It’s always kind of fun to look at how different languages approach the same idea. In English it’s “I want an X” but in Japanese it’s “X is wanted by me”. It works out to the same meaning in the end but it can take a little work to get used to the unusual (to us Americans) word order.

Vocabulary

欲しい = ほしい = wanted

Transcript

言語ガールズ #89

DO NOT WANT

Blue: Another useful は and が pattern is 私は X が欲しいです. It means “I want an X”.

Blue: The “X” has to be a noun. There are different rules for saying you want to do a verb.

Yellow: So I could say: I want a cake.

Blue: 私はケーキが欲しいです.

Yellow: But I couldn’t say: I want to eat a cake.

Blue: Since 欲しい is an い adjective you have to conjugate the 欲しい, not the です, when talking about the past or saying “I do not want”.

Yellow: 欲しかったです. Not 欲しいでした.

Blue: So, is there anything you want to ask me?

Yellow: That’s a trick question, isn’t it!? Since “want to ask” would be wanting a verb and 欲しい only works for nouns!

Blue: I just wanted to know if you had any questions…

Japanese culture puts a strong value on avoiding direct confrontation with your peers. And since phrases like “I hate X” can cause conflict with people who happen to like X it’s better to just say “I don’t like X very much”. It gets your point across while still being mild enough to not rub other people the wrong way.

After all, the last thing you want is to be known as the foreigner whose first impression involved telling everybody how much he hates the Japanese subway system. I don’t care how motion sick you get, the proper phrasing is “I don’t like riding the subway very much but the system itself is very impressive and high tech”.

Vocabulary

嫌い =　きらい = hated, disliked

Transcript

言語ガールズ #88

Speak Softly And Carry A Big Katana?

Blue: は and が patterns can be reversed by negatively conjugating the verb.

Blue: “I don’t have a car” is 私は車がありません
Yellow: Or more casually: 車がない

Blue: “I don’t like books” is 私は本が好きではありません

Yellow: Or more casually: 好きじゃない

Yellow: Hey, isn’t there an adjective that means “disliked or hated”?

Yellow: Can’t I say “私は本が嫌いです”?

Blue: You could… but 嫌い is a pretty strong word.

Blue: In general the Japanese prefer subtle language over blunt statements.

Yellow: I guess you would expect subtlety from the language of ninjas…

Blue: That’s… not quite right.

This pattern is also useful for talking about things you “have” but don’t necessarily “own”, like family members and friends. But phrasing it as “possessions” let me use that lame ghost joke and without lame jokes Gengo Girls is no different from any other old textbook.

Transcript

言語ガールズ #87

Who You Gonna Call?

Blue: は and が also work together for talking about possessions.

Yellow: Possession? Like ghosts and demons?

Blue: I mean like things you have. “I have a car” or “I have a dog.”

Blue: The pattern for “X has a Y” is “X は Y が いる/ある”

Yellow: Is that the same いる and ある we use for talking about locations and existing?

Blue: Yes it is. Which one you use depends on whether Y is alive or not.

Blue: “I have a car” would be “私は車があります”

Yellow: It’s kind of like saying: “There is a car that exists and has a connection to the topic of me.”

Blue: Kind of. But it sounds unnatural to translate it like that.

Yellow: And the car is haunted, right?

Blue: Let me start over from the beginning. はand が are useful for talking about ownership…

“suki” is a semi-common word in Japanese media. The romantic version of “suki” obviously shows up in just about every romantic drama or comedy in existence. But the non-romantic version gets plenty of use too and even in non-romance works it’s pretty common to hear children “suki” their parents or for people to talk about all the hobbies they “suki”.

Vocabulary

好き = すき = liked, loved (pronounced “ski”, not “su-ki”)

Transcript

言語ガールズ #86

Like… Or Like Like?

Blue: In some cases you can use は and が together to create one sentence with two different but related topics.

Blue: For example, the sentence pattern for “I like X” is 私はXが好きです.

Yellow: So “I like books” must be 私は本が好きです

Blue: The “私は” lets us know that the main theme of the sentence is “me”.

Blue: The “本が” tells us that there is a link between topic #1, me, and topic #2, books.

Yellow: And the “好きです” tells us that the link is that you like them!

Blue: But be careful! Using 好き to talk about other people can be interpreted as a romantic “I love them” instead of a friendly “I like them”.

Yellow: Romantic comedy misunderstandings here we come!

With a little research you can find tons of articles on all the differences between は and が, but as a beginner you really just need to know that they do almost the same thing but that は is slightly more common. That’s enough to let you get by until you have the time and experience to really look into the details. No need to overwhelm yourself all at once.

Transcript

言語ガールズ #85

Grammarist

Blue: は isn’t the only subject marker in 日本語. You can also use が.

Yellow: What’s the difference?

Blue: It’s complicated… but in general you use が when you want to put extra focus on the subject of the sentence.

Yellow: As a grammar egalitarian I object to one part of speech getting more attention than the rest.

Blue: If I was talking about my birthday I might say 私はケーキを食べました.

Yellow: I ate a cake.

Blue: The subject and verb get equal focus. We’re talking about me and what I did.

Blue: But if some asked me “Who ate that cake?” I would answer 私がケーキを食べました.

Blue: The focus is admitting that “Who” was 私. The verb is almost just a background detail.

I’ve heard that many Japanese people believe that they are the only country to have all four seasons and are surprised when foreigners tell them that countries like America also have a distinct spring, summer, fall and winter.

No idea why they think this way. Probably just one of those little cultural myths that everybody grows up hearing and never bothers to think about. “Only Japan has four seasons. Every other country is too hot, cold, wet or dry to experience all four seasons properly.”

Vocabulary

春 = はる = spring

夏 = なつ = summer

秋 = あき = fall

冬 = ふゆ = winter

寒い = さむい = cold

Transcript

言語ガールズ #84

Gone Tomorrow

Blue: The negative casual form of ある is ない. That means the negative past tense casual is なかった.

Yellow: One of these days we’ll run out of irregular verbs and what a happy day it will be.

Yellow: So now what are we going to talk about?

Blue: How about a quick vocabulary lesson?

Blue: Here are the words for the four seasons:

Blue: 日本 is in the right part of the planet to have all four seasons. It’s not like those tropical islands where it’s always warm.

Yellow: Always warm actually sounds pretty good. 冬は寒いですよ！

While “iru” and “aru” are probably most important for talking about locations they can be pretty useful all on their own too. Want to say “We have a problem?” Use “mondai ha aru” to say “A problem exists / There is a problem.”

Also, if anyone is actually curious I’m pretty sure you use “iru” when talking about zombies because they move around as if they were alive. This is also true for other semi-alive things like robots.

Transcript

言語ガールズ #83

Lost and Found

Blue: The verbs いる and ある both mean the same thing: To exist.

Blue: You use いる for living things and ある for almost everything else.

Blue: You can use them with に to talk about the locations of people and objects.

Blue: The pattern for “X is at place Y” is “XはYに いる\ある”

Blue: “I am at the library” would be “私は図書館にいます”.

Yellow: Wouldn’t that literally mean “I exist at the library”.

Blue: Literal translations aren’t always the best.

Yellow: One last question: Should I use いる or ある for talking about zombies?

Blue: Why can’t you ever have a normal grammar question?

I could go on and on about all the different ways to use “ni”… but I’m not going to. The two broad uses we’ve covered here (marking locations and marking the target/goal of verbs) are good enough for a beginner. Just don’t be surprised if you see a “ni” being used in a slightly different way every once in a while.

Vocabulary

なる = to become

病気 = びょうき = sick

Transcript

言語ガールズ #82

Overly Ambitious Goal Setting

Blue: に can also be used to mark the goal or target of an action.

Blue: For example, “友達　に　なります” means “To become friends”.

Yellow: I think I get it.

Yellow: The action is “become”. What are we becoming? Friends.

Blue: It doesn’t have to be a purposeful goal either.

Blue: 病気になります means “To become sick” even though most people don’t purposefully set a goal of getting sick.

Blue: So if you see a に that isn’t marking a location it’s probably marking a goal or target.

Yellow: Come on に, leave some work for the rest of the prepositions.

Quick tip for remembering that 下 means “under”: It’s a horizontal line with another line hanging “under” it. The opposite is 上 (うえ), which means “above” and has a line above the horizontal.

Vocabulary

学校 = がっこう = school

下 = した = under, below

Transcript

言語ガールズ #81

Here There Be Dragons

Blue: English has a lot of prepositions that show location. Above, behind, inside and so on.

Yellow: I had to write a preposition based story in elementary school.

Yellow: I called it: “The Horror Beneath The School”.

Blue: Anyways, in 日本語 location prepositions have to be combined with another word like に or へ.

Blue: And you link them to objects with the pattern: Object の Location に

Blue: That means “beneath the school” would be 学校の下に

Yellow: Isn’t の possessive?

Blue: Yes it is.

Yellow: So 学校の下に is literally “In the school’s beneath”?

Blue: Some things shouldn’t be translated word for word. Just go with “beneath the school”.

We haven’t actually covered the right verb for saying things like “There are books at the library”, but I promise to cover that as soon as we finish with our basic lessons on prepositions.

Vocabulary

公園 = こうえん = park

家 = うち = house

Transcript

言語ガールズ #80

The Knights Who Say…

Blue: に is one of the most flexible and important of all 日本語 prepositions.

Yellow: Then why did we wait until our fifth preposition lesson to talk about it?

Blue: The simplest use of に is to mark locations: In the park. 公園に. At my house. 家に.

Yellow: Can’t we also us で to mark locations?

Blue: You use で when the location helps the verb happen: “I am studying in the library”.

Blue: You use に when telling where something is at: “There are books at the library”.

Yellow: What if I say I’m studying at the library, but I’m not actually using the library to study?

Blue: I’m pretty sure there isn’t special grammar for telling fibs.