Guide To Rarely Used Japanese Characters

A while back, I ran across some Japanese characters I’d never seen before—characters like 〆 and ゟ that I hadn’t learned before while studying hiragana, katakana, or kanji.

I recently finally got around to researching and writing a guide for these characters, and just published it today. This guide probably won’t be helpful in reading everyday Japanese (with the exception of 々), but it’s full of some history, etiquette, and a lot of unusual characters.

Guide To Rarely Used Japanese Characters

Plus you can use the knowledge from this guide to impress people at parties, or be that person in Japanese class. Oh, you don’t know 〻? How embarrassing for you. (Please don’t be that person.)

Read the Guide To Rarely Used Japanese Characters here.

Japanese (iOS App) Review

A few years ago, Koichi wrote about what he thought was the best Japanese-English dictionary: an iPod or iPhone loaded up with a Japanese-English dictionary app. At the time, he said his favorite was a little app just called “Japanese.”

Japanese on the iPad

But somehow, in the three years since that post, we’ve neglected to give Japanese (the app) a full, proper review. Thankfully, we’ve recently changed that and posted up a review of Japanese today.

Read our review of Japanese (iOS App) here.

Japanese (iOS App) Giveaway!

It’s been a while since we’ve done a giveaway, but we were fortunate enough to receive some coupon codes from the developer of Japanese, Renzo.

I have 10 free copies of Japanese (the iOS app) to give away, but I thought that we could have a little fun with it. In the past, we’ve had contests involving haiku, videos, and other creative endeavors.

This time around, I want you to redesign the Tofugu logo, but with a twist: make it as ugly as possible.

That’s right, I want you to send me your own, terrible version of the Tofugu logo. I don’t care if you draw it in MS Paint, sculpt it, or make it using watercolors—the important part is that it looks hideous.

The 10 ugliest submissions (based on my own, highly subjective standards) will win a free copy of Japanese.

You can send your entry to hashi@tofugu.com, and you have until a week from the time this post goes up—that’s Friday, June 21 9:00AM Pacific Time—to send in your submission.

Have fun! I look forward to your ugly, ugly submissions. And don’t worry, I’ll post the winners!

Wallpapers & GIFs

Our talented illustrator Aya has already submitted her entry—in the form of some desktop backgrounds and animated GIFs! Hopefully this wonderfully bad creation will give you some inspiration.

Wallpaper (1280×800)
Wallpaper (2560×1440)

GIF (700×438)
GIF (1280×800)

The goal of this article is to help you to understand Japanese letters. It will take a little more research and studying to be able to write a letter in Japanese, but I think I’ll be covering the difficult part. After reading this article, I want you to understand things like the relationship between you and the person you’re writing to, the format of a Japanese letter (both vertical and horizontal), how to write the address on the envelope, as well as the concept of “set expressions.” This will give you the tools to write a letter, make things less confusing, and eventually get you to the point where you should be able to piece together a Japanese letter on your own (resources included in the last section of this article).

Let’s get straight into the first thing you must think about even before you pick up that pen and paper keyboard and monitor, relationships.

Relationships: AKA Who Are You Writing To?

In Japanese, hierarchy is much more important than in many other countries. You have the senpai-kohai relationship. Then you have teacher vs. student, boss vs. minion, older people vs. younger people, and the list goes on and on. On top of this, relationship statuses change when you’re asking for a request, but this (and many other things) will depend on how close you are to the other person. Relationships, your closeness, and where you stand in the hierarchy of said relationship dictate how you act and speak with that other person. Of course, this carries over to letters as well.

I am going to simplify it a bit for you though. In general, there’s going to be three types of letters. They are:

Informal: Friends, Senpai, People below you

Neutral: Teachers, Friends you are requesting something of, Superiors

Formal: People you don’t know, Superiors you are requesting something of

You may have noticed some patterns here. Informal relationships are people of a similar age, aka people who are on the same hierarchy level as you. Then, there’s neutral (which is really just regular-polite level) which has teachers and other superiors whom you have at least a moderately close relationship with, though friends that you are requesting something of get bumped up to this rung (because you have to be nice if you’re asking for something). Lastly, there’s formal, which includes people you don’t have a close relationship with (people you don’t know), as well as superiors that you’re asking something of. Asking something of someone automatically bumps them up to the next rung, as a rule of thumb.

Of course, as long as you stay in the Neutral or Formal levels, you’ll probably always be okay, so that’s what I’ll be sticking with in these articles as well. Informal is informal, and doesn’t really need to follow so many of the rules that I’ll be laying out here during this series.

The Materials

Now that you know who you’re writing to, it’s time to figure out what materials you need to use. I think a lot of this is just common sense, but just in case it isn’t, I’ve summarized and simplified a list provided by the (excellent) textbook, Writing Letters In Japanese.

• In general, white stationary without any pictures is most preferred.
• Business letters are usually written horizontally via a word processor.
• Personal letters to superiors should be written vertically on white stationary (hand written).
• For superiors, use a white envelope.
• Write in pen, using black or blue ink.
• Don’t write with pencils or markers.
• Postcards should only be used in informal occasions, or occasions in that call for postcards (like New Years).

Once you’ve figured out your materials (based on who you’re writing to), it’s time to learn how to use these materials. Sadly, not all of it is as simple as you might think. There are rules, Smokey!

Japanese Letter Formatting Rules

I will cover two types of letter: Vertical and Horizontal. This refers to how you’re writing your text. Does it go up to down or does it go right to left? Depending on which one you choose, there are a few differences you need to take note of.

Vertical Letters

These are the most personal. I suppose you’re putting a lot more work into this kind, because in general you’re writing them out by hand. Horizontal rule letters feel a little colder and less personal, though I think that’s changing. Usually, though, you can’t go wrong with a vertical letter, as it’s the standard style for letter writing in Japan.

As you can see there are various parts, and the positioning of each is important.

Opening: The opening word  consists of a set word, kind of like the word “Dear…” that goes at the beginning of English letters. In Japanese, this would be 拝啓 (はいけい) or 前略 (ぜんりゃく). These actually pair with the closing section, so be careful!

Set Expression #1: Right at the beginning of the letter there should be a set expression. This could be one of many predetermined topics or phrases, which are usually about weather, the season, health of the addressee, and so on and so forth. Certain topics will have certain opening set expressions as well, but we’ll go more into that later.

Content: This is where you actually write your letter and say the things you want to say. Notice how this is the only non-predetermined section out of so many? It’s weird.

Set Expression #2: After you finish saying what you want to say, it’s time for another set expression. This will usually be about the addressee’s health or good wishes for them.

Closing: This is like “sincerely…” in English letters. Unlike that, however, it is paired with the opening. 拝啓 goes with the closing greeting 敬具 (けいぐ). 前略 goes with the closing 草々 (そうそう). No mixing and matching.

Date: This is written a little lower than the text to its right. Use the Japanese numeral system for vertical letters.

Your Name: This is where you write your name. Put it down to the bottom of the column.

Addressee’s Name: This goes to the left of the date and your name, but higher than the date, and lower than all the text to the right.

PostScript (Optional): This is the P.S. portion of the letter. In Japanese, this is 追伸 (ついしん) or 二伸 (にしん), and is written to the left of the addressee’s name, lined up with the main text. This is a little informal, though, so don’t use it if you can help yourself.

As you can see, there’s a lot to consider even before you write any content. Luckily, horizontal letters are a lot simpler.

Horizontal Letters

Generally used in business sorts of situations, horizontal letters are mostly typed out and a lot simpler.

See? Much simpler.

Date: Goes in the top right. It’s written using Arabic numerals since it’s being written horizontally. １２月２５日, for example.

Addressee’s Name: This is where you put the name of the person you’re writing to. As with all letters, don’t forget their name honorific!

Set Expression #1: Here’s where the first set expression will go.

Content: This is where the content of your letter will go.

Set Expression #2: One more set expression for the addressee’s well being and health.

Your Name: This is where you sign your name, horizontally. Might be good to sign it with a pen instead of with the word processor, just to be a little more polite.

Horizontal letters are easier, but they can be considered rude if you send them in the wrong situations. Of course, email is a whole other thing (it’s all horizontal there), and I think it’s causing the mindset to shift a bit on this. Still, though, vertical is the default go-to for writing letters (especially by hand), so be sure learn about it even though this one is easier.

Envelopes And Addresses

The address system in Japan is quite different from America and much of the rest of the world. You’ll want to know about that before sending a letter, otherwise it may not get to the desired location (that being said, the Japanese postal system is baller). Once you know the address, though, there are some rules as to where you should be putting the mailing address, return address, and stamp.

Vertical Envelopes

This is the tall type envelope which you will often see in Japan. It’s good for vertically written letters, as you can crease your letter parallel to the lines you’re writing.

As you can see there are a few different things compared to the envelopes you might be used to. First off, you’ll want to put the postal code in boxes provided. Then, on the front of the envelope, you’ll want to put the address on the right side (written vertically) and the addressee’s name on the left, written in slightly bigger letters than the address to help differentiate. On the flap side of the envelope you should write the return address. Your name and address should go on the left side in the same format as the addressee’s name and address (though size isn’t going to matter as much), and your postal code should go in the boxes if they’re provided.

Horizontal Envelopes

With horizontal envelopes, there are a couple ways to do it.

1. You can turn the envelope sideways so it’s taller, and write the address in the same way you’d write it with a vertical envelope.
2. You can write things horizontally. Just like the vertical envelope, the addressee’s address goes on the front, with their address on top and their name written bigger below. If the boxes for the postal code are posted vertically, turn the envelope and write it in the direction they’re printed (horizontally). On the back of the envelope (flap side) you can put your address and name at the bottom.

A lot of the rules carry over from vertical envelopes, so this should be a little easier. So what about when you’re sending a letter to Japan?

Sending Letters To Japan From Overseas

When you are sending a letter to Japan from outside of Japan, you can write the address in romaji (though Japanese is preferred, if you can), and write it in the format that’s normally accepted in your country. Just be sure to write “JAPAN” at the bottom of the addressee’s address so they know to send it there!

Opening Set Expressions

This is perhaps the most difficult section of all when it comes to writing letters in Japanese. Luckily, these are set expressions, meaning you can just look them up, use them, and gone on with your life. The tricky part comes when you have to come up with some of your own (in certain specific situations), though we’re going to just ignore that for now.

The first set of set expressions is the one that comes before the start of your actual content. It generally has to do with weather, the season, or health of the addressee. There are expressions for each month, season, as well as different opening greetings for various inquisitions on the addressee’s health. Here are some examples, though there are many more set expressions worth knowing (or knowing where to find, which I’ll go over at the end).

January:

寒さひとしお身にしみる今日このごろ…
In this time of piercing cold…

新春とは申しながら、まだまだ寒さが続いておりますが…
While it is the New Year, the cold continues.

Spring:

春の日うららかな今日このごろ…
In this time of beautiful spring days…

日本はあたたかくなっているころでしょう…
I guess it must be getting warmer in Japan…

August:

厳しい残暑が続いておりますが…
The oppressive heat continues to linger…

December:

今年も押し迫りましたが…
This year is drawing to a close… (used after Dec 20)

Health Related:

いかがお過ごしていらしゃいますか？
How have you been?

私もおかげさまで元気にしております…
Fortunately I am doing well (thanks to your help)…

Writing A Reply To A Letter

お手紙ありがとうございました…
Thank you for your letter…

These set expressions are only a drop in the bucket. There are at least several set expressions for each month, season, and situation, and there are probably more out there. The thing about set expressions is you are expected to write with said set expressions, otherwise your letter isn’t going to come off as polite. While creativity is encouraged in Western letters, using some set expression rules is more important in Japanese, which makes things both harder and easier.

Closing Set Expressions

After your main content you have to go back into set expressions. There are fewer of these, but it’s still basically the same thing as the opening ones. Here are some examples:

Making A Request

どうかよろしくお願い致します。
Kindly look after this matter for me.

Give My regards

奥様に宜しくお願いします
Please give my regards to your wife.

Good Health

お寒さの折からお体をお大切に
Please take care of yourself since it’s cold.

Request A Reply

お返事を待ちしております
I look forward to your reply.

I think closing set expressions are a little simpler than the opening ones, but they’re all basically the same thing and you’ll see the same ones over and over a lot.

Where To Go From Here?

So as you can see, writing letters in Japanese is a big ordeal, though once you learn all the rules and do a little practice it’s not all that bad. In fact, it’s very set in stone, meaning that as long as you follow the rules you’ll be able to write a great letter in Japanese.

The next step, I think, is to take a look at examples. Writing letters in Japanese definitely takes an intermediate or advanced knowledge of the language, so if you possess said knowledge and want an English textbook, I’d recommend Writing Letters In Japanese. It contains plenty of example letters as well as lessons going over all of them to help you get your letter writing skills up to snuff. Alternatively, if you’re fairly advanced in Japanese, the Japanese website Midori-Japan’s 手紙の書き方 will do the trick. This site includes many example letters for many different and often specific situations as well as a list of set expressions that you can pull from. Basically, everything you need to template out a proper Japanese letter.

I hope this article and those sources help you to get started writing letters in Japanese! It’s a crazy letter writing world over there, but once you get your foot in the proverbial letter-writing door it become easier. I want to write more on this topic soon, including examples for plenty of different letter-writing situations, but we’ll see if it’s next week or a week in the future to come. Writing letters in Japanese is a huge topic, as I think everyone has come to understand so long as you’ve read to this point.

Sources:
Writing Letters In Japanese
About.Japanese.com
Japaneseteachers.net

For your additional enjoyment, a desktop background of the header:

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About a month ago, we announced our intentions in developing How-To guides to help aid you, our readers. So far, the library contains four guides, three of them on how to set up the Japanese IME on your computer (Ubuntu, Mac OS X, and Windows), and the fourth is the popular Gendered Language guide. Today, we are adding a Japanese Body Language Guide.

As of this post, the body language guide lists a few of the common Japanese gestures, with photographic examples modeled by the one and only Koichi. Take a gander and please tell us what you think about it. There is always room for improvement, so please lets us know!

Take me to the Japanese Body Language Guide!

We hope you enjoy it, and also hope you are now able to make some sense out of all the wacky body language Japanese people do. It’s one of the subtle differences between someone who’s “Japanese” and “foreign,” so learn these well!

Table Manners

Because eating is hard.

Did you know that pouring soy sauce on your white rice is considered bad manners? One of the best things about Japan is the food (assuming you like rice and the ocean) and some of the first things a gaijin should learn are how to use chopsticks and how to eat sushi. Once you get these and other basics down, you’re relatively good to go! So go forth and eat and drink everything in sight like the gluttonous westerner you are.

• How to Actually Use Chopsticks
• How to Actually Eat Sushi
• General Table Manners in Japan
• Proper Eating and Drinking Etiquette in Japan

In the House

Because not wearing shoes is hard.

Did you know that shoes are not worn inside Japanese homes, and that there is even a separate set of slippers worn exclusively in the bathroom? Being invited into someone’s house is considered an honor in Japan, and being a guest in a Japanese home can certainly be a terrifying experience if you are not prepared. Check out these handy posts and brush up on your manners before that home-stay!

• Proper Etiquette When Visiting a Japanese Household
• Wearing House Slippers in Japan

Public Bath Etiquette

Because being naked is hard.

Did you know that you wash your body before you actually get into the bath? Well it’s true, and the last thing you want to do is embarrass yourself further in an already (potentially) embarrassing situation. Many foreigners are not accustomed to Japanese public baths (sento) where everyone runs around naked. However, sento are a staple of Japanese culture and should be experienced if given the chance. Another thing that many foreigners are unaware of is that Japanese sento cure every disease ever forever. Check out these basic tips to get the most out of your next sento visit.

• Japanese Guest Houses: Japanese Bathing Etiquette
• Bathing Etiquette: Sento Guide

Bathroom Etiquette

Because pooping is hard.

Did you know that many toilets have a button that when pressed replicates the sound of a toilet flushing? Well they do, and it’s pretty handy if you find yourself in the need of multiple courtesy flushes. That way, no water is wasted! Well done, Japan. Well done. Like everything else in the country, Japanese toilets are from the future.

• Proper Bathroom Etiquette in Japan
• Showering and Bathing in Japanese Bathrooms

Public Transport Etiquette

Because throwing up in private is hard.

Did you know that it is considered bad manners to projectile vomit in the middle of a crowded train? Okay, so riding trains in Japan isn’t all that hard once you know what you’re doing, but these posters are hilarious. I’ve also included some basic tips on surviving the entire process of using the highly efficient public transport system of Japan. Those trains can get pretty crowded from time to time however…

• How to Ride a Train In Japan
• Train Etiquette Posters

Sitting

Because sitting is hard.

Did you know that it’s rude to have the soles of your feet pointing out towards other people? With the proper amount of samurai pizza cat training you too can learn how to sit in the seiza position for more than two minutes. Most westerners are not used to sitting on the floor like this, but in Japan, you’ll likely be doing a lot of it.

• How to Sit Like a Native Japanese Human

Gift Giving

Because shopping is hard.

Did you know that giving anything related to the number 4 or 9 is considered unlucky? Gift giving can be difficult for the Japanese initiate. Even gift receiving can be an ordeal all in itself. Check out these handy tips and learn how to be the best Santa-san of all time. (Just don’t be like this poor fool and forget to take your shoes off.)

• Japanese Gift Giving Guidelines
• Gifts for Special Occasions in Japan

Letter Writing

Because writing is hard.

Did you know that letter-writing in Japan is not so much dependent on the content but more so on following the proper format? Despite the advent of e-mail, handwritten letters are still very important in Japan. I mean, how else are you going to properly thank the Japanese people for making Nicholas Cage do this?

• General Guidelines for Letters and Postcards
• Some Helpful Tips From JapanForum.com

Everything Else

Because baseball is hard (in space).

Did you know that in French, dandelions are called pissenlit, which means “urinate in bed?” Of course you didn’t. In this section you will find summaries of all the other sections plus etiquette rules you would have never even thought of. Enjoy.

• General Etiquette for Everything Forever by Wikipedia
• Japanese Manners and Etiquette by the Japan FAQ
• Cultural Etiquette in Japan by eDiplomat
• Guide to Japanese Manners and Etiquette by jref

Congratulations. You are now a native Japanese human.

P.S. Already a native Japanese Human? Might as well like us on Facebook.

P.P.S. Already embarrassed yourself terribly in Japan? Tell us about it on Twitter. Or in the comments! Share! Share!

Japanese Dorama (drama)? Check. Studying Japanese? Also check. One of the most addicting things in the world is Japanese drama. If I needed to quit cocaine or something like that, this is what I’d use to kick it. Oh, and Japanese drama is a pretty excellent way to study Japanese. Watching it is one thing… but actually actively studying it is another. I will tell you exactly how to do that and get a ton of benefit compared to the time spent.

Kind Of Not For Beginners

Beginners of Japanese, I’m sorry, this method isn’t amazing for you. It’s better than the “Learning Japanese With Subtitles” article I did a few weeks ago, but it’s still not amazing. That being said, if you watch a lot of jdorama anyways, it wouldn’t hurt for beginners to try this out. I’m just saying there’s probably some things you could spend your time on that would be better for you at your current level … I’m not saying this method won’t be beneficial to all levels (just much more beneficial to intermediate / advanced students of Japanese). There are a few reasons for this:

1. Intermediate+ students will have an easier time with the kanji (an important part of this process)
2. Intermediate+ students will have the grammar foundation that will allow them to look up things they don’t know (and then make sense of them).
3. Intermediate+ students should be able to recognize and avoid gendered language / things they shouldn’t actually need to learn (as well as avoid learning how to talk like a girl / boy or something).
4. Intermediate+ students will know when someone is speaking unrealistically in the drama so they won’t end up speaking like that when they try what they’ve learned out in the real world.

Anyways, are you ready? I’m going to start at the beginning and work my way through how you might use a single episode of some Japanese drama to learn a lot of Japanese… and a whole ton of it, too. I’m kind of baffled by how well this works. Thank you internets for making it possible.

Step 1: Choose The Right Drama

I can’t really go into a whole lot of detail on how to acquire the drama… but I can tell you what drama to watch. It’s actually kind of important for this, because not all drama will allow you to follow the steps I’m laying out here. Why is that? Because we’re starting with a (Japanese) transcript of the drama first, and not all dramas have this readily available to the world.

There’s a pretty incredible website called どらま・のーと (Drama Note) where someone (or some people?) are transcribing Japanese drama episodes. The site’s all in Japanese (I’ll help make some sense of it in a moment) and it’s even doing current drama series (like right now Jin 2 and BOSS 2 are the ones getting the most attention, it seems).

There’s also a list of previous drama that have been transcribed over here, but the most current stuff is on the main DramaNote website.

Things aren’t particularly well organized, I’d say, so I’m going to keep it pretty simple. I’d use the search feature to try and find what you’re looking for, or take a look at the どらま・のーと(旧) page and see if what you want is on the list. Not every drama is up there, of course, but there’s enough to keep any Japanese student busy for a really really long time. Here’s a list of some of the more popular dramas, at least in my mind (though this guide will mostly focus on BOSS, to keep things simple).

BOSS: http://www.dramanote.com/category/7359462-1.html

Jin: http://www.dramanote.com/category/7359471-1.html

Buzzer Beat: http://www.dramanote.com/category/7359468-1.html

Rookies: http://www.dramanote.com/category/7359431-1.html

Hana Yori Dango: http://www.dramanote.com/category/7359277-1.html

Hana Yori Dango 2: http://www.dramanote.com/category/7359431-1.html

Densha Otoko: http://www.dramanote.com/category/7359260-1.html

Gokusen: http://www.dramanote.com/category/7359231-1.html

Pretty nice list, I’d say. One thing that might be confusing is how it lists out episodes. I spent a long time trying to figure out why Boss Episode 1 wasn’t doing what was written in the transcript. Then I realized I was on the wrong season. For example, if you go to the BOSS posts page, you’ll need to go back to the first page to get to Season 1 episode 1 – the ones on the most recent page are from Season 2.

The rest of this guide is going to pretend like you’re watching BOSS, though you can follow along pretty much the same way with any of the other dramas listed above too.

So, if you want to follow along on the live site, you’ll want to go to the BOSS Season 1 Episode 1 page on どらま・のーと.

BOSS Season 1 Episode 1

If you take a look at the Season 1 Episode 1 Page, you’ll see the transcript for that episodes. There’s little notes in there from time to time, but as long as you’re not a total beginner in Japanese you can find where the talking starts. Before getting started, though, I’d recommend downloading Evernote (it’s where I keep all my drama notes, so I can access them anywhere). You can see my Evernote has a 日本語 section where I put these (and other study stuff).

Right now all you can see is Jin and BOSS, because I copied over a ton of the どらま・のーと pages so I’d have access to them for later. Above is my notes for BOSS Season 1 Episode 1 (which is what we’re talking about here). For this guide, all you need to do is copy over the first episode’s content, though.

どらま・のーと doesn’t have the English translation (the image above has my own notes in it), and it doesn’t have times or anything else. All that is up to you (and I think it’s good practice).

Now, once you have the notes copied over, the next step involves some of the actually studying stuff, though how you do it differs depending on if you have English subtitles or not in the version of BOSS you downloaded, er, purchased.

Subtitles Vs. No Subtitles

I’m not going to say one is better than the other, necessarily. I think they both have their benefits and drawbacks. Let me list them out for you:

Subtitles

• Allows you to get through a lot more content more quickly (so you can study more content, but not as intensely)
• Doesn’t give you the opportunity to translate and figure stuff out on your own (which can be a great way to learn)
• Most subtitles, especially fansubs have a good number of mistakes in them, so you should be aware of that possibility.

No Subtitles

• Probably won’t be able to study as much in one sitting (though this depends on your level).
• Will have things you just won’t understand the meaning of (and will have to get someone to help you, which slows you down a bit).
• Overall probably a higher level, so +1 for advanced students and maybe +0 or -1 for intermediate students. Like I said, though, totally depends on you.

I don’t really care which one you choose, I think both can be good. The key, as always, is consistent study over a long period of time, so no matter which one you end up working with, as long as you do it every day you’ll make lots of progress, and that progress will grow exponentially over time.

Step 2: Notes + Dorama

The next step requires you to set your computer up so you can see both the notes and the video (in this guide’s case, BOSS Season 1 Episode 1). Here’s a look at an example setup. Pretty standard. Click on it to make it bigger.

On one side I have my notes (in Evernote) and the other side I have the drama playing. This version of the video happens to have subtitles, so we’ll go through that way. If your video doesn’t have subtitles (or you want to cover them, which is totally good too) you can follow pretty much the same steps, except you’ll have to look up grammar you don’t understand.

As the episode plays, you just follow along, writing the translations in. I’d recommend doing around 10 pieces of dialog at a time. Once you have the translations for all the sentences written down, move on to the next step (don’t worry, the speaking part comes after!).

Step 3: Vocab

Most likely, there’s going to be some vocab that you don’t understand or know yet (if there wasn’t any, then maybe you don’t need to study so much!). My favorite way to study vocabulary is Anki, though you can use whatever you’d like. After you’ve gotten your 10 dialog translations written down, go through and pick out the words you don’t know / don’t know really well, then put them into your flashcard program of choice. Just the act of putting your own words in is good study on its own, and of course you’ll use the flashcard program to study them over time, as well.

After you’ve put the words you don’t know into your flash card program, go through them once to help learn them a bit before moving on to the next step (which will also help you to learn them).

Step 4: Practicing Then Shadowing

The next step is actually two steps. First, you’ll want to go through your Japanese notes and make sure you can read everything. Maybe you won’t be able to (as in, going through your flashcard deck once wasn’t enough… that’s normal), so you’ll have to make sure that you can. Go through line by line and learn how to read everything – once you can read your 10 lines at a decent speed, then you can move on to shadowing, which involves using the video too.

For watching the dramas in this part, I’d recommend VLC. It plays pretty much anything, and it also has a neat little feature that helps a lot with this part. I’m sure it’s something similar on the PC / Linux, but if you hit ALT + COMMAND + ←, it’ll jump back in the video by 10 seconds. That’s perfect for studying a short bit of the video over and over again (until you can do it naturally right along with the video).

Anyways, for this step, you’ll play the video, and just try to speak along with the speaking characters. You’ll try to mimic their accent, and you’ll try to keep up with them in speed (this is why you do a little pre-study beforehand, so it’s easier to get up to their speed more quickly). Approximately ten seconds at a time, you’ll shadow the same bit over and over again, until you feel like you’re really really similar (or exactly the same) as what’s going on in your drama.

Now, this is where a little bit of knowledge comes in handy… people don’t always talk like normal people, so knowing a little bit of Japanese beforehand will help you to avoid studying terrible speech in such detail. Drama’s going to be a little better about this than anime, but that doesn’t mean you won’t run into a weirdo or two on whatever you’re watching. You’ve been warned!

After you’ve gotten the first ten seconds down pat, move on to the next ten seconds, and so on, until you’ve finished your first ten (or so) lines of dialog. Then, it’s repeat and review time!

Step 5: Repeat & Review

There has to be a bit of a mix between repeating and reviewing to make this study method really powerful. If you only study and never review, you won’t learn new words and you just won’t get as much out of it. Sure, review takes up some of your time you could be studying new things, but overall I think it’s definitely way worth it.

Here’s kind of what I’d recommend:

1. Make sure you study your vocab deck every day (Anki will tell you what you need to study and what you don’t need to study, so this is easy).
2. Go through everything you’ve done in the past once via your Evernote notes (read everything there, you don’t necessarily have to do it with the video every time, because that will get really long after a while.
3. Since you’re studying in blocks (as in 10 dialog points) you can mark sections off as “memorized” after a while. Once you’ve come to the point where you’ve memorized a block of dialog, you can probably skip that one and not review it anymore (or as much).
4. Color code things giving you trouble so you know to either look them up or study them more (i.e. use them in your Lang-8 journal entries for practice, or something). Review and work on these things more than things not giving you trouble (the point is to learn new things, after all).
5. Always try to mix in some new stuff too (as in, add 10 lines of dialog every day… or 20 lines, or 30 lines, or whatever you think you can handle while still doing your reviews).
6. Spend some time with each line of dialog and try to replace certain parts of it to make your own (different) sentences. This will help you to not get stuck on only what is said in the dramas you’re watching.

The main thing, though, is to study consistently. I’m always harping on this, but it’s the most important thing of all. Do this everyday (or do something else every day) and you’ll get good, no problem. It’s the consistency that counts, not the 12 hour cram-fests one day a week.

I hope you enjoyed this guide, and I hope it helps a lot of you too! I think it’s a pretty good strategy, and a pretty good way to practice and learn a lot, while still enjoying yourself! So… what drama will you start with?

P.S. You should Follow Tofugu on Twitter.

P.P.S. You should Like Tofugu on Facebook

Just Added! Using Microphones

One thing I find particularly good for this is my microphone (there’s a less expensive version of this microphone that should do the same thing as what I’m about to describe below, though). These USB Yeti Microphones (and I’m sure plenty of other microphones I don’t know about) have an audio jack in them that lets you hook your headphones in and get zero latency headphone output. That means when you speak into the microphone, you can hear what the microphone is picking up (i.e. your voice) without any lag or delay. There’s just something great (and helpful) about listening to yourself as you’re speaking. It’s much different than just hearing yourself normally (which I think is pretty skewed, in general).

By plugging in a microphone like this while you do the shadowing portion of this guide, you can hear yourself, hear the audio from the video, and then really be able to compare and fix your accent more effectively. You’re speaking, but it’s like you’re hearing someone else. Totally different experience, in my opinion, and will help you to get your pitch, accent, and so on a lot better.

If you do this, you’ll just need to get a microphone with a good audio output. You’ll also want to make sure they’re zero-latency (because latency will throw you off, big time). I like Blue’s microphones, though to be honest that’s all I’ve ever used, so I’m sure there are others just as good out there. Starting to get super tech savvy, aye?

On TextFugu, I recently rewrote and improved the “reading and writing hiragana” chapter (feel free to check it out, it’s free), improving it a lot. The idea was to create a step by step process that anybody could use to learn hiragana so that they could move on to the “good stuff.” There were a few goals with this:

1. Make learning hiragana simpler.
2. Create a step-by-step process that anybody could follow.
3. Take the “mystery” out of learning hiragana (especially hard for self-learners).

After coming up with everything and writing it down, I thought it would be useful for readers of Tofugu as well, so I’m posting up a slightly modified hiragana how-to guide for all of you to enjoy as well. If you’re just starting to learn Japanese, or haven’t started yet, this is one of the first things you want to do. There’s no better time than now, right?

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Before You Get Started

For this guide, I’ll be combining several resources. The idea is to take from the best and ignore the rest, organizing for you a great set of resources that will help you to learn how to read and write hiragana (and ultimately allow you to learn Japanese). Before you get started, there are a few preliminary steps I think you should take. They’re optional, technically, but they’ll really help you learn hiragana a lot more effectively and quickly, in the long run.

1. Read about the various Japanese alphabets.

If you knew there was more than one Japanese “alphabet” (okay, fine, they aren’t technically alphabets, but that doesn’t matter much), then maybe you can skip this step. If you didn’t know this, then you should do some reading so that you understand more about what it is you’re about to learn. If you don’t do this, it would be like learning the English alphabet without knowing the letters spell words. With so many Japanese “alphabets” this reading is pretty important.

There’s two ways you can do this:

1. Read some really in depth articles about hiragana, katakana, kanji, and romaji on wikipedia (this is the more complicated option).
2. Read about the Japanese “alphabets” on TextFugu (simpler, quicker, but not as in depth).

I don’t know which one you want to do, but to be honest either is probably fine. Personally, I’d go with the simpler one (#2), just because you only need to know some background info, not become a PhD in Japanese linguistics.

After you’ve gotten the background info on the various Japanese writing systems, you can move on to the next step.

2. Learn The Pronunciation

For me, I think learning pronunciation and understanding how the “patterns” of hiragana work are important to do before you learn to read and write. If you spend some time on this first, you can then associate this with the reading and writing that you learn a little later. Learning the pronunciation of hiragana before you learn hiragana will help you build a foundation of better Japanese pronunciation, help you to understand how the Japanese language works, and ultimately speed up your hiragana learning in the long run (I think it will, anyways).

1. Hiragana pronunciation can be looked at on TextFugu as well (another free chapter)

After you’ve gone through this, you’ll be ready to start learning the reading and writing parts of hiragana.

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The Hiragana How-To Guide

Before you start, I want you to think back to your days of when you learned how to read/write own native language. This will help you to readjust any unrealistic expectations. Most likely, it took you years to get comfortable with English (or whatever you grew up with). Despite this, you’re going to be able to learn hiragana much faster. It’s going to be hard, and you should expect to be perfect in one, two, or even three weeks. It’s a process, and the more you practice the better you’ll end up getting at it, just like anything (as long as you practice the right things, whoops).

1. Download A Hiragana Chart

I’ve actually made a hiragana chart that you can download right here. I think it’s pretty simple, printable, and easy to use. Feel free to use it, give it away, or whatever else you want to do with it. It’s a totally free hiragana chart.

[ilink style="download" url="http://www.tofugu.com/wp-content/uploads/2010/10/hiragana-chart.pdf"]Download Hiragana Chart[/ilink]

You’re going to be using this a lot, so print it out (if you have a printer) and make it handy.

2. Let’s Take A Look At Some Words You Know Already

Despite what you might think, reading and writing Japanese (at least when it comes to kana) is actually really easy. In order to illustrate that, I thought we could look at some words you already know, starting with the word “sushi.”

For the most part, all hiragana characters (or kana) consist of a consonant (a letter that’s not a vowel) and a vowel. If you look at your hiragana chart, you’ll see that there are things like “ka, chi, mu, ra, hu, ji” etc. Although there are some “weird” ones, like “shi, chi, tsu” etc., that are two consonants plus a vowel, you can probably see the basic pattern emerge. Other than this, the only exceptions are “n” (a single consonant) and “a, i, u, e, o” (which are just vowels on their own).

So, knowing that kana pretty much consists of a consonant sound and a vowel sound, let’s figure out how to spell “sushi” in hiragana. It’s quite easy.

The word “sushi” consists of two separate kana: SU + SHI. Take a look at your hiragana chart and see if you can find the kana for both of these (su & shi). What are they? Just for the sake of letting things sink it, go ahead and copy the characters “su” and “shi” in order to write the word “sushi” out. All you have to do is copy them off the chart, we’ll be really learning them in a bit.

This image is taken from the hiragana chart we’re using, and I’ve circled the correct characters. Now, on the sheet they aren’t in the correct order, but when you write out す (su) and し (shi) together, you get すし (sushi). Writing in hiragana really is that simple. It’s amazing, right?

Now, unfortunately, there is a kanji for this word as well (寿司 = すし = sushi), but you don’t need to worry about that at all right now. We’re focusing on hiragana for the time being. Let’s take a look at another word, karate.

This word is often mispronounced as “karadee,” but if you use your knew found knowledge of hiragana pronunciation you’ll realize how karate is actually pronounced. Let’s write it out in kana.

Take the word “karate” and break it up into its individual kana parts (I’ll give you a hint, there’s three parts). Find those three kana on your hiragana chart and write the word out. Pronounce the three individual kana to find out the correct pronunciation of the word karate. Did you get it right?

When you write “karate” out in hiragana, it comes out to からて. This is the hiragana for KA + RA + TE. Totally different from “karadee” that most people end up saying everywhere else.

After taking a look at these, are you starting to understand how hiragana is used to write things in Japanese? Do you also understand how kana in hiragana are pronounced (consonant + vowel, etc)? Good, let’s move on to the actual process of learning to read and write hiragana.

3. Learning to Read & Write

Before you get started, you should make sure that you have a Smart.fm account. This is what we’re going to use to drill the individual kana to help you learn them. We’ll be using it quite a bit in this guide, so it’s best you get an account now so you’re ready.

First 10 Hiragana: あいうえ、おかきくけこ

1. Study your first ten hiragana using Smart.fm – あ、い、う、え、お、か、き、く、け、こ. You’ll have an option of studying these either 5 at a time or 10 at at time. I’d recommend choosing 5 for now, until you get better. Here’s a quick screencast going over how you should use Smart.fm to study your hiragana.

[yframe url='http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=7keQJIpJXZE']

Essentially, you want to…

1. Write the kana down every time you get it right (or wrong)
2. Use the pronunciation audio that’s available to you on Smart.fm
3. Only study 5 at a time
4. Let Smart.fm tell you when you’ve learned something (usually it’s pretty good at that)

2. Go to Drag n’ Drop Hiragana, and only drag the first ten hiragana (a-column and ka-column) into the right spaces. By only doing these ones, you’ll have to find the right hiragana amongst all the other hirgana (helping you differentiate them) and secondly force you to remember what they look like. Try this twice (refresh to restart) and see if you can do it faster the second time!

3. After you feel good about the first 10 kana on Smart.fm, it’s time to put some of that into practice. Complete this worksheet and try to cheat as little as possible.

[ilink style="download" url="http://www.textfugu.com/wp-content/uploads/2010/10/hiragana-1-10.pdf"]First 10 Hiragana Practice[/ilink]

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Hiragana 11-20: さしすせそ、たちつてと

Of course, it’s important that you review the kana you just studied while you’re learning your new kana, so we’ll make sure to do that here.

1. Start by writing out the ten kana that you know and try to do it from memory (starting with あ and ending with こ). If you had to peek it’s not the end of the world. Write out the romaji next to / below / above them for reference.

2. Now write out the ten new kana (sa-column and ta-column) along with the romaji. These are the kana you’re about to study.

3. Go ahead and open the Smart.fm Master Hiragana list again. Since you finished the first 10 kana on there, you should be able to do the next ten now. Do them in groups of five, just like before until you’ve completed up until と (to). Remember to follow the steps from before where you write out the kana each time you get it right or wrong.

4. Visit RealKana and check the four columns of hiragana that you know already. Click on the katakana tab and uncheck anything that’s checked (you don’t want to learn katakana yet). Now, hit the practice tab and go through the practice a few times, until you feel good about reading the kana.

5. After you feel fairly decent about the first twenty kana (especially the new stuff) complete this worksheet to really solidify that knowledge.

[ilink style="download" url="http://www.textfugu.com/wp-content/uploads/2010/10/hiragana-11-20.pdf"]First 20 Hiragana Practice[/ilink]

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Hiragana 21-30: なにぬねの、はひふへほ

You’re actually past the halfway point for the “main” hiragana now! Just keep going, you’re making good progress!

1. Write down your ten new hiragana on your piece of paper with the other hiragana, so you can have them for reference.

2. Log on to Smart.fm, and complete the next ten hiragana (na-column and ha-column). As always, be sure to write down the individual kana every time you get it right or wrong, so you can practice writing. If you need help with stroke order, you can always use the stroke order guide on the hiragana chart page.

3. After feeling okay about the next ten, complete this work sheet, which helps you practice reading and writing the individual kana.

[ilink style="download" url="http://www.textfugu.com/wp-content/uploads/2010/10/hiragana-21-30.pdf"]First 30 Hiragana Practice[/ilink]

4. Visit RealKana and check the four columns of hiragana that you know already. Click on the katakana tab and uncheck anything that’s checked (you don’t want to learn katakana yet). Now, hit the practice tab and go through the practice a few times, until you feel good about reading this kana (you should be pretty good, actually!).

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Hiragana 31-46: まみむめも、やゆよ、らりるれろ、わを、ん

You’re almost there! In terms of the “main” hiragana, this is the last of it. After this, you’re just learning things you already kind of know (like dakuten and combo hiragana), which means you’re pretty much all the way there. Just a few loose ends to tie up after this.

1. Write down your new hiragana on your piece of paper, along with the romaji, for reference.

2. Log on to Smart.fm and finish out the hiragana until ん (n). There’s more than this on Smart.fm, but that’ll come soon enough. Make sure you’re writing down the hiragana you get both right and wrong. Once you’ve finished it up until ん, move on to the next step.

3. Go to RealKana, and this time only check columns な, は, ま, や, ら, & ん. You’re learning more this round, so I want you to focus it a little more on recent kana. Here’s an image to show you what to check (make sure you uncheck the katakana columns in the katakana tab too, if you need to).

Go through these a couple of times until you feel comfortable with them.

4. Complete this worksheet, which focuses on ま through ん columns.

[ilink style="download" url="http://www.textfugu.com/wp-content/uploads/2010/10/hiragana-ma-n.pdf"]Hiragana ま – ん[/ilink]

5. Head on back to Drag n’ Drop Hiragana. In theory, you should be able to complete the puzzle now (rather than just little bits of it). How fast can you get it done? Record your times and see if you can get done in under three minutes.

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Dakuten: がぎぐげご、ざじずぜぞ、だぢづでど、ばびぶべぼ、ぱぴぷぺぽ

In theory, these should be easier than what we’ve been doing so far. You already know the main characters (which dakuten use) and all you have to do is know what little symbol to put next to them (hint: usually it’s a quotation mark). That being said, I’m going to give you more things than normal to study in this section. You should be better at studying hiragana by now, and you should also know the symbols above (minus the dakuten part). I won’t say this section is easy, but it should be easier.

1. Start up Smart.fm and work through the dakuten hiragana. You should finish on ぽ (po). As always, keep writing these things out as you do them whether you get a card right or wrong.

2. Complete this worksheet. This worksheet’s goal is to help you remember what a column will change to when dakuten are added to it. Focus more on remembering that “S” goes to “Z” or “T” goes to “D” rather than focusing on individual kana.

[ilink style="download" url="http://www.textfugu.com/wp-content/uploads/2010/10/dakuten.pdf"]Dakuten Practice[/ilink]

3. On RealKana, let’s practice dakuten hiragana as well as the original kana from which the dakuten came. Check the か, さ, た, は, が, ざ, だ, ば, & ぱ columns. Here’s an image to illustrate:

Make sure you uncheck any katakana columns that might be checked as well. Go through the drills like this until you feel pretty comfortable telling them apart. Can you write them out on your own now? If I said things like…

What do “K-sounds” turn into?

Answer: “G-Sounds”

What do “H-sounds” turn into (two answers here)

Answer: “B & P Sounds”

What do “D-sounds” turn back into?

Answer: “T-Sounds”

What do “Z-sounds” turn back into?

Answer: “S-Sounds”

Could you answer all these questions? If not, be sure to drill RealKana a little bit more so you can learn the differences. Really, just learning these differences is the secret to learning dakuten, so if you can do that, you can do dakuten :)

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Combination Hiragana: きゃ、しゃ、ちゃ、にゃ、ひゃ、みゃ、りゃ、ぎゃ、じゃ、ぢゃ、びゃ、&　ぴゃ Columns

Sometimes, certain kana can be written smaller. When placed next to another kana, it can modify the way it sounds. Don’t worry, though, because the modifications actually make a lot of sense. For example:

き + small ゃ = きゃ (which sounds like kya). It’s almost like saying KIYA, but you drop the “i” sound. KYA!

There are other “combo-hiragana,” but these are the main ones, and the most important for you to know right now. Combo-kana will get a little crazier once we hit katakana, but for now it should be fairly straight forward, especially after you drill them for a bit.

1. Fire up your good buddy Smart.fm again. By now, you should be through the dakuten, and ready to study the combo-hiragana, starting with きゃ, きゅ, and きょ. Since you already know all the characters being used (you just have to remember that the y-column kana are “small”) feel free to study ten at a time. The goal is to get to the end of this list, actually and finish out everything that Smart.fm has to offer. Like I said, though, these should be one of the easiest sets (even though its the longest) for you, and drilling through it should be more about reviewing kana you already know.

2. Let’s practice writing them. Remember, the やゆよ for these are small ゃゅょ. If you don’t write them small, they are just regular sized, and pronounced normally. It’s the difference between:

きや (kiya)　vs　きゃ (kya)

Those are two different sounds and you can’t switch them out with each other. The difference is important! Use this worksheet to practice:

[ilink style="download" url="http://www.textfugu.com/wp-content/uploads/2010/10/combo-hiragana.pdf"]Combination Hiragana[/ilink]

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At this point, you should feel fairly good about almost all the hiragana. You don’t need to be perfect, nor do you need to be at 100%. That’s definitely not expected at this point. It’ll take a while before you read hiragana nice and fluidly, but luckily there’s going to be plenty of opportunity to practice as you continue to study Japanese (now in hiragana!). Well done!

Where To Go From Here?

Well, there’s plenty of things to do, but I’d round out your hiragana reading & writing career with some lessons on hiragana’s long vowels and the small tsu. That right there will make sure you know just about everything you need to know about hiragana, then all that’s left is more practice.

By learning hiragana, though, you’ve opened up a ton of new resources from which you can study Japanese. If you don’t know hiragana, you’re really limited in what you can do. If you do learn it (like you just did, in theory), there’s so much more available to you now, whether it’s various Japanese textbooks, blogs, websites, or whatever. Hiragana will open doors for you.

I hope you enjoyed this tutorial, and I hope you found it useful as well. If you’re thinking of learning Japanese, this isn’t a bad place to start, and I think this guide lays everything out pretty simply and easily. Feel free to contact me if you have any questions!

P.S. If you wish this tutorial was 140 characters or less, you should follow Tofugu on Twitter.

P.P.S. If you want to read a more in depth guide to learning hiragana, you’ll want to check out the first six chapters of TextFugu (all are free).

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