User Comments - changye
changye
Posted on: Studying Japanese
January 9, 2009 at 11:24 AMHi chanelle77,
Yeah, there are a lot of loan words from Holland in Japanese, since Holland was the only European country, as well as China, that was allowed to access to Japan during the period of Japanese isolation between the 17th century and the mid 19th century.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Japanese_words_of_Dutch_origin
Posted on: Studying Japanese
January 9, 2009 at 9:23 AMHi chanelle77,
That's a good selection. Kamakura is a small beautiful city that has a long history. The first samurai government (鎌倉幕府) in Japan moved the capital from Kyoto to Kamakura more than 800 years ago. Of course, Tokyo also has a lot of historic/cultural spots and traditional entertainment. Just be careful not to waste your time visiting Tokyo Disneyland. It's nothing compared to ones in the US, haha. Have a nice trip.
Posted on: Will you Marry Me?
January 9, 2009 at 8:35 AMHI wchan,
You are right. It seems that there are two theories about the interpretation of the "娘", namely, "娘亲" and "姑娘". In ancient Chinese, the character "娘" was primarily used to mean "a lady, a daughter", just like 娘 in modern Japanese. And the same holds in some southern dialects in China. Here is a plausible episode behind this saying, based on the "娘亲" theory, I've found in 人民网.
http://www.people.com.cn/GB/14738/14761/25884/2336822.html
Posted on: 成长的烦恼
January 9, 2009 at 5:43 AMHi miantiao,
That is a parody (by me) of a verse from Analects of Confucius (论语). The original one is "子曰，吾十有五而志乎学，三十而立，四十而不惑，五十而知天命，六十而耳顺，七十而从心所欲，不逾矩。" 哎呀，我十五岁的时候天天看动画片，当然讨厌用功学习。我如果活到七十岁也没有“不逾矩”的信心！
Posted on: Will you Marry Me?
January 9, 2009 at 4:02 AM天要下雨，娘要嫁人。
It rains when heaven deems fit, mother remarries when she wants to.
(That's the way it goes, you can't control it. Let it be.)
They say that 毛泽东 (Mao Zedong) said "天要下雨，娘要嫁人, 让他去吧" when he received the news that his political rival "林彪" (lin2 biao1) tried to defect to the USSR in 1971.
Posted on: Studying Japanese
January 9, 2009 at 2:56 AMHi chanelle77,
I'm very pleased to hear you're going to visit Japan, my homeland. Japan is a small country, but I guarantee that it's full of sightseeing resources for foreign travelers, both traditional and modern, that would fascinate you not only in Tokyo and Kyoto but also in small local cities. Regarding survival Japanese course, I've found the following websites that seem to be "not so bad" for a two-week crush course. I wish you a happy stay in Japan. Good luck!
The first three ones, from All-About Japan, are really worth visiting.
http://japanese.about.com/library/blgrammar.htm
http://japanese.about.com/library/mmore.htm
http://japanese.about.com/
http://www.ajalt.org/sj/sit/sit_index.html
http://www.tcvb.or.jp/en/guide/07japanese.html
P/S. This is a nice official promotion video, "Weocome to Japan".
http://jp.youtube.com/watch?v=ixlcBg0d-Iw&feature=PlayList&p=DA8776DE054FB632&index=0&playnext=1
Posted on: Lao Wang's Office 6: Up-and-Comer in the Office
January 8, 2009 at 12:22 PMHi calicartel,
I only pick the shortest example sentence out of every three in the expansions when I don't feel like studying much.
Posted on: Seeing Somebody to the Door
January 8, 2009 at 12:12 PMI would say "没事儿，没事儿，我送你！" or something like that.
Posted on: The Final Show
January 10, 2009 at 3:16 AMHi Amber, 祝你成功，一切顺利！