Cultural Note: Japanese Language

This week I started Language lessons with a Japanese Tutor. There was a lot to take in, a lot of new stuff but also a lot of very interesting stuff.


If you're thinking of learning a language (Japanese or otherwise) I wouldn't recommend a tutor. My lesson was really fun, really interesting and I will carry it on, but to be honest all the information they teach (and more) is on the internet for free.
However I spent time on the internet, I learnt to read the Hirigana and Katakana Syllabary myself, I then went to a tutor to practice pronunciation and I find I learn best when there is someone in front of me to answer any of my usually ridiculous questions.
There is of course Pro's and Con's to having a tutor and to learning on the internet. I would recommend Tofugu as a great starting place online (Also I must add, if you have an Iphone/Ipad then the "Human Japanese" app is amazing, one of the best purchases I've ever made. It seems expensive, £6 on iphone and £10 on ipad but believe me it's more than worth it)

Of course the decision is yours.

Anyway, that links in nicely with today's cultural note. As I had my first tutor lesson this week, I thought I'd talk about the Japanese Language.

Something very interesting about Japanese language is that, to this day, it's still unclear of where it actually originated from. 3rd Century Chinese Documents contain some Japanese words, but large amounts were not recorded until much much later.

As far as I am aware the first authenticated form of Japanese writing came around the 8th Century, conveniently tilted "Old Japanese". This "Old Japanese" came in the form of a document named the Kojiki which consisted of a selection of myths regarding the main islands of Japan (apparently).

Old Japanese soon found it's way to "Late Middle Japanese" (all very easy to remember). Late middle Japanese must of been terribly confusing for the people of Japan, especially those older generations. Why I hear you ask? (If you didn't ask why, then I shall give you space to do so now..)




Why I hear you ask? well because late middle Japanese saw the introduction of European words (Tobako - tobacco etc). A lot more happened in Late middle Japanese, if you are interested do some research on Google, if not you are more than welcome to ask me.

More importantly I wanted to talk about Modern Japanese. Again there is a lot of information that I could talk about, but it will probably bore most people so I won't (and again if you want the information just ask me or ask Google).

So, present day Japanese consist of 4 "alphabets" known as Syllabary. The 1st one is Romanji, which is Roman letters. If you don't know Roman letters, then you're wasting your time reading this as everything I've written has been in Roman letters. In Japanese they're pretty useless though, so don't panic.



The second and quite possibly most important Japanese Syllabary is Hirigana. Hirigana is used to write Native Japanese words (when there isn't a Kanji - which will be discussed). This seems to be the first syllabary learned by both Japanese students and those learning Japanese.
 If you have a good understand of Hirigana then you can start to really open up your Japanese learning.
I am more than happy to teach anyone Hirigana, as I have a relatively good comprehension of it now.



I will write a new post tomorrow which contains much more information on Hirigana and Katakana, and will also be a good start for you to learn.

Okay so next is Katakana.
 Katakana is used to write "borrowed" words.
More appropriately called Foreign or European words (like Tobako, Pan, Glass etc etc).








And last but by NO means least is Kanji.
 Kanji is probably the hardest to learn (hence why I haven't yet).
There is way over 1000 Kanji to memorize, some Kanji have more than one meaning as well, which makes it very very hard.

Essentially it is the borrowed Chinese writing system, used for Japanese words.

As I said a million times over, there is a lot more information, I don't want to bore anyone but you are more than welcome to ask me for any information you want. I have just provided brief notes for you to read.

I will write about Hirigana and Katakana tomorrow, which I hope to provide a learning tool with.
Apologise if this post feels rushed or slightly boring, it's a little later than I usually write and I am slightly tired, which means I tend to waffle.

I hope you have enjoyed my brief lesson on the Japanese Language system, you probably havent learned anything, but there is always another day. Hopefully that day is tomorrow when you come back and read my Hirigana and Katakana Lesson.

Be sure to follow us on twitter - @TurnChapanese
I appreciate any help in promoting this post. There is links to share this page on facebook and twitter, so I hope people use them.

I also hope this post makes some form of sense.

Thanks again

Dan

Cultural Note: Ninja (Japan)

So I was thinking, the blog will start to get stupidly boring if I only document my life. I don't want that to happen at all. My plan is to start adding other features into the blog. Here's what;

Anything entitled "My day/Week" Etc - will quite clearly be, well, my day or week.
"Cultural Notes" will be a post about a certain aspect of Asian culture, whether it be Chinese,Japanese, Korean or any other part of Asia that has taken my fancy throughout the week.

If you haven't already guessed, my post today will be about, what I believe to be, one of the greatest things in the world - Ninja.


Here's what I've learnt so far;

There seem to be two predominant theories as to why Ninja's exist. I shall explain both of them in my way (My way usual consists of talking in circles, an overuse of punctuation and a sentence structure that makes no sense, so bare with me)

The first theory I read about is that Ninja were the average working men of Japan. Farmers and such like would train in the art of Ninjutsu to defend their self from unwanted infiltrators. I wasn't so keen on this idea so I did not do much research into it, you're more than welcome to research and educate me in this theory if you would like.

The more widespread theory seems to be that Ninja were the "James Bond" of ancient Japan. Essentially Spies and infiltrators. I liked this idea a lot more, so I'll talk more about it.
It is said that the actual fighting skill of ninja was secondary to stealth. Which should be common sense for a spy, but many of us are under the impression they are mainly fighters.
On saying that, they were taught to fight. As I've already said they studied a Martial Art called Ninjutsu or "Ninpo". This martial arts could have been taken from China and adapted by the first Ninja.

One very interesting thing about ninja (other than everything about ninja) is their clothing. Contrary to our belief Ninja did not wear Black clothing. Which is strange as every ninja film /picture or video game is depicted in a black costume. In actual fact ninja wore blue. The black comes from Old Japanese Theatre productions. Black costume were used against a black curtain background to give the appearance and idea that ninja were very hard to spot and could move around relatively undetected.
So next time you see a Ninja in a black costume, you can either boast of the knowledge you have learned, or thank Japanese theatre houses for providing us with one of the most famous misconceptions of all time.
Although to their credit, it was an ingenious idea.

Of course there is a lot more I could write, but most people will have either stopped or be ready to stop reading. If this post gets enough response I might do a Ninja part 2 at one point.

Still thankyou for reading, and I hope you look forward to a lot more Cultural notes and a lot more posts on this blog.
Please help me spread the word, and follow me on twitter @TurnChapanese
Any questions, ideas or adivce, hit me up on twitter.

Thanks again
Dan

Images on this post are from google.

Brief meditation

Well today hasn't been that productive, i spent the majority of the day cleaning. To be honest I'm fine with that. I've really sorted my room out. It's a lot more organised than it ever has been. I would completely recommend you take the time out of your day to organise the space around you.
The thing is, it's been bought to my attention, from a more intelligent and well informed being that this organised, minimalistic household is a very stereotypical western view on Asian culture.
I definitely do not want to give that impression and as much as I may come across a bit arrogant to this culture believe me that is far from what I'm trying to achieve.

As not much happened today I will talk a little about meditation and what I've learnt so far.

So meditation.
Let me start by saying, I can almost guarantee that what you think you know about meditation. You don't.
Or maybe that was just me.
Either way, from what I've learnt it's all about just being still. It's not about blocking thoughts, it's not about attempting to change your mind state. It's all about just being.
As you read this I would like to invite you to meditate with me. I will try to write some very brief instructions for you but I would like everyone to attempt it in their own way.

Start off sitting comfortably, take a few deep breaths and close your eyes. For a few minutes just breathe normally, counting every breath in until ten, then restart

Breathe in - 1
Breathe out - 2
Breathe in - 3 etc etc until ten and then start from 1

When you begin to feel comfortable with that, stop counting and just be. Be still for 10 or so minutes. Open your eyes slowly, give a nice stretch and carry on with your day.

A more impressive post soon but for now let me now how you get one with the meditation.

Follow me on twitter @TurnChapanese