What's new

New free lessons

ibiza

後輩
24 Dec 2002
11
0
11
New lessons available at tokyolounge.com

If you have any questions on them, feel free to post in the forum.

tokyolounge.com/lessons/index.html
 
100%? I don`t know about that. There may be typos, but I try my best to correct everything.

As for the lessons them self. They are correct. I wouldn`t consider myself REALLY advanced. Mabey upper-intermediate.
I study japanese for two years in america, and I`m just finishing up a year exchange in Japan.

If you think anythin is incorrect, post if it in the forums, or email me.
 
I don't want you to take this the wrong way, but before posting free lessons I think you should brush up on your basics. Basic mistakes such as

shinu - shinte / 死ぬ - 死んて
asobu - asonte / 遊ぶ - 遊んて

are in my opinion unforgiveable. Its 死んで and 遊んで. Furthermore, while バスから降りて is grammatically correct, the more common form is バスを降りて which is just as grammatically correct. Your overabundant use of the personal pronous 私 and 俺 also show that you are not yet at ease with the Japanese way people express themselves without referring to themselves.

Again I stress that you I don't want you to take this the wrong way, but I've been in Japan for a number of years and I wouldn't presume to give Japanese lessons, even to beginners, for fear of teaching falsehood. Leave that to the pros. The Japanese for Busy People series of textbooks are not that expensive and very accurate.

Also, to be an upper-intermediate, you must be able to talk about more than just yourself in Japanese. You should be able to talk about abstract concepts for some time with more or less ease. I work in a totally Japanese office (I swear nobody understands English or French), I've been here long enough to do it, but I still find it difficult. I myself think I BARELY qualify as an upper-intermediate Japanese learner.

That's my two cents.
 
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Originally posted by tasuki
That's my two cents.

I think your two cents aren't even worth that amount,, 1. you don't make sense, 2. you don't make sense, 3. Ibiza is smarter than you because scroll down on his main page,,

"My new favorite site is Ghettocities Clothing"

So shut up Tasuki, make a website and see who knows more and in the meantime every else can read my language help too at:

ghettocitiesclothing.com/ghettocitiesguide.html

(It makes a lot more sense ,,)

Josh
 
LOL, your "site" is a joke (and not even a good one at that). "Illustrasians?" Gimme a break... My 4-year-old nephew has more artistic talent with his crayons than your *****ic stick figures. Just 'cuz Tasuki called your punk *** out like i've done so many times in the past, now your forum hopping and hijacking any thread in which he last replied to attack him. Grow up twit...
 
Originally posted by tasuki
I don't want you to take this the wrong way, but before posting free lessons I think you should brush up on your basics. Basic mistakes such as

shinu - shinte / 死ぬ - 死んて
asobu - asonte / 遊ぶ - 遊んて

are in my opinion unforgiveable. Its 死んで and 遊んで. Furthermore, while バスから降りて is grammatically correct, the more common form is バスを降りて which is just as grammatically correct.

I was wondering the same thing about "aite kudasai" (開いて ください) for "open your books." I know it is grammatical, but still less common than "akete kudasai" (開けてください)? The heavy use of 'ore' surprised me as well -- to a girl at that. Is this common among Japanese kids today? :eek:
 
Actually it should be 開いて (hiraite)... I wouldn't say that "ore" is that common among women (at least I don't know any that use it). It's rather boyish and not very polite at that.
 
Originally posted by tasuki
Actually it should be 開いて (hiraite)... I wouldn't say that "ore" is that common among women (at least I don't know any that use it). It's rather boyish and not very polite at that.

Yes, you're right. I looked it up and Aku is an intransative form of the verb which can't take an object.
「教科書の12ページをあいてください」NG→開くは自動詞

I had seen it a lot on the internet seemingly replacing akeru and thought it might be OK.
😊 :note:

「教科書の12ページをひらいてください」
「教科書の12ページをあけてください」

So both of these are grammatical, but ひらく is probably better. More like turn your book to page 12 as opposed to just opening it?

No, I know women & girls don't normally use 'ore,' I was just surprised it was being used to one in the sample lessons (Takuya to Reiko).
 
Not to rain on this person's attempt at giving free lessons (I think its a very noteworthy effort), I think that it may be a bit early for him to be doing this sort of thing and his site should not be recommended.

開く(ひらく) just means open. It's just a different reading. Some people prefer using hiraku (like me) some people I know say aku all the time. It's just a matter of preference. It's a bit the same as, say, choosing 発見する (はっけん; which means find) over 見つける (みつける; which also means find).
 
Originally posted by tasuki
開く(ひらく) just means open. It's just a different reading. Some people prefer using hiraku (like me) some people I know say aku all the time. It's just a matter of preference. It's a bit the same as, say, choosing 発見する (はっけん; which means find) over 見つける (みつける; which also means find).
I knew about akeru and hiraku being synonymous -- aite must just have been a miscopying of the reading in
"教科書の12ページをあいてください".

I've seen that a lot, but really is a pretty basic mistake for a tutorial site. :eek:
 
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Look people, I`m not perfect. There are going to be typos. But 99% of what I teach is correct. I make sure of it.

"Not comfortable with the way Japanese express themselves when referring to themselves?" Give me a break. I over use watashi and ore to keeps the lessons simple. I`m not posting these lessons to flaunt my own japanese skills, I`m posting them to help others. And in that attempt, I will keep the generalized lessons(on verbs, adjectives, etc) rather simple so people can grasp the concept.

I`m not going to fight with you guys over this.
 
Just for the record, my earlier comments were directed at Ghetto and not you Ibiza. Just wanted to clear that up.
 
Ibiza, I don't think anyboday is expecting you to fight anyone over anything. What Elizabeth and me found is that there are a lot of inaccuracies that go beyond simple typoes. That's it. I personally would not recommend these lessons to friends, and that's my prerogative. Yours is to keep offering them regardless of the opinions of the people of this board.

So, no hard feelings, OK?
 
You may just want to get some feedback from a native speaker first and save all this hassle next time, no? :D I actually didn't get that far into it, but would definately recommend setting anything nonstandard or optional -- such as the "watashi" and "ore"s (which I wouldn't introduce at all in this context) along with their particles -- off in parentheses to indicate that more clearly.


And I'm also wondering about this line:

バスケット部活にいたの. Shouldn't it be:

---> "部活のメンバーだった。" or
---> "部活(or クラブ) に入っていた"


にいる sounds more like you were in a physical location of the club, but not necessarily a member or someone who had joined.
 
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She's absolutely right, you know...

And it's not 部活, it's 部. バスケット部、テニッス部、映画部、などなど。部活 refers to the action of taking part in a school club. For example,

Aさん:Bさん、今日忙しいですか。
Bさん:はい、部活があります。

That's not a typoe, it's an interpretational error. It leads the learner to learn something skewed that he/she is going to have to relearn when is he/she is comfronted to the fact that it's wrong, which completely negates the value of taking the lesson in the first place, don't you think?

As I outlined before, て form verbs 死ぬ and 遊ぶ presented as しんて and あそんて? That's more than a typo in my book. If you absolutely want a count, I'll be more than happy to go through all your lesson pages and catalog everything. I mean, if you can't take criticism, you shouldn't be posting your lesson on a free message board, don't you think.

I don't think that Elizabeth nor I have been negative about this. We're just trying to tell you that there are inaccuracies in your lessons and that you should perhaps run them by a native before putting them online.
 
Tasuki
部活 is also used to refer to a school club itself. It is used everyday this way in casual conversation.

Elizabeth:
the question being asked by Takuya was "部活に入っていたの". a response of "部活のメンバーだった" would be grammatically correct, but would sound a little odd foe the question bing asked. "部活(or クラブ) に入っていた" would be a fine answer, but "部活にいたの" is quicker and more casual, thus fitting the conversation.

As for running it by a native speaker first, I`ve always done that, and will continue to do that. As it reads on my site, I`m living in Japan right now, attending school. I remember my teacher picking up the 死んて・遊んて error, but when I was making the HTML file, I pasted from an old word document that I hadn`t corrected.

開いてください is a little odd. I`m used to hearing 開けなさい,akenasai (which is mostly used by strict male teachers), 開いてください, hiraite kudsai is more common.

I`ve upload the updated pages tonight.

I hope that clears things up.


::update::
I just went and asked my 2 friends who read of my school conversation lesson in the first time and they said the 部活 part was normal for casual conversation. Then I went and asked two teachers and they got into an argument over it. I`m going to change it just to be safe. Thanks for the heads up.
 
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I know you live in Japan, so do I. Work in a publishing company doing tech writing for some of the big tech companies in Japan (which I can't disclose, but I'm sure you can guess) so I see a lot of weird engineering Japanese every day.

As for the 部活 bit, it sounds odd any way you put it to Elizabeth, in my opinion. I don't think a native Japanese would answer I was at the club to the question did you join a club. On top of which the question is past continuous (部活に入っていたの), which is also weird for this situation. You cannot according to all logic be continously joining a club... So it would read better as 部活に入ったの?

Anyway, 部活 only refers to school clubS when speaking generally. When you're specific about it and use a club name such as バスケット部 or 映画部, you should only append 部 not 部活. 開いてください is more than odd, it's grammatically incorrect. As Elizabeth said, it's an intransitive verb and cannot take the object (something I knew from practice but didn't know formally, so there goes the illusion of my omniscience, if there was any confusion.)

I'm glad to know that you have the pages checked by a native Japanese speaker, but if two non-native speakers can pick at it like that, maybe you should make sure that he or she is not only giving it a quick glance instead of a thorough check... And don't get me wrong, I'm not saying this to insult you or your checker, it's just that I've run across this kind of behaviour before from Japanese...

***Update***
Thanks for the update. I found it rather funny...
 
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