Gengo Girls#99: Easy as 1 2 3

Gengo Girls#99: Easy as 1 2 3

Although the Japanese always say numbers in Japanese they sometimes write them in western style. This is especially true when doing math, talking about prices and inside of video games. But they honestly can show up just about anywhere. So don’t be surprised if you’re halfway through reading a Japanese news article and suddenly see a familiar number like “12,503” jump out at you.

Vocabulary

= いち = one

= = two

= さん = three

= = four

= = five

= ろく = six

= しち = seven

= はち = eight

= きゅう = nine

= じゅう = ten

Transcript

言語ガールズ #99

Easy as 1 2 3

Blue: It’s about time we learn how to count!

Blue: Numbers 11-19 are created by writing a number after .

Yellow: So 十三 ( じゅうさん) is 13.

Blue: If you put the number before the instead that shows how many tens you have.

Yellow: That means 五十 (ごじゅう) is five tens, or 50.

Blue: It’s possible to put numbers both before and after the .

Yellow: 五十三 (ごじゅうさん) means five tens plus a three, or 53.

Yellow: Which seems dangerously close to being math…