O - Lesson 1.3

Hello everyone,

From lesson 1.3, I'd like to ask for some help in understanding something .  I've only just started practicing writing the characters, so I apologize for having to ask in romanji.

Konya o sushi o tabe ni iki mashō ka? / Shall we go and eat sushi tonight?
Oishii o mise o shitte imasu / I know a delicious restaurant

From what I understand, placing "o" before a noun makes the noun sound more refined.   If that's correct, it makes sense to me when it's placed before "sushi" and "mise," but I'm confused as to why it's also used before "tabe" and "shitte imasu" - can someone please help me understand?  Is it to more formalize the act of "eating" and "knowing"?

Also, I found a post several years ago where someone asked a similar question, and Sayaka's response was:

.......the sentence should be "Konya o sushi tabe ni ikimashou ka". Please go back to the members area to view the corrected version........

It's not corrected in the members area, so I'm not sure which is correct. 

Thanks so much!

This would be a spot where hiragana would be helpful. ;)

o-sushi is written: おすし

Oishii o mise o shitte imasu is written: おいしい　おみせ　を　しって　います。

o/お is a polite prefix, or honorific

o/を is an object marker, i.e. marks the object of the sentence (in this case the object of the sentence is the restaurant / みせを / mise o )

How easy お and を are to tell apart depends on the romaji system used. Some systems write both お and を as "o", and some systems write the object marker (を) as  "wo", which is an old, obsolete pronunciation—https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wo_(kana) . 　

About the other sentence, in the audio Sayaka says:
こんや　おすし　を　たべ　に　いきましょう　か
konya     osushi       (w)o  tabe     ni        ikimashou           ka.

But at the top of the page it says, in bold:
Konya o sushi tabe ni iki mashō ka

I think both are acceptable, but I'm no authority. Hopefully the Rocket Tutor will come along and clear this up for good.

Ok, so I wasn't quite on the right track there.  Thank you very much for so clearly separating the characters to match the romanji for the interpretation.  It made the explanation very clear to understand!

I figured I'd just get through module 1 before I studied the hiragana and katakana.  That way, I'd have a good intro to the sounds, pronunciation, and "feel" of the language before I dove into writing.  Maybe I should rethink that :-)

If you memorize two columns a day, you can be reading hiragana in a week. Hiragana & katakana in two weeks. ;)

Oh my GOSH, really!!!!  Well, I assumed it would take MUCH longer than that - I printed out the writing sheets from another website and it all seemed intimidating to the point I thought it would take many weeks.    You've got me so excited that I'm getting started on it tomorrow, two columns a day, with a target date of 2 weeks  completion!!! :-) :-) :-)

If you are going by Romaji typing then just remember the particle is wo を and the honorifics are o or go お　ご

And sometimes you just have to listen really hard to the way the sounds are pronounced in the conversations.  Then you'll hear the "o" and "wo" better with a little practice.

Hi everyone!

What 夫婦茶碗-さん has said is correct :) (Good job!) I have edited the romaji in the phraseboxes a little, which might help.

As Tony-S10さん has said, it is easier to tell the honorific お from the particle を if it is written in kana.

Usually in conversations, both お and を sound the same, although there are times where を would be pronounced as "wo" (instead of "o") for emphasis. You would usually tell the difference between the two by the context of the conversation. Don’t worry, this comes with time and practice!

I note that "Konya o-sushi tabe ni ikimashō ka" is generally acceptable, but it is more colloquial, and would be more grammatically correct if it was "Konya o-sushi wo tabe ni ikimashō ka". I have since updated that sentence at the top of Module 1.3.

I hope that helps and please don't hesitate to ask if you have further questions :)

Crystal
 

Thanks so much everyone, I'm 2/3 of the way through hiragana, and I've decided I'm going to come back and re-read these post responses once I've finished both hiragana and katakana.  At that time, I'm hopeful they will be much clearer to me!! :-)

 

夫婦茶碗 , your comment of "memorizing two columns a day, you can be reading hiragana in a week" had me feeling hopeful but pretty doubtful.  Well, I'm SO excited to say I have finished the hiragana chart and can read all the characters!!!  I just assumed it would take so much longer to learn and read these characters, but you were so right! 

Hubby was excited to test me and said "can you write the names of two of my favorite characters in Samurai Champloo?  Their names are Fuu and Mugen."  I thought about it for a moment and hand-wrote  ふう.  It took me about a minute to think about Mugen, and then I wrote むげん.  Hubby scrambled to look on google to do a translate and his mouth fell open!  Actually, it was a surreal experience to be able to do that.  Part of me couldn't believe I was actually able to.  I'm quite slow, and I have to think carefully before writing the characters, but it's all good.  Hopefully I'll steadily speed up. 

It took forever to find the characters and type them on the Japanese IME keyboard for this post.  I installed it a couple of weeks ago, but it's the first time I actually used it.  I gave up on trying to find the voiced syllables and turned on the romanji -> hiragana instant translate function.  I'll save figuring out the keyboard for another day.

Thanks a million for the pep talk, I'm literally doing cartwheels :-) :-)

すごい~~~~~~!!! パチパチパチ (*applause) よくできました！:D

Samurai Champloo…I have not heard that title mentioned in awhile. I should see if it's on Crunchyroll. I was a big fan of the director's first work, Cowboy Bebop, but never watched SC.

(If you want to see a cute nursery rhyme featuring パチパチパチ —with hiragana subtitles—here's a YouTube link: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=8Dl2054kSVk —if geo-restricted try searching for the title: おはなしおはなしパチパチパチパチ【手遊び歌・歌詞付】)

 

Hubby loves Cowboy Bebob, but I'm more a fan of Samurai Champloo.  I just love the characters, and especially the music.  Then again, some of my favorite tunes are from Japanese anime shows.  I just love Meiko Kaji's music :-)

I LOVE the nursery rhyme, thank you!!!