Title. Interested to see what people are currently learning. :]
2 Likes
My “OOOOOOOHHHHHHH” moments so far are when I have just learned a new grammar point or phrase and then hear it in a sentence on TV and understand it. It’s so motivating!
11 Likes
That the three wise monkeys (see no evil, speak no evil, hear no evil) are the result of an accidental pun. The monkey’s name are 見ざる、聞かざる、and 言わざる… it’s just the ざる conjugation of the 3 verbs. But monkey is 猿 (さる), which gets rendaku’d to ざる, and bang. Now we have monkeys.
54 Likes
3 Likes
I am hoping to have one today! On my way to Japanese class. I am going to ask about a thing that came up while I was studying yesterday to do with 〜んだ, and a sentence doesn’t seem to match up with what I already learned about it.
1 Like
んだ has always been really tricky for me, but I’d be lying if I said I didn’t use it to save myself from accidentally speaking in an informal tone. lol.
僕はそう思う。。。んです。hahaha
5 Likes
All potentials are group 2, whaaaat?
2 Likes
Most conjugations that I’ve seen (up to N3, dunno about more intense stuff) become group 2. Same thing for causative and relative if I’m not mistaken!
edit: rather, conjugations that you’d use with て form.
Last grammar Aha! moment was two days ago, when I finally understood why the grammar ～ことになっている works the way it does. Previously I just learned “～ことになっている = expressing a rule”, without explanation. For example
この会社では制服を着ることになっている。
In this company, wearing an uniform is mandatory. (It’s a rule to wear an uniform in this company)
But I always thought it was quite a convoluted way just to express that… until I finally got it !
First we start with the grammar ～ことにする, which means taking a decision. Because of する, it’s a clear volitional act where the agent doing the decision is also clear
たばこは吸わないことにした
I decided to quit smoking
I decided.
Then we move up to ~ことになる, which is also about taking a decision, but because of なる, focusing more on the change of state, on the result, without mentioning who took the decision.
来月、出張することになった
Next month, it has been decided I will do a business trip
The decision is not mine, it has been decided by someone else, probably my bosses.
Finally a remainder about している. It can be an action in progress (ing in english, like I’m eating), but it can also be a state. For example
窓が開いている。
The window is open (aka the window was opened at some point in the past and now is still in the state of being open)
Putting all together
～ことになっている = a decision was made by someone in the past and now we are still in the state of this decision in effect, also know as “a rule” !
33 Likes
This is really cool. I’ve seen ～ことになった but not ＝ことになっている.
Makes sense! Thanks for the explanation!
I’d actually say that’s common for native speakers. I hear (casual form)です pretty often just because people aren’t paying attention until it’s already come out. I mean, I certainly will append words to my sentences in English as I hear myself speak so it’s natural.
2 Likes
Pretty much all of Cure Dolly has been mind blowing for me, but two in particular really stand out for me as a 
moment.
The か particle and how it can be used to turn complete sentences into a subject:
The two kinds of で, and the classic「が」が「が」が「が」も「が」だ
8 Likes
What do you guys mean by “group 2”?
1 Like
I think it’s how some resources refer to ichidan and godan verbs? I could be wrong, though.
4 Likes
Aye, it is.
I hate it that particular classification, because there’s nothing about the name “group 2” that tells you exactly which group of verbs you’re talking about.
7 Likes
Yeah, why do so many textbooks and websites avoid the terms godan and ichidan? I find it strange…
10 Likes
I really wish more educational material would use the actual words. Even “いる・える”, while it’s nice for trying to explain the concept initially, isn’t explicitly correct. It’s not even hard to remember which is which! The names make sense! With ichidan there’s 一 thing to do! With godan there’s 五 possible endings! It makes sense!
5 Likes
I’ve found that learning resources tend to fall into two broad categories:
- Quick and easy study but shallow in terms of knowledge
- Deep knowledge but relatively slower practical usage initially
I would put most in that first category where, for example, they tell you that you can add 方がいい to provide a strong suggestion to do something.
タバコを吸わない方がいい
And they do things like this with common phrases that get you up and running but you have to dig deeper to find out what’s really being said.
The second category are the ones I’m just finding out about that actually explain that
- 方 means way
- が turns everything before it into a noun
- いい is really a verb that means “is good”
So what sentence is really saying is that “the way of not smoking” が “is good”
And this way of making things into nouns runs very deep in Japanese and things make way more sense. But this method requires some up front work in changing your mindset.
I’m not sure which one is better yet since I’m still learning myself, but the second category has provided the most gains for me.
1 Like
が is just the subject marker. Even in this case.
That edit is wrong I think.
But your point stands in that, changing verbs to passive, causative and potential all turn the verbs into ichidan (groep 2) verbs.
止まる
止まれる
止まられる
止まらせる
止まらせられる edit
1 Like
I added that last part in cause I don’t think ず conjugations, etc, can be conjugated to て form. The only place it matters I think is when you’d need to use て. Not 100% on that though.