Back To Your 3x5 Apartments, Men.

[amarissia]

superkalifragi recently posted a link to an interesting documentary from the BBC about the state of love and romance in Japan. I highly recommend checking it out, it haz mentions of yaoi and very realistic blow-up dolls.

One of the few blogs I read has been weighing in on this topic lately too, and he always has interesting stuff to say. Originally Gaijin Smash, you can now find him at Gaijin Chronicles. This guy is hilarious and gives some good insight into what living in Japan is like for a foreigner.

Comments

[heiligwasser.livejournal.com]

Woa, I can't thank you enough for pointing mthis out O.O. I think i'll pass on sleep tonight and work my way through it. It IS hilaruos lol.

[ayuka86.livejournal.com]

MAJI! You're a gaijin smash fan too?!

[tenxxxryuko.livejournal.com]

*reads blog* ROFL!!!! XD Grass-eaters and Meat-eaters....Pfft!!! XDDD Omg, this guy is pure CRACK-WIN! 8D

[tenxxxryuko.livejournal.com]

OMG!!!!!!!! Penis festival!!!!!! XD That is so awesome!! And Male Host bars?....Ouran High School flashbacks man.....only anime-boys are more cuter. Lol, :P

[amarissia.livejournal.com]

Yep, he cracks me up. And scared me with that whole 'kancho' thing. :) Japanese schoolchildren are rather dangerous, it seems.

[amarissia.livejournal.com]

Host clubs are the awesome. If I weren't so anti-social, I'd positively get addicted to them. And if I lived in Japan, of course.

[ayuka86.livejournal.com]

Right!?

I worked in a Japanese cram school for a few days last year and I have to tell you, those kids can be scary... No one tried to kancho me or anything, but there were one or two creepy kids. Also an adorrible one (I remember him because he was my first student and he was left handed-- a rarity) too.

But I really hope they don't try those kind of things to me, when I go there to teach in a few years...

[amarissia.livejournal.com]

You just have to become a kancho ninja and always keep your eyes on 'em. :)

A Japanese cram school, that's awesome! Were the kids little brats or were they sweet little chibis?

[ayuka86.livejournal.com]

Chibis actually. I didn't really get any difficult students. The only hard part was explaining English grammar to one 12yr old that pretty much had just moved to the States. No matter what I tried, he just didn't get it. It was kind of cute actually.

I also taught one class of elementry Japanese writing when the real teacher was running late.

[amarissia.livejournal.com]

Yike...even if my Japanese was perfect, I don't know if I could explain English grammar. The whole language is just crazy.

Gah, I envy your kanji abilities! :)

[ayuka86.livejournal.com]

I had a really hard time explaining it too. When it's your native tongue, it's so hard to break it down without going off into a tangent about other aspects of it.

I think the example sentence was supposed to be rewritten to form, "I went to the post office to mail a letter." or something like that, but the phrases were all mixed up and the student had to put them in proper order.

Me: "Ok, we understand that there is a letter ("letter" wo motte-te) but -who- has the letter? -Where- are you going with that letter? Now, -what- will you do with that letter when you get there?"

Somehow the sentence still became, "The letter went I the post to."

And as for low level Japanese, I think you could teach the class too! It's really easy since you already know your kana, so it's just helping for simple sentences. Dekiru yo!

[amarissia.livejournal.com]

Dekimasu! Yeah, I do okay with kana. :)

Yike, that sounds tough to explain. Even though, from what I've learned, word order is a little more flexible in Japanese than in English. Did you have to teach them about the evil particles? Ah, the jigoku I went through with "ni" and "e" and "o"...

[ayuka86.livejournal.com]

Nah, I didn't have to teach them those, thankfully. I don't know how I would have either. As for ni, e, and o, here's an easy way to remember them.

-o: whatever you attach this to is the one being "verb'd"
Ex: kono BIDEO wo modoru (This video is being returned)
-ni: replaces most English particles like in and to. Can replace 'e.'
Ex: Amarichan ni kono BIDEO wo modoru (I return this video to Amarissia)
Ex: Sephiroth ga Midgar ni kaeru (Sephiroth goes home to Midgar)
-e: I don't really hear this one much in conversation anymore since it's almost always replaced by -ni. It's used in writing or very formal situations. Or songs. Also give a feeling of "location."
Ex: Junon e yuku (Journeying to Junon -- yuku give a strong feeling of going)
Exception: Angeal made dewatte iru (I'm placing a call to Angeal)

[amarissia.livejournal.com]

Ooh, thank you, I didn't know that last "made" exception!