Language

Konnichiwa! Watashi wa Patricia desu. Yoroshiku onegaishimasu!

{Hello! I’m Patricia. Nice to meet you! (: }

The Japanese language is a very interesting subject. It is made up of Hiragana, Katakana and Kanji. Sometimes, we can write them in Romanji (just like what I have done above).

They have five vowels, “a”, “i”, “u”, “e”, “o”. Mix together with consonants to make a sound, similar to the Chinese’s Han Yu Pin Yin.

Japanese sentences are formed in the order of subject-object-verb order, different from the English language, which we have the subject-verb-object order.

For example,

English: I-eat-apple.

Japanese: I-apple-eat.

Then adding in the particles (like, “a”, “the”, “is” etc.), a proper sentence would be formed.

In different context, Japanese uses different style of languages, the informal with family and friends, formal in general with anyone else, and the super formal used in business settings.

For example, a simple “Please wait” can be spoken differently in the three contexts.

Informal: chotto matte

Formal: chotto matte kudasai

Super formal: shosho omachi kudasai

{http://www.japaneselifestyle.com.au/japanese_language/japanese_language.htm}