Japanese Help Questions/Translations

[Darnellrbts]

Originally Posted by masaegu

One mistake.
ばんご　＞＞　ばんごう

More Japanese would use せんこう than せんもん but I won't call it a mistake.

Thx for the help I see what I did wrong for the number part, and am I better off using せんこう for major? I don't know if i should post another topic for 4 more sentences I'm suppose to translate using the XはYです.sry for all the questions in advance.

1) Ms.ogawa is Japanese- おがわさんはにほんです

2) Mr.Takeda is a teacher- たかださんはせんせいです

3) I'm a inernational student- わたしはりゅうがくせいです

4) my major Japanese- せんもんはにほんごです

[StonerPenguin]

Thank you so much masaegu! Honestly, you're better than any textbook or educational program. I'm really grateful to have your instruction or I think I could've gone my whole life without figuring out what you just told me. Thank you for really explaining it to me and typing all that out. I think I understand now.

But I'll be honest, my mind is, like, 'woah' blown. That's a lot to think about. However, I'll do my best and pay WAY more attention to speech patterns. This is pretty intense. Man, this makes me realize how much I really wish I had somebody to practice talking with in real life...

[duo797]

Originally Posted by Darnellrbts

Thx for the help I see what I did wrong for the number part, and am I better off using せんこう for major? I don't know if i should post another topic for 4 more sentences I'm suppose to translate using the XはYです.sry for all the questions in advance.

1) Ms.ogawa is Japanese- おがわさんはにほんです

2) Mr.Takeda is a teacher- たかださんはせんせいです

3) I'm a inernational student- わたしはりゅうがくせいです

4) my major Japanese- せんもんはにほんごです

I would say you are better of using せんこう for major than せんもん though it's not a huge point. せんもん you'll see translated a lot more often as 'specialty'. While 'major' and 'specialty' are similar for the most part, they're not the exact same word. For example, when I tell people I am majoring in japanese I say 'にほんごをせんこうしている' (Don't mind if you don't understand している, you'll get to it at some point. している is another conjugation of the verb する but you'll get to all of that later in Genki.

Also, your first sentence should be:
おがわさんはにほんじんです。

What you had before is that 'Ms. Ogawa is Japan (the country).' When you have a country name, if you add じん to the end of a country (人 is the kanji, you'll probably learn it pretty soon so I just thought I'd show you now. Use your book to learn how to write it because it's not written exactly the same as it shows up in computers) then the word is 'resident of said country'. Therefore にほんじん is a 'Japanese person' アメリカじん is an 'american' and so forth.

[Darnellrbts]

Originally Posted by duo797

I would say you are better of using せんこう for major than せんもん though it's not a huge point. せんもん you'll see translated a lot more often as 'specialty'. While 'major' and 'specialty' are similar for the most part, they're not the exact same word. For example, when I tell people I am majoring in japanese I say 'にほんごをせんこうしている' (Don't mind if you don't understand している, you'll get to it at some point. している is another conjugation of the verb する but you'll get to all of that later in Genki.

Also, your first sentence should be:
おがわさんはにほんじんです。
What you had before is that 'Ms. Ogawa is Japan (the country).' When you have a country name, if you add じん to the end of a country (人 is the kanji, you'll probably learn it pretty soon so I just thought I'd show you now. Use your book to learn how to write it because it's not written exactly the same as
it shows up in computers) then the word is 'resident of said country'. Therefore にほんじん is a 'Japanese person' アメリカじん is an 'american' and so forth.

Thx so if I'm talking about a the Resident of the country and not the country I add じん at the end, gotta make a mental note I get what I did wrong thx. I don't want to advance from making basic sentences until I can do it without posting for help, because kore, sore, ano, dore are next and that looks confusing lol. I have 2 sentences I tried translating from my workbook I would like 2 know if I did this right
1) Are u a student? がくせいですか
answer- yes, I'm a student at nihon university
ええ,にほんだいがくのがくせいです
2) Michiko are u a 4 year student?-ミチコさんよんねんせいです
answer- no, Michiko is a 3rd year student
いいえ, ミチコさんはさんねんせいです
sry my post so long

[KyleGoetz]

Originally Posted by Darnellrbts

Thx so if I'm talking about a the Resident of the country and not the country I add じん at the end, gotta make a mental note I get what I did wrong thx. I don't want to advance from making basic sentences until I can do it without posting for help, because kore, sore, ano, dore are next and that looks confusing lol. I have 2 sentences I tried translating from my workbook I would like 2 know if I did this right
1) Are u a student? がくせいですか
answer- yes, I'm a student at nihon university
ええ,にほんだいがくのがくせいです
2) Michiko are u a 4 year student?-ミチコさんよんねんせいです
answer- no, Michiko is a 3rd year student
ええ, ミチコさんはさんねんせいです
sry my post so long

Yeah, although technically it's not just a resident of the country, but a citizen of the country. If I am an American living in Japan, I am an アメリカ人, not a 日本人.

ええ is less formal than はい. Typically, はい is what you'd see in a sentence like your sample sentence.

Finally, you've got your English screwed up in your last conversation, too, so I can't correct your Japanese.
"Michiko, are you...?
No, Michiko is..."

See how you messed up the English?

[masaegu]

Originally Posted by Darnellrbts

1) Are u a student? がくせいですか
answer- yes, I'm a student at nihon university
ええ,にほんだいがくのがくせいです
2) Michiko are u a 4th-year student?-ミチコさんよんねんせいです
answer- no, Michiko is a 3rd year student
いいえ, ミチコさんはさんねんせいです

よんねんせい　＞＞　よねんせい
よ is an exceptional reading of "number 4".

ミチコさん　＞＞　ミチコさんは

[Darnellrbts]

Originally Posted by KyleGoetz

Yeah, although technically it's not just a resident of the country, but a citizen of the country. If I am an American living in Japan, I am an アメリカ人, not a 日本人.

ええ is less formal than はい. Typically, はい is what you'd see in a sentence like your sample sentence.

Finally, you've got your English screwed up in your last conversation, too, so I can't correct your Japanese.
"Michiko, are you...?
No, Michiko is..."

See how you messed up the English?

sorry I copied the sentences wrong. Is Michiko a fourth- year student? That's the right sentence from the book.

[Darnellrbts]

Originally Posted by masaegu

よんねんせい　＞＞　よねんせい
よ is an exceptional reading of "number 4".

ミチコさん　＞＞　ミチコさんは

ok thx I see where I messed up again, gotta make another mental note for 4

[KyleGoetz]

Originally Posted by Darnellrbts

sorry I copied the sentences wrong. Is Michiko a fourth- year student? That's the right sentence from the book.

In that case, masaegu's corrections get you almost 100%. He just forgot to point out that for "is michiko a 4th year student" you need to end the sentence with か to mark it as a question.

As a native speaker of English, I sometimes overlook simple things people forget in their English, so it's understandable that he misses something once every century or so

[StonerPenguin]

Well, the Japanese girls haven't responded, but I did send the email to the one girl's secondary email since I wasn't sure if it was an o or a 0, or 77 or 79, in the first email address she gave me. So, I've waited a while and I'm gonna email Emiko.

How would you say "I already sent an message to Mao at her SoftBank account saying~"? 「～ってメッセージをもう真央さんのSoftBankのアカウン� ��に送ったのよ」?

I'm sure I'm gonna need a good bit of help with this