Some of the hard-to-translate puns in Japanese come from the fact that certain definitions are given different meanings depending on what system is used. The title of this post, for example, says literally "the A, I, O of Japanese" but I took some liberties and wrote out the katakana for the vowels, and then the "Romanization" (using Latin characters to phonetically spell a Japanese word) of Japanese to get a rhyming phrase much comparable to "the A,B, Cs of Japanese."
You can see how things get complicated quickly. However, there are many games and puzzles that are JUST as complicated, and it is my opinion that, if I am going to struggle to find a solution to some sticky brainteaser, the prize at the end better be me ecstatically reading a "do not litter" sign.
Hm. Maybe it's just me...
The first thing to wrap your brain around is that two of the alphabets are phonic based, that is, sounds - not letters. Instead of learning the letters h-o-t-e and l, and how to pronounce them, and then putting them together to spell "hotel" you learn the phonics "ho" "te" and "ru" (ホテル).
Much of the information in this post starts from Japanese Hiragana & Katakana for Beginners by Timothy G. Stout. It's a book I bought ages ago that came with a CD Rom that contained flash cards to print off and practice with. Once I figured out that many "loan words" (words like "hotel" that are technically English words adopted into Japanese) were written in the katakana alphabet, and once I sounded them out I could reasonably understand them, I decided to learn that system first. Many suggest learning hiragana first, and I don't really think it matters much - once you learn one, there are a number of characters that overlap and look similar (eg. "ya" = や, in hiragana, or ヤ in katakana) so you can pretty much learn the second alphabet (OK so it's technically not an alphabet but whatever) pretty easily.
The book uses a tried-and-true learning system where a new symbol (for example, ホ) is compared with a mnemonic device to connect it with the sound and the shape (this looks like a "HOly cross" and is pronounced HO). It was great for quick lookups, but I wanted something more streamlined than a book or a bunch of flashcards as I continued to learn.
Enter the apps.
I downloaded three free apps on my phone, and they all work offline:
- Kana Mind, a quiz game which filled the role of the flashcards
- Memory Hint Katakana
and
- Memory Hint Hiragana, which both had very nice mnemonic charts that were easy to open and flip back and forth while one was doing the quizzes with Kana Mind.
Whenever I had a moment, I was flipping around between the quiz to the memory hints, and once my phone died, I tried to write out kana charts (vowels across the top, consonants down the side, with the phonics filling in the center), annoying everyone around me as I filled napkins full of Japanese characters.
Another set of apps I found particularity useful, especially as I was on say, and exercise bike and couldn't flip back and forth between my apps but could watch videos, is the 2 Hour series. Granted, it takes WAY longer than "two hours" but the hints, although somewhat stupid ("imagine し is a hook hooking a sheep and is pronounced "shi"), really do work.
As I mentioned in my previous post, I really know nothing, but with practice I think I can improve. When I booked a hotel in Sapporo, where the sign looked like this, I was able to sound out the kana at the very top - RO - TO I-N, which when pronounced out loud, sound like "Route Inn" -- the name of the hotel. Looking at the menu for our flight, I saw a word that, when sounded out, said "coffee". Granted, both of these had English translations right next to them, and there is always Google Translate to fall back on, but I'm still pleased with myself.
There is nothing quite as fun and gratifying as realizing that, in the fourth decade of your existence, and after feeling you were bad at language all your life, that you are actually teaching yourself something useful.
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