Lessons 1.2 Tea Time

I'm glad there's an explanation for this. Duolingo has drilled 熱い（あつい）into my head for a long time when it comes to hot tea, so I had to immediately stop and search Google and this forum to figure out what was goin' on. ;)

ありがとう！

こんにちは (Konnichiwa) Tcollins89, toru e and EarleyGrave,

Sorry about the confusion and thanks for pointing that out! It looks like the wrong kanji was used for あたたかい (atatakai) in this lesson. It should be 温かい (atatakai) not 暖かい (atatakai). Also, あたたかい (atatakai) should be translated as "warm," not "hot."
The Japanese team have updated this and it should be all correct now. 

toru e, you're pretty much spot on, except we would use the kanji 温かい (atatakai) instead of 暖かい (atatakai). 

あたたかい (atatakai) and あつい (atsui) can be a little confusing, since they have multiple kanji and similar meanings in English. Here's a quick summary of how to tell them apart:  

• 暖かい (Atatakai) is used to talk about "warm" weather or climate.
• 温かい (Atatakai) is used to talk about  something that is "warm" to the touch, like drinks or food.
• 暑い (Atsui) is used to talk about "hot" weather or climate.
• 熱い (Atsui) is used to talk about  something that is "hot" to the touch, like drinks or food.

So EarleyGrave, you would be 100% correct in saying that 熱い (atsui) is used for hot tea! 

I hope this helped. Please let me know if you have any more questions!
べんきょう　を　がんばって　ください！ (Benkyō o ganbatte kudasai!)
 

Would it be correct to say that a Japanese person would ask for “warm tea” with 温かい instead of “hot tea” with 熱い because the latter would carry the implication of being “too hot to drink” when it comes to beverages? If so, it would still make sense to translate Japanese warm→hot and English hot→warm to preserve the intended meaning…

Sorry, I get bored and end up falling down magical rabbit-holes. ;) I'd appreciate your thoughts!

こんにちは (Konnichiwa) Earley Grave,

Thanks for your question (and I totally understand what you mean about the rabbit holes!). 

That would be correct, and I would agree with you on translating it as “hot tea,” with a literal translation of “warm tea." Thanks for your thoughts! I will pass that on to the Japanese team. 

べんきょう　を　がんばって　ください！ (Benkyō o ganbatte kudasai!)

Yay, I'm not crazy. ありがとう！

こんにちは (Konnichiwa) Earley Grave,

I agree with you on that one! Japanese people would most likely say 温かい紅茶 (atatakai kōcha) “warm tea” to ask for a “hot (cup of) tea." 

あたたかい (Atatakai) is translated as “warm," but depending on the context, it can look a lot like the English word “hot.” We've updated our translations in this lesson to reflect this, so the English field says now says “hot," and the literal field says “warm." Hopefully now it will be a little easier to distinguish between the two. And thanks for you thoughts on this!

Please let me know if you have any more questions!
べんきょう　を　がんばって　ください！ (Benkyō o ganbatte kudasai!)