Sakura and Ohka - Japanese translation

[randombs]

Maybe whoa is the Chinese reading?

[noobish hat]

I believe 'whoa' is the Keanu Reeves reading of を

[sj33]

My friend in Tokyo used to insist that を　is read as 'wo' instead of 'o'. It's the only time I've ever ignored the advice of a Japanese person when it comes to Japanese pronounciation.

I'm pretty sure the kanji used for 'baka'　(馬鹿) are used purely for phonetic reasons. This was pretty common in Classical Japanese (and as I'm doing a Classical Japanese translation assignment right now, I can tell you it is the bane of my life... spending ages looking up a word in a Classical Japanese dictionary before it finally clicks that the kanji are being used purely for phonetic reasons). Then again, that story is a good one for remembering it.

[randombs]

I believe 'whoa' is the Keanu Reeves reading of を

QFT

[randombs]

My friend in Tokyo used to insist that を　is read as 'wo' instead of 'o'. It's the only time I've ever ignored the advice of a Japanese person when it comes to Japanese pronounciation.

Was this during your early Japanese-studying days? If so, they might have said it to try and help you differentiate between を　and お. Otherwise, I'm not too sure. Maybe you gave them dodgy English advice and that was your payback?

[kryss]

In Romaji I would write "wo" for を, but pronounce it the same as お. Easiest way to solve the problem is just not to write Romaji!

[randombs]

To be honest, it's not exactly something you'd muck up. Once you're told it's pronounced o and not wo, surely it wouldn't happen again? It's like when you're told -****a is pronounced -shta, it just sticks.

[noobish hat]

Easiest way to solve the problem is just not to write Romaji!

Seconded.

[randombs]

What's wrong with romaji?

[kryss]

It should only be used by learners at the very beginning, and for Japanese names when necessary (authors' names, etc.)
Otherwise it's not really using a language.

At least that's my opinion.

[noobish hat]

well, of course you've got to use it to talk to people who don't know Japanese or you wouldn't get anywhere, but I don't think people learning Japanese should ever use it, there's no point; it only takes about an hour to learn kana.

[randombs]

I learned hiragana before romaji, if that makes sense. Learning hiragana's what got me into Japanese in the first place. I only learnt it as a joke because I was bored at the beginning of my Arabic class. Naturally they started with the Arabic alphabet for the first week or so and I decided I may as well learn some sort of alphabet, and there was a Japanese guy in the class and I borrowed his dictionary and copied them out and just kept writing them, so my hiragana used to look like printed hiragana for ages

I think the evils of romaji have been blown out of proportion, though. If someone's stuck learning romaji then that's up to them. They'll come around to hiragana eventually. Others get into hiragana quite quickly.

Of course, spending time learning a language through your own language's alphabet isn't ideal, but for some people it may be the easiest(or, in some cases, the only) way to progress, and it depends on how quickly they're looking to do that. In my case, I could take it or leave it, so I'm not fussed, whereas some people I know who study it are planning on moving to/working in Japan or have some sort of personal progress deadline, and in that case I'd recommend diving in and just learning hiragana, but for people just dabbling in it or whatever, I let them find their own course. No one plans on learning a language without learning that language's alphabet.

I'll rarely type in hiragana on Facebook, say, because my Japanese friends usually do it, and because they(or I) may not be at a PC with Japanese support at the time. Plus, it annoys the non-Japanese speakers because they just see squares and exclamation marks

Ok I'll admit it, I need romaji. I can't play Typing of the Dead without it!