My laptop was built in Japan, and has the hiragana characters listed on various parts of the keyboard. However, its also a QWERTY style keyboard, and I have neither learned how to switch it over, nor do I wish to learn how to type all over again when I can type in romaji and switch it over to Japanese characters.

If you want to learn how to type in Japanese without a Japanese keyboard, this site will teach you how. It helped me. You may have to scroll down until you see "Typing Japanese using a non-Japanese keyboard," then click the link titled "Preparation - Installing MS-IME." I hope that helps...

About.com: http://www.coscom.co.jp/japanesefont/index.html

~ S.A.

I got this program from a friend I found in a Japanese contact site :p I haven't tried it yet, because he was using it to learn the hiragana and katakana, but I already knew them... AND, I've just been too lazy.

anyway, check it out. It might be something for you. My friend said it was an excellent program to learn the different alphabetes (not entirely sure it was teaching hiragana, but he said he had problems with both...sooo yeah, you could always just check it out...it's free after all) ^^

Japanese Learning Site

Thanks to the both of you. And that program is actually very effective and helpful O.o

It does have hiragana BTW.

It was really cool to load it and recognize some of the text!! ^_^

Awesome! I'm glad I helped a little.

~ S.A.