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Crossroads at Anhedonia Jct.23's avatar

こんにちは猫鳥 (koh-n-nee-chee-wah 'Good afternoon' but common 'Hello' or 'Hi' -- neh-koh 'cat'/toh-ree "bird'). The first five characters are in hiragana, the syllabary used for Japanese words and name. The Japanese hear words as strings of syllables, not letter put into words. There's also the angular katakana which has the exact same sounds but is used for foreign names and scientific names and terms. The last to are the Chinese characters known as kanji, which can have multiple pronunciations and meanings and are the bane of anyone learning to read and write Japanese.

Quick pronunciation guide: there are only five vowel sounds, in order with hiragana & katakana - a (ah)あ/ア, i (ee)い/イ, u (like the 'o' in 'to)う/ウ, e (eh)え/ェ, o (oh)お/オ. 'G' is always hard. As I said, Japanese hear words in syllables, thus when they hear the word 'neko', they don't hear four letters n-e-k-o, but just the two syllables ねこ, as spelled out above. This is just a taste. There's more to it, of course, but there is no sound in Japanese that can't be found in English. The reverse in not true, which leads to lots of confusion when Japanese try to write foreign names.

Anyway, please take your time. There's absolutely no hurry. I ain't goin' nowhere. Scroll at your leisure. I get the feeling we joined Wonkette at about the same time. You have about 2K more non-allowed posts and I have about 2K more upfists, so it sort of evens out. I joined in 2013. Whereabouts are you on our globe? I'm ~60 mi./100 km due north of Tokyo, medium size city, easy to find, capital of my prefecture. In closing, here are two very spoiled kittehs. https://uploads.disquscdn.c...

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Catbird's avatar

Darling kittehs! Pardon my Japanese, but arigato gozaimasu for your non-comment. I have to think you speak Japanese. Was it difficult to learn? I sometimes watch Japanese movies and it seems like it would be. It sounds as if you would be more comfortable in your kitchen cut in half. I know Japanese houses and apartments tend to be small, but what a set up. I'm 5'1.5" and it sounds too cozy for me. I am sorry to hear about your depression and I hope you have good therapy and drugs. If you ever have the inclination, I'd love to hear more of what it is like having lived in Japan for so long. You've probably seen lots of changes over time. Anyway, please keep those kittehs warm and happy. (They look a bit demanding from their picture.)

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