by Nao

kumo, un

Clouds or a cloud is kumo.

Kumo sometimes becomes voiced sound gumo, other words added to the beginning. Akanegumo is madder red cloud seen at dawn or in the twilight. Hikōkigumo is a contrail. Hikōki is an airplane. Clouds that are likely to snow are yukigumo. Yuki is snow. Clouds that thunder are Kaminarigumo.  Rain clouds or nimbuses are amagumo. Clouds looking like fish scales are called urokogumo.

Yamikumo is used to modify words describing what you do. Added na or ni to the end, it is categorized as an adjective noun or a na-adjective grammatically. Yamikumoni means at random. To choose at random is “yamikumoni erabu,” in which erabu means to choose. However, it sounds coarse because yami means darkness.

1. Draw the horizontal stroke on the top.
2. Draw the dot on the left.
3. Draw the hook from where you start the previous stroke. After changing the direction of the brush, finish the stroke with a sweeping stroke.
4. Draw the vertical stroke in the middle.
5. Draw the dot above to the left.
6. Draw the dot below to the left.
7. Draw the dot above to the right.
8. Draw the dot below to the right.
9. Draw the horizontal stroke at the center.
10. Draw the longer horizontal stroke.
11. Draw the L-shape with a sharp angle at the bottom. You can separate this stroke into two.
12. Draw the dot in the lower right corner of the character.

MUCC – Shuushifu
Lyrics and Music by: Miya

ムック　「終止符」
詞曲：ミヤ

我奪う色彩　七つ数えろ　体の深きで
降りた別世界　軋む残響　宴の始まり告げ

愛をうたえば　悲しく響く　がらんどうのよな夢の中

早く消し去りたい逃げれば少し楽になれるのかな
この不快感を　頭ごなしに蹴飛ばし歩いてきた

悲しきマリア　銃を片手に　赤い現実に穴をあける
寒空の下　僕等の声は　深い雑音に埋もれ消えた

揺るぎなく強靭な意志を待ったはずの一四の虎は
当然のごとくに気付けずに強がる
唯一の救いは誰もが知った吠え方をすることで
忘れられること

冷たい雨が今日は優しく　空っぽの隙間に満ちる

愛さないなら　愛さないのならば
いっそこのまま消してくれ

悲しきマリア時は冷たく
終わりを告げる引き金を引く

ローマ字：

Ware ubau shikisai　nanatsu kazoero　karada no fukaki de
orita betsu sekai　kishimu sankyou　utage no hajimari tsuge

Ai wo utaeba　kanashiku hibiku　garandou no yon a yume no naka

Hayaku keshi saritai nigereba sukoshi raku ni nareru no kana
kono fukaikan wo　atama gonashi ni ketobashi aruitekita

Kanashiki MARIA　juu wo katate ni　akai genjitsu ni ana akeru
samuzora no shita　bokura no koe wa　fukai zatsuon ni umore kieta

Yuruginaku kyoujin na ishi wo matta wa zuno juushi no tora wa
touzen no gotokuni ki tsukezuni kyougaru
yuiitsu sukui wa daremo ga shitta koe kata tsuru koto de
wasureraru koto

Tsumetai ame ga kyou ha yasashiku　karappo no sukima ni michiru

aisanainara　aisanai no naraba
isso kono mama keshitekure

kanashiku MARIA toki wa tsumetaku
owari wo tsugeru hiki kane wo hiku

MUCC – Freesia
Lyrics by: Tatsurou
Music by: Miya

ムック　「フリージア」
詞：逹瑯
曲：ミヤ

声は胸を刺す　プライド悲しい　百獣の王の群れ
全て与えて　飼い慣らした檻の中で　今夢を見る？

枯れない向日葵　花プラスチック綺麗だね　ずっとずっと
枯れたマザーリーフ　新しい命　残して死んでった

悲しくも美しい世界　誕生が終わりの始まりだろう？
創造は破壊影の為の光　葡萄とコルク　君と僕全てが表裏のはずだろう？
なのに表か裏か君のいない世界は暗い　暗い

太陽さえ焦がす様な思いも
鈍い傷跡を残して陽炎に変わった

恋を拾った偽物なのにキラキラと輝いて
愛を詩えばたった三行で詩い終わる愛でした

悲しい美しい世界　枯れない花が心に咲く

ここにいるよ　汚れたままで
僕等は笑顔も忘れてしまうから
風になって　大空深く沈んで行こう
君への熱だけ残して

ここにいるよ　一人でいるよ
僕等は涙も忘れてしまうから？
太陽さえ焦がす様な恋も
時が浚ってく　ほら染めてく
大切な景色を

ローマ字：

Koe wa mune wo sasu　PRIDE kanashii　hyakujuu no ou no mure
subete ataete　kuinarashita ori no naka de　ima yume wo miru?

Karenai himawari　hana PLASTIC kirei da ne　zutto zutto
kareta MAZAARIIFU　atarashii inochi　nokoshite shindetta

Kanashikumo utsukushii sekai　tanjou owari no hajimari darou?
souzou wa hakai kage no tame no hikari　budou to CORK　kimi to boku subete ga hyouri no hazu darou?
nanoni omoteka uraka kimi no inai sekai wa kurai　kurai

Taiyou sae kogasu youna omoi mo
nibui kizuato wo nokoshite kagerou kawatta

Koi wo hirotta nisemono nanoni KIRAKIRA to kagayaite
ai wo utaeba tatta sangyou de utai owaru ai deshita

Kanashii utsukushii sekai　karenai hana ga kokoro ni saku

Koko ni iru yo　yogoreta mama de
bokura wa egao mo wasurete shimaukara
kaze ni natte　oozora fukaku shizunde ikou
kimi e no　netsudake nokoshite

Koko ni iru yo　hitori de iru yo
bokura wa namida mo wasurete shimaukara?
taiyou sae kogasu you na koi mo
toki ga saratteku　hora someteku
taisetsu na keshiki wo

by Nao

seishun

sei -> http://wp.me/pAlaB-Hs

shun ->  http://wp.me/pAlaB-eV

Seishun means youth or one’s prime time. In Japanese, ao sometimes means green or fresh leaves and therefore means young. The second character, or spring, is also compared to youth. The changes of seasons are likened to the transitions of one’s life, or aging in particular. Seishun can be an energetic and optimistic genre of literature or movie. As is always the case with youth, however, musing on seishun causes bitter and sweet feelings because the word accompanies the immaturity of youth. In this sense, seishun is something you can look back and reflect on.

by Nao

ame, ama, u (wu)

Ame is rain.

Baiu or tsuyu is the rainy season that usually comes in June. Both baiu and tsuyu have the same two characters. Bai means plum and u is this character. Rain shower is niwaka ame. Niwaka means sudden. A thunderstorm is raiu. Rai means thunder. A heavy rain is ōame. Rainy weather is uten.

Draw each dot from the upper left to the lower right like a raindrop.

1. Draw the horizontal stroke on the top.
2. Draw the vertical stroke on the left.
3. Draw the hook from where you start the previous stroke. End the stroke with an upward turn.
4. Draw the vertical stroke in the middle.
5. Draw the dot above to the left.
6. Draw the dot below to the left.
7. Draw the dot above to the right.
8. Draw the dot below to the right.

by Nao

hikari, hika-ru, kō

Hikari is light. The verb hika-ru means to shine.

Gekkō means moonlight. Nikkō means sunlight. Nikkō is the name of a world heritage site, too.

This character also means scenery. Kanko is sightseeing. Kan means to see.  Japan Tourism Agency is Kankōchō, which has English, Chinese, and Korean websites.

1. Draw the vertical stroke from the top.
2. Draw the dot on the left.
3. Draw the sweeping stroke from the upper right corner of the character.
4. Draw the horizontal line from the left to the right.
5. Draw the sweeping stroke from near the center. It ends in the lower left corner of the character.
6. Draw the curve from near the center. End the stroke with an upward turn.

by Nao

akaneiro

akane -> http://wp.me/pAlaB-Mm

iro -> http://wp.me/pAlaB-gr

When the setting sun casts a rubia glow and dyes the sky, we say, “sora ga akaneiro ni somaru.” We call the sky “akaneiro ni somatta sora.” The verb “somaru” is to take on color. Its past or adjective form of the verb is “somatta.”

by Nao

akane

Akane is a plant called rubia (madder) or the color madder red.

Draw the upper part first.

1. Draw the dot top left.
2. Draw the horizontal line crossing the first dot.
3. Draw the sweeping dot top right.
4. Begin to draw the lower part. Draw the horizontal line from left to right.
5. Draw the left side of the rectangle.
6. Draw the right-angled hook from the upper left corner of the rectangle to lower right. Stop before changing the direction of the brush and make a nice shoulder. The vertical part is bolder than the horizontal part.
7. Go back to the fourth stroke. Draw the sweeping stroke toward left. It touches the fifth stroke.
8. Draw the curve like the letter L. Don’t press the brush at the corner.
9. Draw the lower side of the rectangle.

by Nao

ki, moku, boku

A tree is ki. Trees are kigi. When you write kigi, you can either write this character twice or change the second character, gi, into another that means ditto.

Thursday is mokuyōbi. Mokusei is Jupiter. Mokusei whose sei is another character means something made of wood. Mokkin is xylophone.

A big tree is taiboku.

1. Draw the horizontal line from the left to the right. The tip of the brush moves along the upper side of the line.
2. Draw the vertical line from the top to the bottom. The tip of the brush moves along the left side of the line.
3. Draw the sweeping stroke from the previous strokes intersect. Let it sweep toward the lower left and make it thinner gradually.
4. Draw the sweeping stroke heading toward the other corner. Make it broader at the end.

by Nao

yama, san

Yama is a mountain. Most Japanese mountains have the suffix -san, such as Fujisan (Mt. Fuji) between Shizuoka and Yamanashi, Asosan (Mt. Aso) in Kumamoto, Zaōsan (Mt. Zaō) in Tōhoku, Rokkōsan (Mt. Rokkō) in Kōbe to name a few. The suffix –yama is similarly used for some mountains. Some examples are Kurohimeyama (Mt. Kurohime) in Nagano and Wakakusayama (Mt. Wakakusa) in Nara.

Yama also means a peak. The climax, the most important stage, or the critical juncture is called yamaba. Ba is a field.

Your speculation or guess is yama. If your speculation has succeeded, you can say yama ga atatta. Atatta is the past tense of the verb, ataru, or to hit. Failed speculation is described as yama ga hazureta. Hazureta is the past tense of the verb, hazureru, or to miss.

Start from the vertical line in the middle. The vertical strokes on both sides are about the same length.

1. Draw the vertical line from the top center.
2. Draw the L-shaped stroke from the left.
3. Draw the short vertical stroke on the right.

To friends & family of JET ALTs, the complaint is an old one, and familiar.  The Japanese language, with its “nuanced formal expressions and three different writing systems, is a uniquely complex language. How could a foreigner possibly learn it? Even Japanese people make mistakes.”

Author Emily Parker recently noted in The New York Times Book Review that “the Japanese language is being transformed by blogs, e-mail and keitai shosetsu, or cellphone novels. Americans may fret over the ways digital communications encourage sloppy grammar and spelling, but in Japan these changes are much more wrenching. A vertically written language seems to be becoming increasingly horizontal. Novels are being written and read on little screens. People have gotten so used to typing on computers that they can no longer write characters by hand. And English words continue to infiltrate the language.”

Since after World War II, the Japanese Ministry of Education has simplified characters and limited the number of kanji used in the media.  The recent proliferation of cell phone novels has made popular flat and simple language and expressions.  The popularity of graphic novels may also contribute to this trend.

Technology is assisting people to use and recognize more kanji. Instead of having to write every stroke from memory, users can type words phonetically into a computer and a list of characters to choose from pops up on the screen.

So, family & friends of ALTs, take heart.  Should these trends continue, they may encourage a more accessible Japanese for foreigners, in turn accelerating internationalization.  Our ALTs may find it a bit more comfortable to communicate in Japanese and live in the country.

But is this a good thing? I’m not so sure…

~A Friends & Family Post

by Nao

isshin

is(ichi) -> http://wp.me/sAlaB-one

shin -> http://wp.me/pAlaB-Gh

As these characters tell us, isshin means single-mindedness or wholeheartedness.

We usually this word as the adverb isshinni, adding ni after this. It means wholeheartedly. When you do something isshinni, you do it without thinking about other things because you are so occupied with it. To think intensely is “isshinni kangaeru.” Kangaeru is the verb “think.” The attitude of “isshinni” is positive, but “isshinde” implies that you have a desperate hope for something or desire to do something. Actions and behaviors in this case can be either positive or negative. Only the result can judge it. People might not approve one’s behavior in such a desperate situation if they regard it as whimsy.

by Nao

ka-ku, sho

Sho or shodō is calligraphy. Sho also means calligraphy work. Shodō implies art and techniques. One of the tags we put in this blog is kaisho. The sho of kaisho is this character, meaning calligraphy. Kaisho is the square style of writing.

The simplest meaning of this character is to write, a verb, when it is read ka-ku. Ku is written in hiragana. It is okurigana. A document is bunsho. Bun means text. A book is tosho or shoseki. To means illustrations. Seki means something recorded. Toshokan is a library. Kokuritsu Kokkai Toshokan is National Diet Library. A bookstore is shoten. Ten means a store.

Some compounds using this character mean something written. A white paper is hakusho. A letter is Shokan. Kan means letters.

1. Draw the hook on the top from the upper left corner.
2. Draw the longest horizontal line crossing the vertical part of the first stroke.
3. Draw the horizontal stroke from the left. Its end touches the end the first stroke.
4. Draw the horizontal stroke below it.
5. Draw the horizontal stroke that is a little longer than the previous one.
6. Draw the vertical line from the top to the center of the previous stroke.
7. Begin to draw the lower part. Draw the vertical line on the left.
8. Draw the right-angled hook. Make a nice shoulder while changing the direction of the brush.
9. Draw the horizontal stroke inside.
10. Draw the lower side of the rectangle.

1. Nunca he sido un gran partidario de la publicidad ecologista, principalmente porque son demasiado sentimentalistas, pero hay días que dan al clavo.

2. Encontré una forma que de alguna forma me satisface para escribir el apodo que me dió mi familia. 浩二 (Aunque hay otras tantas, ésta siento que es la adecuada) Si no me equivoco tiene un elemento Kanji, lo que es lo usual en japonés. La otra que me ha servido es こぢ pero ésa es una construcción con el silabario, mientras que la primera es el nombre de varios dudes. コヂ las dos últimas son como escribiría un gaijin. El seudónimo que tomé sería algo así: ネカトル (Dado que el katakana es usado para palabras de origen extranjero). Lo construí con el silabario y lo corroboré con internet.

3. Es posible que vaya al Garbanzo el fin de semana, a lo que viene a ser el Thanksgiving. Aún no sé, ya me estaba acostumbrando a ir y este año no se iba a poder.

Bonus: También me tienen sonriendo los mensajes de mi diosa Shiksa.

Bonus II: si quieren sonreír, vean la parte gris del lado derecho de este blog, casi a la altura de la barra.

And speaking of threesomes, those two narcotics agents and I had one going all morning long.

Terahara had left the interrogation room and Ozawa was now sitting right across from me at the desk, typing up the information I had already written down into a notebook computer.

Having spent a good hour and half answering questions about my family circumstances, and filling in the boxes with my educational background and work history, my writing hand started to cramp up. I pushed on to the next page just the same, hoping that the sooner I finished up, the sooner the cops would let me go.

On the third page, I bumped up against a Chinese character I couldn’t read.

As good as everyone claimed my Japanese to be, there were still many things I didn’t know, hundreds upon hundreds of kanji I couldn’t read, even more I couldn’t write. Like a cripple leaned on his crutches, I depended heavily on my electronic pocket dictionary.

Whenever you come across a Chinese character you can’t read, the first thing you’ve got to do is count the brush strokes, or the number of lines required to write the kanji. For example, the kanji for “person”, 人 (hito), is written with two strokes. “Big”, 大 (dai), is written with three strokes, “heaven” or “sky”, 天 (ten), is written with four, and the character for “beauty”, 美 (bi, etc.), with nine. Once you know how many strokes it takes to write the kanji you can then look it up in a Japanese dictionary where the characters are listed according to, among other things, their stroke number and components called as radicals.

This is the word that stumped me: 勲章. I knew the second character could be read as “sho”, but I wasn’t familiar with the first character. I tallied the stroke number–fifteen–then, looked it up. When the search came up with over a 100 characters written with fifteen brushstrokes, I added the radical for “strength”, 力. That narrowed the results down to eighteen characters. 勲 was at the top of the list and was, I now understood, pronounced “kun”.

Putting “kun“ and “sho“ together and got ”kunsho”. I didn’t know what that meant, but I was almost there. Looking up the ”kunsho” in the Japanese-English dictionary I discovered that the word meant “decoration”.

I was being asked if I had ever been decorated. “Decorated? Like a Christmas tree?”

“No,” Ozawa said, looking up from his notebook computer. “Have you ever been decorated by, for example, the emperor or a governmental official.”

I was tempted to ask Ozawa whether he thought I would be here if I had, but replied that I hadn’t.

“Just write ‘no’ on all these places,” he suggested.

Yeah right. I wasn’t about to take anything for granted, not when it meant the possibility of getting thrown in jail.

I continued to answer each question as thoroughly as possible–something that must have been driving the man up the smoke-stained wall. The last thing I wanted to do was tie the knot that they would hang me from.

by Nao

jibun

ji -> http://wp.me/pAlaB-uM

bun -> http://wp.me/pAlaB-Ai

Jibun is oneself. It can be yourself, myself, etc. depending on the context. “Jibun de shinasai” means, “do it yourself.” “Jibun de shimasu” means, “I’ll do it myself.” The philosophical question, “who am I?” leads you to journey to find who you are. The search for self is “jibun sagashi.” Something you can pursue is jibunrashisa. Rashisa means appropriateness and it also implies worthiness, so jibunrashisa is a noun that means being true to yourself and being yourself. Jibunrashiku is either imperative or adverbial. When this is an imperative message, it encourages you to be yourself. When you use it as an adverb, any verbs can follow this word. Basically, it means, “be yourself when you do whatever you do.” For example, jibunrashiku ikiru means to be yourself or to live like yourself. Ikiru is the verb “live.”

Since I last wrote in my blog, many things have happened.

I got over my swine flu, but ended up missing the last week of lessons and the week of exams. I was so tired due to my upside-down sleeping patterns. Not to say I slept upside down, but rather if I went to bed it was at 5am-6am in the morning and I would get up at 3pm-4pm. Occasionally I didn’t sleep at all for periods of over 24 hours.
So I met with my teacher, Kanayama-sensei,  on the Friday at 4pm which was the last day of the exams. She tried to convince me to just resit the semester rather than take the exams, since I wasn’t doing very well in class anyway. Considering I was homesick, injured, depressed and tired for pretty much the entire semester ensured I couldn’t do better than scrape a pass.
Anyways, just after the meeting she mentioned that there was a party to celebrate the end of the semester, so I went along since my headache wasn’t too bad and I figured it would make me sleepy enough to sleep early.
It was a really fun party and I got to see my friends again. It was pretty cheap considering it was all you can drink and they gave us some nice-ish food. Best thing was socialising with the teachers (Song-sensei and Kanayama-sensei both sat at our table in the izakaya) and seeing Chanelle mix drinks while trying not to get caught by the izakaya staff, having brought her own selection in with the intention of mixing mojitos and pina coladas for the teachers. For some reason they had never tried them before.

I went home afterwards, having to wait half an hour for the bus (bought some cakes from the Little Mermaid bakery before it closed. They make really nice apple pies. Though maybe not as good as my nana Margaret or my little brother. Their apple pies are amazing.

I revised my butt off for the exams. Was in the library as much as I had been before I had the internet, though it was crowded a lot and I couldn’t get a good desk. I spent 6 hours there drumming causative and passive verbs into my head and writing out kanji after kanji. I even practiced speed reading, which came in so useful in my final exam, since I mistimed it and ended up having 10 minutes to finish the reading section.

I think, despite my mountains of revision, that I failed. Mostly due to my abismal performance in the speaking test. I’d just finished the 2 hour final exam and due to mistiming it I had been forced to miss out some grammar questions I would have otherwise been ablw to answer, and then had 10 minutes to read a 2 page spread of text and answer 2 pages of questions on it. I answered all the questions though, with the exception on the extended writing answer. It shook me up though, realising I had probably failed despite the fact I actually thought I did ok on the kanji and grammar until that point. I ended up with no break and went straight in to the speaking exam. My mind blanked, and the kanji readings in the text that I memorised that morning left me struggling. I made so many mistakes that I knew it was going to be a failure. I ended up getting upset and could hardly continue. I got to the interview part and got through that ok, except half way through I realised I was supposed to be using polite and humble forms and I wasn’t. So I failed again. Then I got to the roleplay. I had written out and practiced 2 of the 3 roleplays. I was better at the one on my experiences in Japan though, and knew I would do well if I got that one. But I was given the letter of reccommendation role play which I wasn’t as good at, and ended up forgetting how to speak any Japanese at all. So I gave up and didn’t finish it.

Kanayama-sensei said I only had around 50% before these exams and I need 60% to pass, so I doubt I will pass.
But she says I will be better off resitting JLP3, but it ruins my plans. I wanted to do JLP3 this semester, JLP4 next semester and intensive JLP5 and 6 in my final semester. If I have to resit, then JLP4 is the highest I can get, and it isn’t good enough to get fluent for my final year in Japanese at Newcastle University.
Also if I fail this semester, I may get my scholarship taken off me, and have to repay the 100,000yen I have already recieved. Though I can’t exactly help the fact I had influenza…

I have been pretty lonely whilst in Japan, but I am starting to get out more and make more friends. I went to Tokyo Disney Sea with the Soul Run people. I could only afford to go after 6pm (which is 3,100yen as opposed to 6,500yen for the whole day) but it was still amazing. I got to ride some fun rides and see a 3D Aladdin live show, and I bought some Minnie Mouse ears (they were 1,050yen though :S ) The fireworks were amazing. Everything was so Christmassy even though it is onlt November!
On December 2nd we are all going to Disney Land for the day. I hope I can afford it, since I am running low on money. I’m going to transfer more over this evening when the UK is up and running. I think it will be faster than last time, mostly because I actually know I need to go convert it from pounds to yen myself rather than waiting for it to happen itself. Maybe I will get a good exchange rate this time?

I went out with Gary and the guys from Canada House the other day. We went to a festival at the Tokyo University of Foreign Studies not too far from ICU’s campus. We rode our bikes there, which was good because I needed the exercise. I hadn’t eaten all day but I didn’t like how small the food portion sizes were for the money they were charging. I gave in and bought some ゆず茶(Yuzu Tea) from the Korean food stall. Yuzu are a sweet citrus fruit that is very popular in Japan. It reminded me of how Lemsip would taste if it was actually yummy. Very sweet and tangy.
After the festival, some of us went off to Higashi-Koganei station’s side streets and got some Gyoza from this really nice restaurant. It only cost 500yen for 2 rows of gyoza (10 gyoza in totally I think. either 10 or 12) plus a bowl of rice, some pickles and some soup. There was free water on the table too. I had a really fun time and made new friends – some American, some Japanese.

I am hoping that I will spend the holidays going places with friends, but everyone seems busy going outside Tokyo. I can’t afford that yet. Maybe I can’t afford it until after Christmas, or perhaps not at all.

I am looking forward to Soul Run Video Night #2 (I was unaware #1 had even happened) and I really hope I have the money for Disney Land on the 2nd.

by Nao

naka, chū, jū

The inside of something is “something no naka.” For example, the inside of a box is hako no naka. Hako is a box. No is joshi (a particle). We use the particle, no, to combine two nouns. The latter belongs to the former.

The center is chūshin or chūō. Both shin and ō mean the center. Be careful not to write chūshin in the wrong order, shinjū, which means to commit suicide together.

Chūshi is cancellation. Shi means to quit. Chūdoku is addiction. Doku means poison.

Nicchū is the daytime. Including the same characters, both chūnichi and nicchū mean China and Japan. China is Chūka Jinmin Kyōwakoku. We call it Chūgoku for short. Goku means a country.

Draw the rectangle first.

1. Draw the vertical stroke on the left.
2. Draw the upper horizontal line and the right side of the rectangle. The horizontal part is narrower than the vertical part. When you change the direction of the brush, stop shortly and put down some more part of the brush to make the line bolder.
3. Draw the lower side of the rectangle.
4. Draw the vertical line in the middle.