Katakana 1

I can just hear you asking, "Lieani, I thought japanese had funny symbols for words. Why are we learning japanese without those symboys ? " Dont worry, We're going to start learning them now

-Before we can really learn japanese we need to be able to use kana. Kana refers to both hiragana and katakana, Which are two of the writting systems that are used in japanese.

-The other system is kanji. Its more complicated than the other two, So we'll come back to that later.

-For now, We're going to start learning hiragana since its the default writing system for japanese

-Here are the first five characters.

A (あ）
I　(い)
U　(う)
E　(え)
O　(お)

-Here, Each character starts with K and is followed by one of the vowels.

-The way that you write something is much more important in japanese than it is in english.

Ka (か)
Ki (き)
Ku (く)
Ke (け)
Ko (こ)

-As you learn more hiragana, You'll be able to stop writing in english letters. You'll be that much closer really knowing japanese !

-Here are a few words that you can write already ! Give them a try.

あおい
Blue
Biru

いいえ
No
Tidak

-these words use characters from both sets.test out your memory!

おか
Hill
Bukit

いく
Go
Pergi

-If we only had the 46 hiragana characters to choose from, Japanese wouldn't have many ways to pronounce words. But adding more characters isn't a very good solution.

-Instead, We can place little symbols next to a character to show that it is read differently.

-The symbol im going to talk about this time is the dakuten (also called a tenten)

-The dakuten looks like quotation marks. It's placed in the top right corner of a character. Not all characters can use a dakuten.

-All "K" characters can use a dakuten. Putting a dakuten on them gives them a G sound instead of a K sound

Ga (が)
Gi (ぎ)
Gu (ぐ)
Ge (げ)
Go (ご)

-Many peple new to japanese think that each character is a word, But hiragana and katakana only represent sounds. They dont mean anymore than the letters of the english alphabet do.

-Go ahead and practice these some more and i'll get more hiragana characters ready for you to study. Next time we'll cover the months!