SPEAK JAPANESE WITH CONFIDENCE! ESSENTIAL JAPANESE PHRASEBOOK & DICTIONARY TUTTLE Publishing Tokyo | Rutland, Vermont | Singapore Contents Introduction Pronunciation guide Basic grammar 1. The Basics 1.1 Personal details 1.2 Today or tomorrow? 1.3 What time is it? 1.4 One, two, three... 1.5 The weather 1.6 Here, there... 1.7 What does that sign say? 1.8 Legal holidays 2. Meet and Greet 2.1 Greetings 2.2 Asking a question 2.3 How to reply 2.4 Thank you 2.5 I’m sorry 2.6 What do you think? 3. Small Talk 3.1 Introductions 3.2 I beg your pardon? 3.3 Starting/ending a conversation 3.4 A chat about the weather 3.5 Hobbies 3.6 Invitations 3.7 Paying a compliment 3.8 Intimate comments/questions 3.9 Congratulations and condolences 3.10 Arrangements 3.11 Being the host(ess) 3.12 Saying good-bye 4. Eating Out 4.1 At the restaurant 4.2 Ordering 4.3 The bill 4.4 Complaints 4.5 Paying a compliment 4.6 The menu 5. Getting Around 5.1 Asking directions 5.2 The car 5.3 The gas station 5.4 Breakdowns and repairs 5.5 Renting a vehicle 5.6 Bicycles/mopeds 5.7 Hitchhiking 6. Arrival and Departure 6.1 General 6.2 Customs 6.3 Luggage 6.4 Questions to passengers 6.5 Tickets 6.6 Information 6.7 Airports 6.8 Trains 6.9 Taxis 7. A Place to Stay 7.1 General 7.2 Hotels/B&Bs/apartments/holiday rentals 7.3 Complaints 7.4 Departure 7.5 Camping 8. Money Matters 8.1 Banks 8.2 Settling the bill 9. Mail, Phone and Internet 9.1 Mail 9.2 Telephone 9.3 Internet/email/social media 10. Shopping 10.1 Shopping conversations 10.2 Food 10.3 Clothing and shoes 10.4 Cameras 10.5 At the hairdresser 11. Tourist Activities 11.1 Places of interest 11.2 Going out 11.3 Booking tickets 12. Sports Activities 12.1 Sporting questions 12.2 By the waterfront 12.3 In the snow 13. Health Matters 13.1 Calling a doctor 13.2 What’s wrong? 13.3 The consultation 13.4 Medications and prescriptions 13.5 At the dentist 14. Emergencies 14.1 Asking for help 14.2 Lost items 14.3 Accidents 14.4 Theft 14.5 Missing person 14.6 The police 15. English-Japanese Word List Introduction Welcome to the Tuttle Essential Language series, covering all of the most popular Asian languages. These books are basic guides to communicating in the language. They’re concise, accessible and easy to understand, and you’ll find them indispensable on your trip abroad to get you where you want to go, pay the right prices and do everything you’re planning to do. This guide is divided into 15 themed sections and starts with a pronunciation table which explains the phonetic pronunciation of all the words and sentences you’ll need to know, and a basic grammar guide which will help you construct basic sentences in the language. At the end of the book is an extensive English–Japanese word list. Throughout the book you’ll come across boxes with a symbol beside them. These are designed to help you if you can’t understand what your listener is saying to you. Hand the book over to them and encourage them to point to the appropriate answer to the question you are asking. Other boxes in the book—this time without the symbol—give alphabetical listings of themed words with their English translations beside them. For extra clarity, we have put all phonetic pronunciations of the foreign language terms in italic. This book covers all topics you are likely to come across during the course of a visit, from reserving a room for the night to ordering food and drink at a restaurant and what to do if you lose your credit cards and money. With over 2,000 commonly used words and essential sentences at your fingertips you can rest assured that you will be able to get by in all situations, so let Essential Japanese become your passport to learning to speak with confidence! Pronunciation guide Japanese is very easy to pronounce. It is made up of strings of syllables (a, ka, ta, etc.) which just join together following very simple rules of pronunciation (e.g. anata is a- na-ta). Unlike English, each syllable has mostly even stress and combinations of vowels (e-i, a-i, etc.) do not represent completely new sounds. Vowels Japanese has five vowels, pronounced either long or short. Distinguishing the length is very important as sometimes the meaning depends on the difference (e.g. ojisan/ojiisan, terms of address to a middle-aged man and an old man respectively). Note that a final e is always pronounced (e.g. sake, rice wine, is pronounced close to sakay). a like a in America a asa asa ā ah (as in the exclamation !) ah mā mah e e as in pet or e desu des ay is in sway, but shorter ay sake sakay ē eh sounded long, like ere in there eh eeto-ne eh-to-nay i like i in pit, though slightly longer i nichi nichi ī ee as in keep ee iie ee-ye o o as in top o yoru yoru ō ou as in four oh kyō kyoh u u as in put u haru haru ū oo as in coop oo chūmon choomon Consonants Most consonants are pronounced in a similar manner to English. b b as in bat b bin bin ch ch as in chip ch nichi nichi d d as in day d dame damay f f as in food f fuyu fu-yu g g as in give g gogo gogo h h as in hat h haru haru j j as in jump j niji niji k k as in king k koko koko m m as in mat m totemo totemo n n as in nut; n namae nama-e at the end of a word n(g) yen (g) yen may be more like ng ng as in thing ng ringo ring-o p p as in pat p posuto pos-to r Somewhere between English r, l r raigetsu raigets and d. Never rolled r; more like r in car s s as in start s semete semetay sh sh as in ship sh shio shi-o t t as in tip t dMshite doh-shtay ts ts as in hits ts itsu its w w as in watt w wakaru wakaru y y as in yes y yoru yoru z z as in zoo z mizu mizu Note: when i and u follow k, s, t, h, p or come between two of them, they become very shortened and are often not heard at all (e.g. desu becomes des and mimashita becomes mimashta). Vowel combinations Basically, each vowel should be pronounced separately. The most common combinations are: ai ai as in high ai hai high ao ow as in now ow nao now ei ay as in play ay rei ray ue weigh as in weight eai ue weigh Basic grammar 1 Sentence construction The greatest difference between Japanese and English sentences is the position of the verb. In Japanese the verb always comes last, giving the basic structure as subject–object–verb: Sensei wa michi o oshiemashita Teacher way showed (me) 2 Parts of speech Nouns Japanese nouns have no articles and no plural forms. Zasshi (magazine), for example, could mean “a/the magazine,” “magazines,” or “the/some magazines.” This might sound potentially confusing to English speakers who expect the clear distinctions that articles and plurals give. In actuality, though, very little confusion exists, because Japanese has ways of indicating number when it is necessary (see chapter 1). Pronouns Japanese uses pronouns far less than in English. They are in fact often omitted when in the subject position. In English we have to say “who went” in the sentence “I went to Kyoto yesterday” if it is clear you are talking about yourself, in Japanese you can merely say kinoo Kyoto e ikimashita (yesterday to-Kyoto went). The most frequently used pronouns in Japanese are watasi (I) and anata (you); ‘he’, ‘she’ and ‘they’ are far more uncommon. Adjectives Like in English, Japanese can use adjectives in two ways, before the noun they describe (mushi-atswee hi, a humid day) or following it (kyoo wa mushi-atswee desu, today is humid). In grammatical terms, adjectives can in fact function as verbs, and have tenses like verbs (see below). Verbs The verb is probably the most important element in the Japanese sentence, since it is quite possible for the sentence to consist of a verb and nothing else: