Help with this sentence?

kiite · 8 May 2014

The sentence in my book is 【悪いけど牛乳買って来てくれない？】 and the given translation is "could you go and buy milk?" but what is the 悪いけど part for? wouldn't that mean "even though it's bad/difficult" or something? so the sentence is more like, "even though it's difficult, won't you buy milk and return?"

lanthas · 8 May 2014

I'd translate it as "I know it's bad of me for asking, but...". Similar to when people say 悪かった when apologizing: "that was a bad thing for me to do."

kiite · 8 May 2014

ooh so its kind of an 'excuse me..' or 'sorry, but..' situation? i didnt know that people said 悪かった in apologies! thank you.

nekojita · 8 May 2014

悪い is used here as "Sorry" (in a casual way). Don't read it too literally.

買ってくる is a common phrasing when you're going to go out and buy something and come straight back. Again, no need to translate literally when you put it in English. This is quite a common pattern, for example if you wanted to say "I'll go take a look", you're more likely to use 見てくる (not 見ていく). In English we add "go" in phrases like this and the "come back" is usually assumed/implied, in Japanese the "go" part is assumed but you add "come back" instead.

lanthas · 8 May 2014

Also see the traditional 行って来ます when you leave the house - "I'll go and come (back)"

nekojita · 8 May 2014

Indeed! Actually, いってらっしゃい is the same, only it comes from いらっしゃる instead of くる

kiite · 10 May 2014

thank you both for the information, that's interesting! i didnt know that about the phrase 行って来ます! also, the section of the book i was in was talking about how in japanese they say the errand and the returning from, whereas in english we say the going to and then the errand. this was just an example that confused me a little haha :>

Help with this sentence?

kiite

doodler!

lanthas

kiite

doodler!

nekojita

先輩

lanthas

nekojita

先輩

kiite

doodler!

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