Zizka's JLPT 4-3 Studies

[Zizka]

次の：

翻訳

今朝は最悪だった。This morning was really bad.

かけておいたはずの目覚まし時計が鳴らず 1時間も寝坊をしてしまったの だ。I had set the alarm clock ahead of time but I slept an hour late.

I’m not sure how appropriate it is to say ‘in advance’ in an actual translation. It sounds weird. I didn’t realize かける could be used (among it’s 10000 other uses) to set an alarm.

いつもは駅までウォーキングのつもりで30分歩いているのだが、I always plan to walk to the train station in 30 minutes,

もうそんな時間はない。 but I didn’t have the time for that.

バスを使うことにして、バス停に並んだ。I decided to take the bus and stood in line at the bus station.

Since the story happened in the past, shouldn’t it be だった here?

しかし、今度はバスがなかなか来ない。However, this time the bus just didn’t show up.

時刻表には5分間 隔と書いてあるのに、Is was written every 5 minutes on the time table,

Also, here, can I used the passive to translate 書いてある? I’m saying this based on:

have been done is technically a passive.

I’ve asked GPT. So 隔 means an interval. Chat GPT says: The schedule ‘says’ every 5 minutes.

To do:

なんと20分も待たされてしまった。

[pm215]

Yes, that’s the right answer.

[pm215]

@Zizka

Since the story happened in the past, shouldn’t it be だった here?

Japanese written narration of past events can mix past and present tense. There’s a bit on this in the front part of the Dictionary of Intermediate Japanese Grammar, in a section “Phenomena of Tense and Formality Switchings”.

@Zizka

Also, here, can I used the passive to translate 書いてある?

Yes, passive is OK for this construction (which, like English passive, doesn’t state the person who did the action).

[Zizka]

Bunpro:

I’m continuing Bunpro (which I like by the way, I think it’s worth the cost) and I’ve noticed something.

もうあの家に帰る事はないだろう。

I always imagined 事 to mean ‘thing’. My mind has trouble reconciliating 事 as anything verb related. Also, according to Bunpro:

In this expression, the adverbial particle は is working to present (A) as the extent (a regular role of adverbial particles), while the 形容詞 ない negates that extent. This negation is up to interpretation, with the literal meaning simply being ‘There is no (A)’.

は, adverbial particle? I don’t think I’ve ever read anything about that before. Worth looking into. For me, は is topic(al) particle.

But then there’s also:

ザクシャ・イン・ラブ」とは「愛を永遠に」ということなのだ。

In this case it’s written in kana but it’s still 事. I don’t know if this is specific to this structure or if we can use こと/事 interchangeably.

Then there’s: これ以上言わない事にします。もし何か言ったら彼女を怒らせるでしょう。Which is another use of こと, to decide.

Then there’s 生徒は、先生に従う事だ。Another use for koto, should.

There are tons more but こと is used a lot more than I imagined in Japanese. Another one is this one:

連絡がなければ、僕が仕事に行く事になります。

I think I should probably not interpret こと as ‘thing’ in the example above.

[Shannon-8]

@Zizka

は, adverbial particle? I don’t think I’ve ever read anything about that before. Worth looking into. For me, は is topic(al) particle.

I feel like this はapplication may be more like the は nestled in “ではない/じゃない” …
Jisho calls ことはない an “expression, いAdj”
I’m thinking it will generalize as Bことはない “There is no need to B”; “B never happens”; “There is never a time when B”…
Perhaps it’s that the timing of when things happen is a Adverbial? “Adverbs of frequency”?

[pm215]

@Zizka

I always imagined 事 to mean ‘thing’. My mind has trouble reconciliating 事 as anything verb related.

It can mean “thing”, but it can also be used as a nominalizer, like の. DoBJG gives these separate entries “koto 1” and “koto 2”.

@Zizka

は, adverbial particle?

I think this is bunpro doing a literal translation of the Japanese grammar term 副助詞. The idea is that this class of particles is definitely affecting how you interpret the verb but isn’t a simple “indicates directly an ‘argument’ of the verb like its subject or object or indirect object”. The topic particle は as well as others including も, だけ and ほど are put in this category. Unless you’re particularly interested in how standard Japanese high school grammar analyses and labels particles you can ignore this term, I think.

@Zizka

In this case it’s written in kana but it’s still 事. I don’t know if this is specific to this structure or if we can use こと/事 interchangeably.

The basic rule of thumb is “use kana for ‘grammar pattern’ constructions”. This is part of the post war writing system reforms. It’s not actively wrong to use the kanji (with a range of acceptability depending on the particle), and you will sometimes see that, especially in older writing, but it’s less usual. One of the standard edits publishers do when producing a “modern” version of a prewar text is that they convert a lot of “grammar” words from kanji to kana, as well as modernizing the kana spellings and using the postwar simplified kanji forms.

@Zizka

こと is used a lot more than I imagined in Japanese

Yep. One of the pains of intermediate level Japanese is getting to grips with the wide array of こと and もの constructions…

[Zizka]

@pm215

I think this is bunpro doing a literal translation of the Japanese grammar term 副助詞. The idea is that this class of particles is definitely affecting how you interpret the verb but isn’t a simple “indicates directly an ‘argument’ of the verb like its subject or object or indirect object”. The topic particle は as well as others including も, だけ and ほど are put in this category.

I don’t understand this. I do understand だけ and ほど fit in all this but not は.

@pm215

The basic rule of thumb is “use kana for ‘grammar pattern’ constructions”. This is part of the post war writing system reforms. It’s not actively wrong to use the kanji (with a range of acceptability depending on the particle), and you will sometimes see that, especially in older writing, but it’s less usual. One of the standard edits publishers do when producing a “modern” version of a prewar text is that they convert a lot of “grammar” words from kanji to kana, as well as modernizing the kana spellings and using the postwar simplified kanji forms.

I wonder why Bunpro arbitrarily switch from kana to kanji without any specific reasons, at least none I can see. I would’ve imagined some sort of consistency.

@pm215

It can mean “thing”, but it can also be used as a nominalizer, like の. DoBJG gives these separate entries “koto 1” and “koto 2”.

@Zizka

生徒は、先生に従う事だ

I don’t think the sentence above has anything do to with nominalizing anything, I mean to say, I’m not seeing it. Just to be clear, I’m saying that I don’t understand, not that you’re wrong.

[pm215]

@Zizka

@Zizka

生徒は、先生に従う事だ

I don’t think the sentence above has anything do to with nominalizing anything, I mean to say, I’m not seeing it. Just to be clear, I’m saying that I don’t understand, not that you’re wrong.

Yeah, I think that’s probably best just learned as its own thing, rather than forced into one bucket or the other.

[Zizka]

Bunpro:

Some mistakes I’m currently making.

(1) 旅行が楽しみほど 、今日は寝れなさそう。

I thought ほど was used to express an extent, but it’s not the right answer here.

The answer is の余り . It’s used to express a negative result, in this case, not being able to sleep at night.

(2) いつももらってばかりですみません。(もらう)

I put ばかり here is when the meaning is ‘nothing but’+verb, you need to use the て form of the verb + ばかり.

(3) 外国語というのは、母国語以外の言語。

Here, I just put という which, to me, meant ‘called’.

(4) 人によって考え方が違うということだ。

I put という here again, for ‘it is said’, but that was also the wrong answer.

(5) 先生ほど、いろんな人がいるよね。

I put ほど here, since I was told it was ‘extent’.

(6) カーテンによって仕切られたところが僕の部屋だ。

I put のに, thinking it was a purpose here.

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Explanations:

(3) 外国語というのは、母国語以外の言語。

According to Bunpro, this is a combination of と+いう+のは. のは is called a nominalizing particle, which I assume is like こと. It’s an expression to express something will be explaine further.

In the previous example が国語 is what will be further explained as: 母国語以外の言語.

(7) 来年引っ越す事になった。

I could’ve sworn I had read making a decision was ことにする, not 事になる. But here it means It has been decided that.

(8) 動かない生活により、人々は以前より心疾患にかかりやすくなってしまった。

I thought the answer would be ため he

翻訳（つづく）

re.

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翻訳（つづく）

なんと20分も待たされてしまった。Believe it or not, I ended up waiting for 20 minutes.

このままでは2時間近く遅刻してしまいそうだ。If things remain like that, it seems like I was going to be 2 hours late.

So here, I wasn’t sure if そうだ meant ‘heard that’ or ‘seems that’. According to Bunpro:

Verbs -

降るそうだ - Unaltered verb, そうだ that is repeating information.

降りそうだ - Conjunctive form, そうだ that is used for making observations.

In this case: しまいそうだ the verb is altered, so I think it’s the そうだ used for making observation. Although, I wouldn’t say しゅまう is in the conjunctive form though, which would be しまって. I feel like we’ve talked about this before though. So I asked GPT and it said that the verb stem is used in combination with そうだ, not the て conjunctive form. The thing is that dictionaries define て form as conjunctive but there are other ways to be conjunctive.

この前上司から「余裕を持って来るように。」 と言われたばかりなのに、

I couldn’t figure out the meaning of 余裕, even with the definitions, I’m still not sure:

At first I could understand because I confused 待つ and 持つ! Regardless, GPT translates as:

余裕を持って = “with plenty of time / with a margin”

I don’t know where ‘time’ comes from.

To do:

ちっとも歩しない。ああ、自分が怒られている様子が目に浮かぶ (注2)。

[pm215]

@Zizka

(7) 来年引っ越す事になった。

I could’ve sworn I had read making a decision was ことにする, not 事になる. But here it means It has been decided that.

When you make a decision to do something it’s ことにする. The use of ことになる means it’s not something you actively decided to do, it just happened to you (in this case, somebody else made the decision). DoBJG has a bit of discussion about this.

@Zizka

conjunctive form

This is bunpro doing literal translations of Japanese grammar terms again – they mean the 連用形. I prefer “masu stem” for this, as I’ve mentioned previously.

[Zizka]

Bunpro (cont.):

結局僕がおごる事になった。みんな後輩だから。

@pm215

The use of ことになる means it’s not something you actively decided to do, it just happened to you (in this case, somebody else made the decision).

So in this case, the person didn’t chose to pay, it was imposed on them because they were the oldest.

A：「どうして彼と別れたの？」
B：「だって、ずっと嘘をついていたもの。」

Bunpro describes the ending particle もん as childish but in its definition it says it’s casual (not childish). It’s not the same thing. I imagine anyone use もん, it’s just very casual.

これ以上何も言う事はない。

That’s another mistake I made. My understanding is that it’s always used in the negative.

動かない生活により、人々は以前より心疾患にかかりやすくなってしまった。

Another mistake I made. ‘Due to’ to me, is either のに or ため. I never consider より.

Thing called ‘xyz’

In my current study, there are quite few ‘thing called’. I’m generally used to という for that.

お金というのは、良くも悪くも力がある。

In this sentence, I didn’t put のは at the end, it didn’t cross my mind (even though I saw it yesterday ). I think the のは there is really throwing me off.

楽しいって言っても、サッカーの方が楽しいと思う。

That’s another one. This one has the ‘although’ ‘even though’ connotation though.

イルカは動物の中で頭が一番いいという事だ。

And there’s another one. = it is said. I need to stop seeing こと as ‘thing’, it’s making me make mistakes.

Lots of confusion here for me, if only regarding ‘things being called’ something.

翻訳

翻訳

余裕を持って = “with plenty of time / with a margin”

I don’t know where ‘time’ comes from. Why does GPT translate it as plenty of time here? Is this just an expression?

[pm215]

@Zizka

結局僕がおごる事になった。みんな後輩だから。

@pm215

The use of ことになる means it’s not something you actively decided to do, it just happened to you (in this case, somebody else made the decision).

So in this case, the person didn’t chose to pay, it was imposed on them because they were the oldest.

Well, yes and no. The speaker is presenting the situation as it not being their active choice, but as the dictionary notes, sometimes you do that because you’re being humble. It’s a bit like in English “So I ended up paying for everyone” – that might be that you were pressured into it, but it’s at least as likely that it’s somewhere closer to that you did it because you felt you ought to.

@Zizka

Bunpro describes the ending particle もん as childish but in its definition it says it’s casual (not childish). It’s not the same thing. I imagine anyone use もん, it’s just very casual.

Bunpro says もの is casual and sentence-ending もん specifically is childish. There is absolutely a “sounds like a sulky kid” usage to the end of sentence version here which is what bunpro is getting at. The relevant sense from Daijisen is:

不平・不満・恨みの意を込めながら、相手の自分に対する非難に対し、根拠や理由を示し、反駁(はんばく)、訴え、甘えなどの気持ちを表す

…basically an emotive way of giving a reason in response to somebody’s criticism. The Japanese equivalent of the “but he started it!” response to “don’t fight with your brother” is likely to have もん in it; similarly responses to “why haven’t you done your chores yet?”, “eat your vegetables” and other parental criticisms.

on 余裕

@Zizka

余裕を持って = “with plenty of time / with a margin”

I don’t know where ‘time’ comes from. Why does GPT translate it as plenty of time here? Is this just an expression?

In this context the boss is saying “arrive with plenty of margin/leeway”, which is to say “don’t cut things so fine that you might arrive late”. The Japanese doesn’t explicitly talk about time – 余裕 is generally about having enough spare of some resource for it not to be a problem, and could be time, money, room at the end of a new pair of shoes, whatever – but time is a pretty common resource for people to talk about and it’s obviously the resource in question in this text. “arrive with time to spare / give yourself plenty of time / etc” is a natural way to express this in English, which is why chatgpt has picked it.

[Shannon-8]

@Zizka

So in this case, the person didn’t chose to pay, it was imposed on them because they were the oldest.

Wow!
I learn so much on this thread!!

[Zizka]

So I’ve made some charts to differentiate all the こと、もの、ため because I’m struggling to figure out the nuances of each one individually:

(you can click on each image to enlarge as it can get small to read).

As you can see, it can get rather confusing, it’s like an avalanche or similar words/expressions. により can be used for because of/due to… but so can の為, 為に,なぜなら and のに. It’s all mixed up in my brain which makes it difficult to sort out. It’s also because in English, that are relatively few expressions which mean ‘because’.

翻訳（つづく）：

翻訳

この前上司から「余裕を持って来るように。」 と言われたばかりなのに、I was told to have plenty of time (to make sure I’m not late)

ちっとも歩しない。I couldn’t walk at all (so as not to be late).

ああ、自分が怒られている様子が目に浮かぶ。I asked GPT what it meant…

“I can clearly picture myself getting in trouble.”

I thought 怒れる meant to become angry.

I’m thinking this 目に浮かぶ is an expression?

[pm215]

@Zizka

ああ、自分が怒られている様子が目に浮かぶ。I asked GPT what it meant…

“I can clearly picture myself getting in trouble.”

I thought 怒れる meant to become angry.

ChatGPT is giving you an idiomatic translation of the meaning again. This is 怒る. (怒れる isn’t a thing except as a conjugation of 怒る.) Specifically, it’s the passive, so this is somebody else getting angry with us.

目に浮かぶ is indeed an expression: you can find it in jmdict.

[pm215]

@Zizka

ちっとも歩しない。I couldn’t walk at all

You dropped a character here – it is 進歩 – and so your translation is wrong, by the way.

[Zizka]

翻訳（つづく）

この前上司 (注1)から「余裕を持って来るように。」 と言われたばかりなのに、ちっとも進歩しない。

“Even though my boss just recently told me to come with plenty of time to spare, I haven’t improved at all.”

(Chat GPT) The thing is that I was missing that kanji, which, together means 進歩しない: improve (negative): 進歩「しんぽ」.

Regarding と言われたばかりなのに I think it’s meant to be understood as: と+言われた+ばかりな+のに.

I couldn’t find anything in the dictionaries (both basic and intermediate) about 目に浮かぶ. GPT says: ‘to imagine something clearly’.

ああ、自分が怒られている様子が目に浮かぶ。

So someone (the boss) will get angry at the speaker because they’re often late.

駅で大事なことに気がついた。I noticed something important at the train station.

[pm215]

@Zizka

I couldn’t find anything in the dictionaries (both basic and intermediate) about 目に浮かぶ.

Yes, they don’t generally cover idioms/expressions. Jmdict has an entry for it:

目に浮かぶ 【めにうかぶ】 (exp,v5b) to picture; to come into one’s mind; to remember