which will run on HSDPA and I'll be able to use on cell towers in Japan, and the unlimited family plan so I never worry about minutes again!

減少、増加、上がる、下がる

Today's interesting lesson has to do with increasing and decreasing.

My wife and I were trying to figure out the different between 減少、増加、上がる、and 下がる last night. In English:

減少: decrease
増加: increase
上がる: increase (go up)
下がる: decrease (go down)

Note: There are other words for increase and decrease in Japanese - but we're focusing on these four today.

Neither of us could really figure out a good explanation for why some things use 上がる and some use 増加 and vice versa. We though about it for a tick, and then I came to this conclusion:

When the subject is singular and the value increases or decreases: 上がる・下がる
When the subject is a singular word composed of many items and the value increases or decreases: 増加・減少

Here's the break down:

Temperature is a singular thing whose value can increase or decrease. You could say:

もうすぐ春に成るから、温度を上がる。

Because it will be Spring soon, the temperature will rise.

Population is a singular idea composed by the number of citizens in a given location. It's one from many. So you would say:

最近人口が減少している。

Recently, the population is decreasing.

My wife agreed this is the likely distinction. It's possible that some more highly educated scholar has already come to this conclusion and written a dissertation on it somewhere. If so - laud his brilliance. For the lay man, I wrote a simple blog entry about it so students who don't spend their time in the dissertation section of their university's library can pick up on this important distinction.

Contractions

I wrote to the Japanese instructor at a local college asking for advice on improving my Japanese. My greatest frustration between level 3 and 2 is that the path is murky and I'm drowning trying to find my way to the surface.

Some people can open a book and learn everything on their own. I guess I need a guide. I am motivated enough to bust open whatever resources are necessary to gain the knowledge that I require, but I need a guide to tell me which resources to seek and in what order.

She replied to me kindly today, and one of her expressions was new. My wife explained it really means "I'm really happy to hear that."

The teacher said:

日本語の勉強を続けてがんばっているようで何よりです。

何よりです？ I looked it up - it means 'best, above all'. Ok, so my interpretation is:

Above all, continuing to do your best studying Japanese [is important].

Apparently I'm way off - my wife says 何より _really_ means 何より嬉しいです。

Whoa - whoa - where did this 嬉しい curve ball come from? So in Japanese, a contraction (for lack of a better term) means you can just LEAVE OUT AN ENTIRE WORD?! Well ok - pardon me for thinking that is complete and utter bollocks.

So instead of MY original understanding, the sentence really means:

I'm so happy to hear that you're still studying Japanese diligently.

I use 'diligent' for がんばる when the action is tedious and time consuming. So sue me.

Double Double

You've gotta love the Japanese. They like to exaggerate everything without really meaning too.

So I was studying my kanji flash cards this evening, and I came across a word that I knew, but didn't know that I knew when presented with the kanji for this word.

冷凍食品 - Frozen Foods.

Easy enough - you see it on signs in the grocery store, and if you suck at cooking, this aisle is Universally accessible. Grab something, throw it in the basket, microwave and dine.

But I didn't know that I knew the kanji for 凍る 'to freeze'. Let's break down the first two quickly:

凍る - to freeze

冷める - to get cold (冷たい is probably more widely known amongst students of Japanese - cold!)

So what do we have? 冷凍 'cold freeze'

Does that really make sense to anyone but a native? Why not just write 凍食品? Interpreted only by the kanji in play, don't we still get 'freeze eat things' ?

But that just wouldn't be enough emphasis on 'this stuff ain't warm'

I know all the important words

No lengthy explanation this time. I have a very important word to bestow on you that you will likely not find in any textbook:

ニャンニャン

It means 'sex'.

If a chick whispers this in your ear - go directly to your room - do not pass Go, do not collect $200 dollars. 'Nuff said.

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