Ok, for those of you who know me well, I have been working hard on my Japanese the past few months so I could take the JLPT3 (Japanese Language Proficiency Test or 日本語能力試験3級)… well I sat for it in December, so lets hope I passed!
So now what you ask? Well, I have been thinking and it occurred to me, that while many Japanese know lots of English words, and a good amount can even speak, one of the biggest differentiators between my perception of who is good and who is not is simple, their accent.
In most interactions, we only are exchanging a relatively small number of words, so how you say them really count. If you meet 2 people, 1 has a vocab of 1000 words but great pronunciation and one has a vocab of 2000+ but is hard to understand, who will you perceive as the better speaker? Granted, overtime, the truth will probably come out, but then again, first impressions are hard to shake.
So I have decided to focus on reducing my Japanese accent, at the same time, I will be trying to apply those same techniques I am using on myself to non-native English speakers.
Now, I know, the same problems Japanese speakers have with English will be different from those who are native Spanish or Russian speakers. In the same way my problems with pronouncing Japanese may be different than the problems I have with Spanish.
So to start, I am going to keep it simple, I will focus on general techniques as well as specifics. What is in my head now is this basic strategy
1. Read a passage in the target language. (Record It)
2. Have a native speaker read the same passage. (Record It)
3. Compare recordings with the native speaker so they can help you see where you are making errors
4. Rerecord, rerecord, till you get it perfect.
Also, for some fun, I am thinking that I will use this opportunity to develop a British accent for myself… as a citizen of the UK, it seems only fitting that I use a British accent when I try and use my British passport right?
If you have any ideas, thoughts, comments, please post em up below…
Here are some references I will be reading over the next few weeks to give me more ideas
For Japanese Learners
simple TIPS and TRICKS: http://www.ehow.com/how_2151706_improve-japanese-pronunciation.html
http://www.wikihow.com/Sound-Natural-While-Speaking-Japanese
http://answers.yahoo.com/question/index?qid=20080116175740AA3loa7
For (American) English Learners
http://www.accurateenglish.com/HTML/tips.htm
http://esl.about.com/od/speakingenglish/a/accent_reduce.htm
http://www.speakingyourbest.com/accentguides/japaneseaccent.html
(this site is trying to sell stuff, still interesting)
http://www.americanaccent.com/
(this site appears to have a computer analyze your English! pretty cool)
http://comptonpeslonline.com/assessment_sections/anlys_section/intro_analysis.shtml?send_to=info%40englishwithoutaccent.com
this guy seems interesting: http://www.scottsensei.com/
this looks has a good bunch of resources: http://www.sunburstmedia.com/PronWeb.html
For those who want a British Accent
http://www.articleclick.com/Article/Learn-British-Accent—A-Plus-for-Actors/1060245
http://ask.metafilter.com/20898/How-to-pick-up-a-British-accent
http://www.ehow.com/videos-on_7570_speak-british-accent.html
(this lady has American accents too)
http://www.patriciafletcher.com/classically_speaking.php
As I sit here enjoying a lovely Saturday lunch at a Vietnamese restaurant in Kanda, Tokyo it occurs to me that writing a post on useful restaurant words in Japanese could benefit travelers coming to the Land of the Rising Sun. Note: This is not eloquent Japanese, rather it is designed to be easy and useful!
One of the biggest barriers to entry for me when I first moved to Japan and couldn’t read Kanji (or hell, even Katakana) was the menu. You look at a page full of gibberish and it can make you want to just leave and go somewhere familiar where you can easily pick out what you want to eat… did I see a McDonalds back there? Thankfully, you aren’t alone here and often restaurants will have an English, or at least a Picture menu (possibly outside to attract customers). Don’t be ashamed! You can ask for them with the phrases below:
May I please have an English menu = Eigo no menu kudasai
and
May I please have a picture menu = shashin no menu kudasai
That wasn’t so hard right? If they have the menus, yokatta! You are in luck, it should be easy from here, simply point to what you want from the menu and say:
I’ll have this please = Kore o kudasai
Vietnamese Resturant's Picture Menu
If not, don’t fret! This is where the true adventure begins. You could of course say:
Do you have any recommendations? = Osusume wa?
and I will give you some key words to help you here at the bottom of this post, but if you are feeling bold, I suggest you go with one of my favorite Japanese words: Omakase. Omakase literally means something along the lines of “Please be kind to me” but it basically is like saying, “your call, please try your best to bring me something I like.” The added bonus to using this word is that the Japanese will often think (and sometimes even say) “why the hell does this gaijin know omakase?” No need to worry, the Japanese are usually quite nice and upstanding and they will often really try to bring you what they think is best, not just bring you the most expensive thing on the menu!
Another big plus about restaurant Japanese, they often keep a lot of the original words (for example, today I am eating Pho Ga (Fa- gwa I think?) which I believe is pretty similar to the original Vietnamese. They also understand and use words like rice, soup, spoon, fork, table etc. so, if you are desperate, its worth it to try your English slowly and you may get lucky and hit a bull’s eye!
When the food comes, here are a few key words, oishii and oishisou, which mean delicious and looks delicious respectively. These are particularly important if you used Omakasei to show your appreciation of the food they selected for you.
A couple other useful phrases you might want to use:
May I please have a Beer/Wine/Water = (Beer/Wine/Mizu) kudasai
and
May I please have 1/2/3 more = Mou hitotsu/futatsu/mitsu kudasai
Don’t be embarrassed to use hand gestures (especially for numbers) to accomplish your task here 
Now the time has come, you have to pay. A quick note here, in Japan, unlike the US, oftentimes you will not pay at your table and have to take the receipt (usually left on the table somewhere) and go to the register and pay. Occasionally this will not be the case or you may need to call your waiter/waitress with:
check please! = okanjou onegai shimasu
But lets face facts, you’ve just eaten a nice meal, and you may be a little tired (or tispy ;-P) and not feel like subjecting your poor waiter/waitress to anymore of your Japanese… don’t worry! I got you covered!
In the US, if you want to let your server know you a ready to pay, you can simply make a signal with your hand where you are signing a fake receipt in the air, meaning “Check please!”
Well, the Japanese also have a similar signal. If you catch their eye and cross your two index fingers together to form a little T (or a cross) in the air, and I feel it is a pretty close translation of the above hand gesture
Lastly, you can thank your server (and oftentimes the chef too) with the phrases.
Thank you, it was delicous = Arigatou oishikatta
or
Go chi so sama deshita (often abbreviated to, go so sama)
Go chi so sama deshita means something along the lines of “Thank you for this feast” or “Thank you for the treat.” It is said to the server and/or the chef, but also, if someone pays for your meal, its is the polite way to thank them in Japanese.
One last note, remember, in Japan, tipping is not necessary. That being said, it never hurts Full disclosure, my cheap ass stopped tipping after the first 2-3 months, its really not necessary most of the time, and the smallest bills available are 1000 yen (more than 10 bucks!) and you don’t want to give them just change right? Thats kinda insulting…
Anyway, I hope you enjoyed this post, I will upload the videos and some pics from this meal shortly, as well as write an auxiliary post that will just have the key words (as well as some extra ones not here) and less chat from me so you can conveniently print it and take it with you.
Happy exploratory eating! Ganbatte!
To start with, this post is based on some rules about Transitive and Intransitive verbs a Japanese teacher gave me, right now its a little messy and all mixed together, I am going to seperate the post into an English Post (complete with romaji) and Japanese post. For now, please bear with me and enjoy.
【自動詞と他動詞の文法についてです。】
Here are some rules on transitive and intransitive verbs….
3 rules:
1. All words ending with “-aru” are transitive. Changing from “-aru” (他動詞 – Tadoushi – needs an object, を)
to “-eru,” they become intransitive. Jidoushi. (自動詞 – Jidoushi – works by itself)
2. Words ending with “-reru” are all transitive. Tadoushi.(他動詞 – Tadoushi – needs an object, を)
3. Words ending with “-su” are all transitive Tadoushi.(他動詞 – Tadoushi – needs an object, を)
“-aru” and “-eru”
Ex. （あ）上がる 上げる、集（あつ）まる 集める、伝（つた）わる 伝える、
“-reru” and “-su”
Ex. 壊（こわ）れる 壊す、売（うれ）れる 売る、切（き）れる 切る
“-ru” and “-su”
Ex. 写（うつ）る 写す、 出（で）る 出（だ）す、帰（かえ）る 帰す
“-eru” and “-asu”
Ex. 遅（おく）れる 遅らす、 逃（に）げる 逃す
“-u” and “-asu”
Ex.動（うご）く 動かす、 乾（かわ）く 乾かす
“-iru” and “-osu”
Ex.起（おき）きる 起こす、落（お）ちる 落とす
“-u” and “-eru”
Ex. 開（あ）く 開ける
“-eru” and “-u”
Ex. 聞（き）こえる 聞く
“-u” and “-eru”
Ex. 立（た）つ 立てる
“-eru” and -u”"
Ex. 見（み）える 見る
もちろん例外もありますが、大体はこのような型になっています。
Of course there are exceptions, but these are the general rules.
【1度と1回について】
Regarding 「度」and「回」
基本的に同じ意味ですが、少し差があります。
Basically the same meaning. There are small differences as follows.
１決まった言い回しがあります。
Set phrases and idioms.
例：一度＿＿＿してみる、もう2度と＿＿＿ない、第＿回卒業式
２「度」１から３まで、「回」無限に使えます。
「度」is usually used for number from 1 to 3.「回」can be used for any numbers
例： 1度、2度、3度、X４度。1回、2回、3回 ・・・100回・・・
This by far is the number one reason to unlock your phone, apple deems fit to only us to background the phone, mail, and the ipod, but the iphone can definitely handle more than that! Especially if you have the 3GS but even for those with the 3G backgrounding is a super useful tool. It allows you to open programs and then switch to other programs leaving the original one open (in the background). Backgrounding is great when you set programs like Nimbuzz (to receive chat messages) and (Siphon to receive calls) to run backgrounded. Backgrounder is also nice for simpler things. Programs like the App Store and Cydia (the Pirate, “jailbreak app store”) or even certain games which take a long time to load. If you load them, and leave them backgrounded, you can flip back and forth quickly and easily.
2. Voipover3G
What can I say, its the greatest… this may not mean much for those on AT&T back stateside but Japan’s main carrier for the Iphone is Softbank, and they RAPE you on cell phone bills. Note the caps. With the basic plan, it costs 40 Yen a minute (46 cents a minute at today’s exchange rate). So for me, this is actually my number one because, nothing like being able to use VOIP over my data plan and not get raped by Softbank… maybe I will get my bill under 10,000 yen this month lol… doubtful 
3. Winterboard
Winterboard is just cool, you want 5 icons at the bottom? Yea they got that.
6? No problem, you’ve come to the right place!
Change your font, colors, icons, standard background, lock screen and almost anything else you can think of, yep, they can do that!
Its definitely the home depot for the iphone, lets you personalize it, definitely pleasing to the eye.
In combination with the Voip over 3G and siphone (or nimbuzz, though I havent been able to get Nimbuzz to work over 3G yet) GV is great, it basically allows my Japanese cell to recieve calls from my US GV number (routed through Gizmo to Siphon which is backgrounded of course)
5. Unlock
Unlocking my SIM card was very useful over Thanksgiving and I will use it again for Christmas, Unlocking your SIM is essential for any traveller, international rates are another way Softbank will rape you, international roaming fees! On the other hand, I don’t even think AT&T phones will be able to get service in Japan! Regardless of the country, with an unlocked iPhone, you can slide into any store and pick up a SIM card and be talking in no time, at local rates. It would be nice if you could get a data plan too, but they are hard to find on a prepaid SIM card. (Apparently Tmobile offers cheap prepaid data plans for 40 dollars a month in the US. They are over the slower Edge, not 3G networks though.)
6. SB Settings
This also could be higher on this list because its one of the most useful apps on my phone! Think windows task manager for your iPhone. Check running processes (damn backgrounded apps!) adjust brightness, toggle 3G, WIFI, Bluetooth, quick launch programs, see your stats, you name it, you can do it from SB Settings (which reminds me I have to put a link to siphon!)
Man, does anyone else hate Apple as much as I do? They are the new evil empire… M$ is cleaning up there act, securing up windows, playing nicely with open source and generally being less evil. Apple is building stronger walls and really playing games with their App Store. Why can’t google voice have an app? Who do you think you are? I am glad the FCC is stepping in and sticking it to them. Just wait, everyone loves them now, its hip and trendy to have a Mac… we sell out for the beautiful designs and stability, but that image won’t last.
8. Free programs galore
There are tons of free programs in Cydia, everything mentioned in this posting is free. Better still, if you get really deep into it and install SSH, you can steal any program available and install it yourself. That will be posted later, probably by Travis because I have yet to accomplish this myself
9. Siphon (SIP phone)
What can I say, free, awesome and it works over 3G, what else could you want? You can program any SIP service you have, so far I have only tested it with Gizmo (Google Voice) and Voipbuster, but its been great. Only feature its really lacking is a way to store your information for multiple accounts so you dont have to retype your info each time.
Siphon also backgrounds nicely, meaning you can sign in and leave it on to receive calls from people. I would love if they could find some way to hook into the regular phone notification system. Currently, when someone calls on my Google Voice number, it rings and I have to find the icon, reopen the app, and THEN click answer… total pain, and kinda slow. Anyone with info on this, please contact me!
10. SSH
More on this later, Travis will tell you more about it. Basically you can directly connect to your phone through your network and transfer files, do whatever you need. Straight up command prompt style. 
Thats all for now, any questions, or over programs you think I forgot, please feel free to comment below!
これは、日本語の私の最初のブログポストです。日本語は下手ですから、すみません！でもやってみましょう！(英語版もあります：http://ichibantech.com/blogs/2009/12/07/ed-vs-ing-forms-of-adjectives-in-english/)
日本人に-ingと-ed形容詞は難しいから、良い出発点と思います。
例から始めましょう！
例えば: He is boring vs. He is bored 意味は全然違います!
He is boring -> 他の人にとって彼は、面白くありません. (彼はつまらない.)
vs.
He is bored -> 彼は、退屈しています。
全然違うでしょ？
書いた理由は、多くの友人がこの点の問題を抱えているからでした。最近私の友達言いました“I am very boring lately”.
I figured this would be a good place to start posting as I have discovered that this point to be especially confusing to my Japanese friends, they almost ALWAYS mix up the -ing and -ed forms of adjectives. (Japanese version here! 日本語版もあります！)
Lets start with an example
If you say: He is boring vs. He is bored it has completely different meanings!
He is boring -> To other people, he is boring. (OR He makes other people feel bored.)
vs.
He is bored -> He feels bored.
big difference huh?
I wrote this post because my friend had said, “I am very boring lately” which was funny because she meant to say, “I am bored”… because she felt bored, but really she insulted herself by calling herself boring.
Another example:
He is exciting -> He makes me (or other people) excited
vs.
He is excited -> He feels excited (He wants to jump up and down)
Got it?
If you have any other questions, or better still, you feel you can add some clarifications please don’t hesitate to post them in the comments section!
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