和
VOCABULARY

おはよう
ohayô
good morning

こんにちは
konnichiwa
good afternoon, hello

こんばんは
konbanwa
good evening

おやすみ
oyasumi
good night

ありがとう
arigatô
thank you

すみません
sumimasen
excuse me

おねがいします
onegai shimasu
please

どういたしまして
dôitashimashite
you are welcome

またあいましょう
mata aimashô
let us meet again

じゃあ またね
jâ mata ne
see you soon

さわだ:
Sawada
 
  ko n ni chi wa ha ji me ma shi te.
  Good day!      How do you do?

は、
  wa ta shi wa Sa wa da de su.
  I’m Sawada.

ど う ぞ 
  zo yo ro shi ku.
  Nice to meet you.
リー :
Lee
  ko n ni chi wa ha ji me ma shi te.
  Good day! How do you do?

は、  リー
  wa ta shi wa Lee de su.
  I’m Lee.

どう ぞ 
  zo yo ro shi ku.
  Nice to meet you.

1. N1は N2です

1) Particle は

The particle は indicates that the word before it is the topic of the sentence.
You select a noun you want to talk about, add は to show that it is the topic and give a statement about the topic.

わたしは リーです。 I am Lee.

[Note] The particle は is read わ.

2) です

Nouns used with です work as predicates.
です indicates judgement or assertion.
です also conveys that the speaker is being polite towards the listener.

わたしは がくせいです。 I am a student.
2. Sか

1) Particle か

The particle か is used to express the speaker’s doubt, question, uncertainty, etc.
A question is formed by simply adding か to the end of a sentence. A question ends with a rising intonation.

2) Questions asking whether a statement is correct or not

As mentioned above, a sentence becomes a question when か is added to the end.
The question thus made asks whether a statement is correct or not.
Depending on whether you agree with the statement or not, your answer to such a question begins with はい or いいえ.

あなたは がくせいですか。 Are you a student?
…はい、がくせいです。 …Yes, I am.

リーさんは せんせいですか。 Is Mr. Lee a teacher?
…いいえ、せんせいじゃ ありません。 …No, he is not.

3) Questions with interrogatives

リーさんは がくせいですか。 Is Mr. Lee a student?
3. Nも

も is added after a topic instead of は when the statement about the topic is the same as the previous topic.

リーさんは がくせいです。 Mr. Lee is a student.
マリアさんも がくせいです。 Maria is also a student.

※Noun → N, Verb → V, Adjective → adj, Sentence → S
HIRAGANA, KATAKANA, ROMAJI

The hiragana syllabary developed from Chinese characters. Hiragana was originally called onnade or “women’s hand” as it was used mainly by women - men wrote in kanji and katakana. By the 10th century, hiragana was used by everybody. The word hiragana means “ordinary syllabic script”.
The hiragana syllabary consists of 46 characters and is mainly used to write word endings, known as okurigana.
Hiragana is also widely used in materials for children, textbooks, animation and comic books, to write Japanese words which are not normally written with kanji, such as adverbs and some nouns and adjectives.
Katakana is used for foreign names and loan words.
Romaji is the system for writing Japanese using the latin alphabet so that both non Japanese readers and computers understand this language.

[Note] There are 2 different ways of writing り, さ, き and こ:
HIRAGANA & KATAKANA
 Japanese syllabary