Daily Thread: simple questions, comments that don’t need their own posts, and first time posters go here (June 17, 2025)

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17 comments
  1. > ぐ–ち【愚痴】
    >
    >[名]言っても仕方がないことを言って嘆くこと。「愚痴をこぼす」

    Does 言っても仕方がないこと mean “things one can’t help but to say” or “things that are pointless to say”?

  2. 日本語を外国語として学習していると、ブレークスルー体験を何度もするということがあると思います。皆さんのブレークスルー体験にはどのようなものがありますか?

    もう全部、ひらがなで書いてくれればいいんじゃないの?と、日本語を初めて学習し始めたときに思ったりもしたが、いや、漢字が3割くらいは混ざっていないと文の切れ目もわからず、読む速度がとんでもなく低下することに気づいた。

    小説などを黙読していて、発音できない漢語があるのだが、発音できなくても、実は、意味が透明に100%わかってしまう、漢字のビジュアルから、発音を経由しないで、意味が現前化する、ということが自動的にできるようになった。

    自分が日本語で話していたり書いていたりする文が、自分の母国語に、自分で、なにひとつ、まったく翻訳できないことに気が付いた。

  3. How do I describe someone’s movement if we’re going somewhere together, where the motion would be 「帰る」for me and 「行く」for them?

    E.g. if I’m living in a foreign country, and I go to my home country to visit family. I then ask my family to come live with me in my new country. 「一緒に(新滞在国)に帰ろう」- it’s 帰る for me but not 帰る for them since they’re not returning anywhere. 「一緒に(新滞在国)に行こう」maybe?

  4. 「肉厚で歯応えがある」What does the で mean here. for context they were describing a piece of shrimp tempura

  5. hi hi some questions please.

    Are these two Japanese phrases natural? Can they be used interchangeably?

    I’m wondering about the naturalness and nuance of these two expressions:

    あまり考えずに答えます
    考えすぎずに答えます

    Both seem to mean “I will answer without thinking too much,” but I feel like there might be subtle differences in meaning or usage.

    Is either phrase more common or natural in everyday conversation?

    Can they be used interchangeably without changing the nuance?

    Are there specific contexts where one fits better than the other?

    Any insights or example sentences would be really appreciated! im wondering whether i can say this out loud while im trying to calculate what the correct answer for a JLPT question is. the teacher is doing it with me – waiting for me to answer. or, if at a variety show the MC is waiting for the contestant to answer, and the contestant is thinking out loud.

  6. Hi, I was studying the grammar point (まで – Even, To even, To the extent of) via Bunpro, link:
    [https://bunpro.jp/grammar_points/まで](https://bunpro.jp/grammar_points/まで)

    They gave this example but

    * 私はお金を払ってまで旅行には行きたくない。
    * I would not go **to the extent of** paying money to go traveling.

    I realise that because EN is SOV whilst JPN is SVO (subject-verb-object), I start reading from the front, then from the back till the middle. So my translation is:

    – I don’t want to travel to the extent of paying money

    But this translation confuses me, bcuz it now sounds like he’s willing to pay money if it means he doesn’t need to travel

    As of now I have 2 issues:

    1) Is my current way of reading from the front, then from the back till the middle determinal to my learning? If so, what can I do to fix it

    2) The example used for まで which confuses me translation wise

    Would really appreciate it if someone could help me with this, thanks in advance!

  7. So のに means for purpose right? 帰るのに5時間がかかります.. or 日本語を学ぶのに5年がかかりました。but why is のに used in “日本語を学ぶのに5年をむだにした” ( i wasted 5 years learning japanese)

  8. 私は**ただ**彼女と話したかっただけです. Example sentence from kaishi 1.5k deck. The bold word – ただ is translated as **simply** in the card. But if we have ただ, why do we need **だけ** after the verb? In jdict they both translate as simply/only. ChatGPT(i know it’s bad) told me that ただ adds emotion, and the だけ is the grammatical simply (as in the only action that wanted to be taken). Is this true?

  9. Tried writing a little journal entry (really bad at writing atm) lmk how I did-

    火曜日, 十七日 六月-

    はああ、 日本語に書いてようとするがいたい。 助詞は, 中に群がりごくを見忘れて。僕は書くことを多分ダメよ…

  10. [u/fjgwey ](https://www.reddit.com/user/fjgwey/)

    シリーズ日本人、昔からおもろいことゆうとるなぁ~ 第二段

    >万葉集に「いぶせくもあるか」、意味は、「気分がはれない、うつうつとする」なんですけど、ってのがあって、それ、こう書いてあります。

    >馬声 蜂音 石花 蜘蛛 荒  鹿

    >い  ぶ  せ  くも ある か

    >馬の声ってのは「ひん」じゃね?なんですが、ま、当時hiっていう発音はないので、「い」。蜂の音ってのは、「ぶん」なので「ぶ」。

    ~~~

    ご飯をよそう「しゃもじ」ってありますよね。あれ、なんで「しゃもじ」だかって知ってたりしましたか? しゃ-word なんだな、これが。ダイレクトに言わないで、「しゃ」から始まる例のあの単語っていう隠語みたいなものなのです。「しゃ文字」なのですよね。

  11. Wanted to confirm that I understand what ばかり is doing at the end of the sentence here

    >おふくろの味ムードに付き合って、漂白のため皮が固くなり味を失った里芋を、全国画一のだしの素を使って煮ころがしてみたところで味気なさを噛みしめるばかり。

    Is this ばかり basically “*All I* feel is…”? The sorta “nothing but” usage?

  12. What is the difference between the counters ~日間 and 第~日?
    As an example, I’m starting each day in my notebook by writing the day of the week, date, and how many days I’ve been learning. So today I wrote
    火曜日 6月17日 六日間

    Looking for any advice or knowledge! Thanks so much in advance!

  13. A:「僕はどんなことをしてでも、津波からみんなを守ろうと思ったんだ」

    「津波が来るその日に島の人たちを山へ向かわせたかった」

    「だからね、僕はそこで一計を案じたんだ」

    B:「それって?」

    A:「僕が鬼になって、島を襲うのさ!」

    B「…………」

    A「どうだい羽依里くん? 素晴らしい企てだとは思わないかい?」

    B「……真面目に考えたんだよな?」

    A「もちろん大真面目さ!」

    B: (MC internal monologue) 要は、津波が島を襲うその日に、島の人たちが、自分たちから山に逃げるよう仕向ければいいんだ。

    I’m trying to understand better ばいい, I looked into it again and I think in this case it’s the “wish, desire” meaning.

    Basically there’s a girl that has a premonition about a tsunami, but none believes her, so her friend tries to come up with a plan to make the people run away.

    my interpretation so far:

    In short, the day the island will be struck by the tsunami, she hopes to induce / urge the people to run away in the mountains voluntarily.

    since it’s an internal monologue and he’s talking about his friend’s plan, would u interpret it as “she hopes” or “would be good if” ?

    I understand it doesn’t have to be 1:1 or that you can rephrase it in multiple ways, but i’m trying to break it down so I will understand better future sentences, and interpret them in a more “natural” way.

    Also よう here is like ように right? “so that, in order to” , “she hopes to induce (scare them off) so that they will run away voluntarily”

  14. Hey everyone. I recently came back from Japan and my boss, who is Japanese, helped me a lot with travel tips, sightseeing, language questions and was very supportive overall. I got her some little things that I think she’d like like. I wanted to also write her a card in Japanese, can anyone tell me if this correct and if it sounds natural/respectful? (She’s an older lady)

    (Name)

    このたびは、日本への渡航前に多大なるご支援を賜り、誠にありがとうございました。
    おかげさまで、日本では大変有意義な時間を過ごすことができました。
    ささやかではございますが、こちらの品が少しでも日本を思い出す一助となれば幸いです。

    敬具

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