I’m Making Progress, Apparently

Japanese Language Reading
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So I’ve been taking an * ahem * extended break from WaniKani (translation: I haven’t mustered the motivation to continue my reviews, and I’ve gotten myself addicted to BanG Dream! and Smash Bros. all over again), and while on this “break”, I’ve found that I’m making some sort of progress in my Japanese studies!

Let me show you:

On April Fool’s Day, one thing that happens in バンドリ is the changing of dialogue to something completely absurd of out of character for one of the girls to say.

Here’s Masuki’s line:

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When it comes to translating sentences, I tend to have trouble and just move on, whether it be because there are certain grammar points I don’t know or kanji I don’t know. But I found I was able to translate this one with relative ease.

私 = わたし = I

別に = べつに = Not really / Not particularly

かわいい = Cute

もの = Kana form of object (物)

とか = Among other things / Such as (I had to look this one up)

好きじゃねえ = Don’t like

から = I’m not exactly sure what this means, if anyone would be willing to help.

くっ．．．．．．！= * pain *

And when you put it all together, it roughly translates to…

“I don’t really like cute things…ugh…!”

You see it works! Cause she actually does like cute things! And it physically hurts for her to say that! Do you understand? Do you see the funee???

Of course there’s someone out there going, “Oh, that measly sentence? I could have translated that in my sleep!” And yeah, there are 100% people who could have translated that 10x faster, but for me, it feels like a sort of checkpoint in my Japanese journey. It may start with one sentence, but soon I been able to translate whole paragraphs of text and more!

I’ve also been able to understand small tidbits of event stories in the game! While I can’t pick out each and every word they’re saying, I can generally understand the gist what the characters and going through, and appreciate the game more than I already did.

In a nutshell, I’m really excited to see where I’ll be moving forward next.

(also, feel free to correct my translation if it’s off, this is one of the few times i really tried translating a sentence)

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It’s fun finding things in the wild you can read! Congrats! I just had one in Animal Crossing actually. I was looking at names for custom designs and one was 花 1 and I was way more excited than I needed to be. I was just so happy to find a kanji I knew in the wild! At my level it doesn’t happen often. Especially in a game that’s in English!

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Well done! It is really great when you realise you’ve improved! I reckon the から in that sentence means “because”. If you use から as a conjunction you can put it after a phrase e.g:
楽しいですから、日本語を勉強します！
たのしいですから、にほんごをべんきょうします！

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Oh could you explain how you’d translate OP’s sentence with the because in it? I sadly can’t read your explanatory Japanese sentences just yet. :pray:

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I would interpret as something like 'Because I don’t really like cute things… ugh!"

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What is a this? A mobile game?

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Yep, you can find it as バンドリ under the JP App Store, or simply BanG Dream!.

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Gotta say, it’s the best feeling in the world! ^^

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Ah okay, that makes sense! I looked up なら in my JP dictionary app and I saw that it meant because, but I just really couldn’t understand it in the context of the sentence, if that makes any sense.

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It’s so exciting when you can read or understand something you see or hear. I find myself getting all excited when that happens to me, usually something on TV Japan. So good work, Masurei!

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Ah, having the じ and the small や on separate lines really threw me off!

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It’s essentially the same as a trailing “so” in English. You might also see a trailing けど similar to “but…”
“It’s not like I like cute things or anything, so…”
Or another kinda tsundere line, something like 別に好きじゃないけど… “I don’t particularly like (you), but…”

These kind of trailing conjunctions aren’t as common in English but I’m sure you’ve seen them at least once or twice. I have a bad habit of using them way more than most people, so I’ve never had much issue understanding their use in Japanese personally.

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oh my gosh tsundere masuki

I’ve seen けど quite a bit, never から. Thanks for the perspective!

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The tsundere characters always get me…

Also I know that feeling when you can understand something substantial by yourself, it’s a pretty good motivator for me at least! Good luck :slight_smile:

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Isn’t her name suppose to be mass king(?) マスキング

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マスキング means masking, as in マスキングテープ (masking tape).

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MASKING is her stage name, but her actual name is Masuki Satou.

edit: マスキング and 佐藤 ますき, if you’re curious

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This thread is pretty much a good summation of the difference between other platforms and this community. On here, you get 25 likes and people celebrate with you. You guys are awesome.

@Jonapedia, you coming back on Discord soon? I have a question :eyes: maybe we will add another communication channel too :stuck_out_tongue:

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