Nihongo o benkyoushimashou!

One of my lesser known talents is that I can speak conversational Japanese.  Post-school but pre-children (in that lovely interlude where I could do anything I liked), a friend asked if I would enrol on a Japanese GCSE course to keep them company.  And, in their words: "because you will make sure I don't jack in the course early, because you're such a swot.  You know, like Monica in that episode of Friends when they go on a reading course".

 

(Scroll forward to 4.40 and that's me in class apparently)

Since I was in my 20s with boundless energy and plenty of time, and because I am a swot, of course I said yes.  And it was really quite fun.

The Japanese writing system has 3 layers - 2 phonetic alphabets plus 1 pictorial system called Kanji (essentially nicked from Chinese characters and bastardised a bit).  Today I am going to introduce you to some Kanji:

Tree: ki

Wood: hayashi

Forest: mori

And now here's my sewing version:

Tree:

Wood:

Forest:

Unfortunately I can't quite remember how to say "I can't wait until this &*@%£*$ Christmas Fair is over" in Japanese.

However, if asked at the Christmas Fair whether I will do it again, I will reply "chotto....".  We should have this expression in English.  It literally means "a bit", but in reply to a question it can mean "No, and I am not going to give you a reason why, and you can't ask me the reason why either because that would be unacceptably rude of you".

We were taught this in the context of how to say no to being asked on a date or something.  How much easier would it be to say "chotto" than to think of rubbish excuses like washing your hair or visiting your Great Aunt in Cheltenham?  Although now that I am old and grumpy (and in no danger of being asked on a date), I am perfectly happy to just say "no".

G x