Learning Japanese, I think I'm learning Japanese, I really think so!

Next week I will announce my India trip and fundraising efforts to all the teachers at my school, and I thought it would be really cool if I could make the announcement myself in Japanese. (GULP!) So I had my supervisor help me write it ... well, ok write it for me. One of my students helped me practice after school, and made a recording on my cell phone that I could listen to over the weekend to work on pronunciation. Most of the vocabulary was new and the grammar was a bit more complex than what I already now, but I think it is still really good practice.

I typed the whole speech below -- partially as a way to practice, but also so you guys back home can get a taste of Japanese grammar.

First, in Hiragana/Katakana and a few Kanji: (The Japanese use three different alphabets - I know two of them and am slowly learning the third.)

インド　では　にせにょねん　の　つなみで　たくさん　の　いえが　こわれました。　そして　いまだに　えんじょが　うけられない　ひとが　いませ。 私は　ふゆやすみに　インド　へ　いきます。　そして　いえを　なくした　ひとの　ために　いえを　たてる　ボランチア　に　いきます。それで　私は　ぼきんを　あつめたい　です。　まくひょ　は　５０，０００円　です。　おねがいします。　

This is what is says if you were to write it out in Roman letters. I broke it into sentences and below each one put the literal English translation, in the same order it would be in the Japanese sentence. This should give you a sense of why Japanese is so difficult to learn (one of several reasons actually.)

Indo dewa nisenyonen no tsunami de takusan no ie ga kowarimashita.
India in 2007 in tsunami by many house were destroyed.

Soshite imada ni enjo ga ukerarenai hita ga imasu.
And still help get not people there are.

Watashi wa fuyuyasami ni Indo e ikimasu.
Me winter vacation India will go.

Soshite ie wo nakushita hito no tameni ie wo tateru boruntear ni ikimasu.
And house lost people for house build volunteer to do will go.

Sore de watashi wa bokin wo atsumetai desu.
So then I donation collect please.

Mokuhyo wa 50,000 en desu.
Goal 50,000 yen is.

Onegai Shimasu.
If you would, please.

The grammar rules are actually rather simple once you really get down to it, and there are few irregularities. What makes it hard is that it is almost backwards from English grammar, so you have to completely switch your thinking. I am at the point now where I have a decent grasp of some basic grammar and enough vocabulary to use it, but figuring out what to say in a given situation off the top of my head is REALLY HARD because my brain is not used to thinking in Japanese.

I can't even tell you how many times I have accidentally spoken Spanish to people here, because it is the foreign language that automatically pops into my head when I know English will not work. And I even combine Japanese and Spanish. It is weird when that happens.

Other reasons why Japanese is so difficult -- they still use thousands of the Chinese characters - to be considered literate, you must learn 2,000 of them. Furthermore, there are various ways to say everything, according to how polite you want to be. So even a super basic sentence might be said in 3 or 4 different ways by various people, depending on the situation. Luckily as a foreigner, we can get away with using the incorrect form (using the familiar/casual form with a supervisor for example) and no one will hold it against us. But the tricky part is that people will speak to you in all the different forms, so even though you may actually have learned the vocab and grammar of what they are saying, if they chose to say in the uber-polite form (which is how most store clerks speak), chances are you will not understand them!

You can probably understand why Japanese people are so impressed when foreigners try to learn their language.

Luckily, the pronunciation is rather easy. If Japanese pronunciation was a difficult as Korean, I swear nobody would even bother to learn it.

But really, when you think about it, English is crazy difficult language also. If you don't believe me, try teaching it sometime!