Call me ...

[magevampjoe]

Hiya, first post on the forum!
Anyways, yo to everyone.

I've come across a little problem, well two in fact.

FIRST PROBLEM:
How do I ask people to call me something. For example, they call me rofuerurusan, and I want them to call me Joosan. What would I say in Japanese for this?
I tried wakan, but it simply gave back results for 'to call' as in to phone someone.

SECOND PROBLEM:
My second problem is saying sorry about my bad Japanese. Up until now I have been using:
sumimasen, watashi no nihongo ha warui desu
but I get the feeling in myself that this is entirely wrong.
Sorry, I haven't set up the IME on this PC yet...

Thanks for your help!

 

[Mike Cash]

<name> to yonde kudasai.

 

[magevampjoe]

Thank you Mike. I was struggling with that. Now is there an answer to my other problem, or is that perfectly acceptable?

Arigatou.

 

[Lotorie]

I will say:

sumimasen, nihongo wa... choutto muzukashii desu.
demo, gambarimasu.

sorry, japanese language is... a little difficult.
But, I will try my best

"Warui" is a bit strong I think.
It means "wrong", well, but as opposed to a good thing.

 

[Elizabeth]

SECOND PROBLEM:
My second problem is saying sorry about my bad Japanese. Up until now I have been using:
sumimasen, watashi no nihongo ha warui desu
but I get the feeling in myself that this is entirely wrong.
Sorry, I haven't set up the IME on this PC yet...
Thanks for your help!

Watashi no nihongo wa heta desu.

HTH !

P.S. Agree with epigene-san's answer. The above was in keeping with the original sentence structure. :sorry:

 

[epigene]

SECOND PROBLEM:
My second problem is saying sorry about my bad Japanese. Up until now I have been using:
sumimasen, watashi no nihongo ha warui desu
but I get the feeling in myself that this is entirely wrong.
Sorry, I haven't set up the IME on this PC yet...
Thanks for your help!

"Watashi wa nihongo ga heta desu" should be better.
Literally, it means "I'm not good at Japanese."
If you want to apolgoize for not being good at it, just had "gomen" or "gomennasai" before it. The former is for casual speak. The latter is used when you want to be polite.

 

[magevampjoe]

Thanks everyone! I thought warui would be wrong, so thanks.

 

[Elizabeth]

Thanks everyone! I thought warui would be wrong, so thanks.

Warui is meant for things that are unpleasant, disadvantageous, in bad condition, immoral, etc. Pretty much everything but unskillful, which is where heta substitutes.

 

[The7thSamurai]

<name> to yonde kudasai.

Just make sure you don't say "Joosan to yonnde kudasai". Shouldn't refer to yourself with a san.

 

[magevampjoe]

Thanks again everyone.
I do seem to do that quite a lot (Saying san after my name), especially whilst introducing myself... Silly me! :|

Now I understand the use of warui, (ie where NOT to use it)

Cheers all!

 

[Haruspex]

Hmm oresama worth a try... just for the thrill of it Nah, don't try that.

 

[ajmd20]

Ａｃｔｕａｌｌｙ I think ｙｏｕ ｃａｎ ｓａｙ Ｘさんと呼んでください, Ｙちゃんと呼んでください、嬢さんと呼んでください or whatever you want. I think that in this case rather than referring to yourself with san as in Xさんと申します, you are simply stating the name you would like to be called by. Welcome to any corrections though.

 

[undrentide]

Ａｃｔｕａｌｌｙ I think ｙｏｕ ｃａｎ ｓａｙ Ｘさんと呼んでください, Ｙちゃんと呼んでください、嬢さんと呼んでください or whatever you want. I think that in this case rather than referring to yourself with san as in Xさんと申します, you are simply stating the name you would like to be called by. Welcome to any corrections though.

さん、ちゃん、くん are honorifics and only to be used for others, but never for yourself.
If you introduce yourself 私はXXさんです, that would sounds just ridiculous.
Unless you'd like to make some kind of jokes about yourself, I'd strongly recommend not to use san/chan/kun.

If you ask people
××と呼んでください
then people will call
××さん／××ちゃん／××くん.

 

[ajmd20]

Ｉ'ｍ ｔｈｉｎｋｉｎｇ particularly ｏｆ ａ ｃｏｎｔｅｘｔ like:
原田美知子です 気軽にみっちゃんと呼んでくださいね。 or
アンドリュー・ゴードンと申します。 アンディーさんと呼んでください。
I'm pretty sure that at least the first one is correct, but maybe I'm wrong?

 

[nice gaijin]

the first one is fine, because it's more of a friendly casual introduction, and they're asking people to use their nickname. The second one is more polite, and asks people to use an honorific, which you shouldn't do. It should just be アンディーと呼んでください

 

[Elizabeth]

Ｉ'ｍ ｔｈｉｎｋｉｎｇ particularly ｏｆ ａ ｃｏｎｔｅｘｔ like:
原田美知子です 気軽にみっちゃんと呼んでくださいね。
I'm pretty sure that at least the first one is correct, but maybe I'm wrong?

I think the first sounds ridiculous and I've personally never seen two native speakers, at least adults, work out with each other what suffixes they need to add to each others name.

If you're trying to explain these conventions to a clueless foreigner go with something general like this that doesn't make yourself the center of the universe :

呼び捨てで呼ばれるよりは、名前＋さんで呼ばれる方がいいですね。

 

[Mike Cash]

I think the first sounds ridiculous and I've personally never seen two native speakers, at least adults, work out with each other what suffixes they need to add to each others name.

I have.

 

[Elizabeth]

I have.
fillerfillerfillerfillerfiller

OK, I should have qualified that with when two people are introducing themselves or name + さん、ちゃん くんとよんで。。。 , taking my cue from undrentide-san's example. But it's likely there are still curious exceptions even so.


And I recall you've also never heard a guy refer to himself as わたし in a casual situation. Although I actually did recently, completely by happenstance. A man probably in his mid 50's talking to a group of friends on a train. Who also used ちゃ、ちゃった, which triggered a feeling that there is something to the gay label...or maybe just because he was a little older.