so glad you’ve joined! It sounds like you have a really similar level and experience as I do. I’ve probably just done less reading practice. Welcome! I also find the grammar books dry (but useful for getting closer to goals). It will be really motivating to have more people actively trying to keep each other going.
me too!
I’ll be interested if someone with more experience comments on this. It seems to me it’s like the answer to the question (looking at people playing different instruments): 楽しそうですか。And the answer means you think it seems only those with the violin are having fun. Something doesn’t feel quite right about it as a general statement (if it’s violin, it seems fun), but I have absolutely nothing to back that up, lol. Somehow it feels like 楽しそうだ is commenting on an observation (that you have experienced), whereas バイオリンなら is a conditional. I wonder if these are compatible?
This is a bit of the blind leading the blind, but I wonder if these options are closer for general statements:
バイオリンなら、楽しいですよ！or
楽しそうなバイオリン
The other ones look good as far as I can tell
私も一日に二回日本語を勉強したいですが。。。ちょっと。。。
ooh that’s a good way of saying it that fits in with how I’ve seen it used. Thank you so much!!
I would echoe your statement that this sentence feels stilted and the situations in which one can use it would be pretty limited. But going purely from a grammar standpoint it is not wrong per se. That’s why I didn’t comment on it. The sentence was lacking more context either way so I was not sure what the intention was.
For some other critique:
Your usage of たくさん is wrong. You either put it directly to the verb: だけど、趣味がたくさんあるし or as modiyfing the noun with たくさんの趣味 with a strong preference for the first one.
That’s great that we’re around the same level! I’ve done a fair amount of reading, but I think I have some gaps in knowledge since I haven’t really made it through a textbook (yet!). Also it’s all been manga so far, so a lot more slang and a lot less formal speech.
Yeah, it definitely seems that my original sentence limits the hobbies that would be fun to “voilin”. “Only violin seems fun” instead of the intended “violin is one example of something fun.” To put some more natural context around the sentence, I think if this were the question:
ピアンは楽しそうですか
About piano, does it seem fun?
Then the answer sounds more natural:
バイオリンなら楽しそうだ
(not piano, but) if it’s violin, that seems fun
What I originally meant to say is simply 「バイオリンが楽しそう」 but of course that doesn’t use the grammar point.
Oh, of course たくさん would need の before a noun since it’s a noun itself. Thanks for the correction!
I was trying to find a reference for why たくさん would be preferred before the verb and not before the noun and I found a good explanation on stack overflow: たくさんの本を読んで versus 本をたくさん読んで. So you’re definitely right that 「だけど、趣味がたくさんあるし」 sounds best.
So たくさん used before a verb is acting as an adverb. I have seen it at the beginning of a sentence though (presumably as an adverb too), and I’m not sure what the difference is, if any. Genki doesn’t really explain any nuance, but it lists these two examples as both meaning “I ate a lot of vegetables” (Genki volume 1, edition 2, page 112):
I bolded the grammar points I used. (I couldn’t think of any can/can’t sentences )
Also, if someone can tell me how to add furigana to posts, that would be helpful!
The way I make furigana in Wanikani is a bit round about. First I write the text using kanji in Word. Then (in Word) I highlight the text and click the Ruby icon:
That adds furigana in Word automatically. You have to check for mistakes and correct them. Then, copy the text with furigana from Word, and paste it to Wanikani. It’s magic and does all the formatting for you automatically!
To do the furigana manually with code in WK is really time consuming. Here is the code for 歌
sorry, I didn’t write it very clearly, I’ll edit my post. You copy the text from Word and paste it to Wanikani - then voila - it shows up in WK nicely with furigana and properly formatted! It’s magic!
The last sentence uses は instead of が because it is a new topic, correct? So the dialogue means something like “Do you watch sports often? - No, I don’t. But when it comes to exercising, I like that.”, right?
Would it be possible to use なら instead and say the following?
運動するなら好きですが、スポーツは見ません。
“I like exercising but I don’t watch sports.”
Or do the two parts of the sentence always have to end the same way when using なら like this? (e.g. 野球なら見ますが、サッカーは見ません。)
I’m not an expert but I wouldn’t be surprised to read your sentence with nara. It sounds perfectly fine to me. The verbs don’t need to match up no. Though, I would probably not use it as an answer to that direct question since nara has a feel of picking something up said before. But the question didn’t contain 運動する.
What I want to throw in here is that this は (in both the example as well as your sentence) carries a nuance of contrast. That is probably the main reason why it is は instead of が in this case.
家庭教師 Tutor
頭が良く smart
生物学 biology
文学 literature
歴史 history
What I was trying to say lol:
Summary
I would like to work part-time as a university in-class tutor. [reasons] Uni classes seem interesting, college students are smart and I want to see various uni teachers for how-to-teach experience. If I was a class tutor, I’d teach biology, literature or history. Given that I can speak English best, I want to work in an English-speaking class. Because of the inability to travel, I will work online. I’m still studying so I only want to work a couple of times a week.
I don’t know if I really get this nara thing properly though…
)
動物の中で何が一番好きですか。
