My basic experience trying to learn Japanese: Starting off: So the syllabary only has one way to pronounce each character and anything written in katakana is more than likely an English word I already know. This is surprisingly easy and, in some ways, makes more sense than English. Later on: Kanji is a crime against the very concepts of communication, writing and comprehension.
So is english spelling though. Take it as you would english, one word at a time. Slowly you start getting a sense for kanji meaning (usually just the onyomi reading, although kanji meaning literally doesn’t matter, word meaning does.) But no writing is fucked beyond anything that makes sense.
Kanji is amazing helpful for reading quickly and expressing concepts in a small amount of space (think buddhist 4 kanji phrases or word play based on kanji). Its just damn tedious to learn and maintain. The use of kanji and hiragana/katakana makes it easier to parse sentences quickly too, at least I have found that kanji visually stand out and impart the core elements of the sentence (nouns and verbs, with the order somewhat implying the grammar).
I can see that Kanji has both artistic and poetic merits. I never thought about its usefulness in distinguishing homophones before and that is honestly a really good positive about them. But my distaste for Kanji comes from parts of my native language that I dislike. In English, spelling and pronunciation are often disconnected. If I hear a new word, I only have, at best, a vague idea of how it is spelled. And if I read a new word, I only vaguely know how it might be pronounced. This problem doesn’t exist with hiragana and katakana. If I see a word written in them, I know the correct pronunciation immediately, and if I hear a word, I know how to spell it correctly. Granted, there might be instances where I do not know which syllabary to use, but since most katakana words are borrowed English ones, those situations are few and far between. But if a word is partially or fully expressed through Kanji, it creates an even worse problem of what I dislike about English. If I see the word written out but have not encountered the Kanji before, I do not have any clues to go on how that word is supposed to sound. And if I am told a new word that utilizes Kanji, I have to have it written out for me if I want to write it correctly. Japanese has an elegant simple solution to problems I face in my own language nearly everyday (my family name has a non-silent “e” at the end of it and not one person in my entire life has pronounced it correctly without being told how to). But that solution is attached to the hip to a system that is anything but simple.
Japanese easily has the most horrible writing system out of any modern language. Chinese uses Kanji as well pretty much but at least there's only one way to pronounce each character. In Japanese there could be Onyomi reading or Kunyomi reading and often depending on the Kanji they're paired with there are multiple ways to pronounce these readings too. There being more than 10000 Kanji doesn't help either. Kanjis origin come from creating characters for everything and every action because people back than had no writing system and didn't know any better. Like 日 representing the sun (obviously)... It's not even just the Kanjis that are dated. Why would there be both Katakana and Hiragana?? There is zero difference in pronounciation of a Katakana and its Hiragana counterpart. I know Katakana are just used for sounds and foreign words but why on earth would you not use one for everything?? Do you really enjoy learning 40+ "new" characters for no good reason??? Japanese is a dated hot mess and they should finally abandon their writing system (or at least Kanjis). Anyone who says otherwhise doesn't know Japanese well enough, is a Japanese obsessed with Bushido or a weeb.
"I've played video games for more than 2000 hours, so I can study Japanese for 2000 hours." Is what I tell myself everyday when I ponder my decision....
Dude, you're spot on. This year in my class we started with like 30, and then soon enough there were only 9 including me. Idk if it was because of Zoom meetings/virus shit or what, but our last class had only about 4 other kids show up
A few years ago I decided that I wanted to learn Spanish just so that I can read uhm, sinful comics. What sucks about that is the fact that I deadass dedicated a major part of that year to learn Spanish until I eventually realized that most of these comics start with “hola” and end in “Te amo” so I just kinda gave up the language and the “comics”. And now all I remember from what I learned is how to pronounce the word “Spanish” in spanish so um? That was a good ending I suppose lol.
@@officialanxme7041 scandinavian isn't a language. It's a group of languages such as danish, norwegian, swedish, etc. Unless if you're learning all of them.
There is a joke in Japan. "Why do the Japanese believe that Japanese is the most difficult language in the world?" "Because we don't know how to use it ourselves."
@@theblackryvius6613 but on the other hand, the more you study different languages, the more you learn about your own by comparing them. Like really knowing how it works, not just speaking it thoughtlessly like we do most of the time. It’s a wonderful experience and we only have to gain from it
@@NothingFunnyAboutTheseCarpets That’s true. I was more so speaking about how it’s a pain due to the fact that you can’t always expect a satisfying/correct answer from a native speaker. Often it just “is what it is”, but I find that there’s always a reason for why a certain structure works. (Though genders in Indo-European languages are probably the biggest “we don’t know” in linguistics that I’ve come across.)
Lmao still cuz K-pop artists do sing in Japanese ;v;✋ And if you knew basic Japanese, so it's easier to sing a song from your favorite K-pop group in Korean and Japanese
Now I've made Japanese subtitle for this vids. It's very interesting for us Japanese too because we think that we shouldn't use English unless it's perfect. That’s it for me, until now. Thank you for giving me this opportunity.
I get you! Not only in Japan, us in Latin America are supposed to speak english fluently without any mistake, not to mention our accent. We should sound american, otherwise you'll get mocked or summ. That happens everywhere. (By the way, your english is so good, don't stress too much over it please ^^)
Hi, Japanese here. I can understand learning Japanese is difficult for English speaker as it's difficult to learn English for Japanese speaker. Cuz it's completely different:DD And, I saw some of people said that Chinese language is the hardest one. But I don't think so. Chinese and English are similar in terms of grammar but Japanese!!! The grammar is crazy and there are 3 types of character. One of them (Kanji) has more than 3k character. OMG plus, sadly, it's true that you won't be worth knowing Japanese since it's only spoken in Japan :( BUT, I'm more than happy that you guys are interested in Japan! And don't worry, Kanji is difficult even for the Japanese people. In fact, I cannot write most of them lol Tysm for taking your time to read this and GOOD LUCK 🤗 (I apologize if there's any grammar mistakes. I'm still learning 😂)
lol i have a japanese person and i chatted with him in english and he said that he cant speak english because its hard. and i said to him that i cant also speak japanese because its hard. that was the last time i chatted with him lol.
I'm an asian so it was pretty easy to figure out the grammar part, since almost all asian countries have similar grammar(especially my country language and japanese). But even so, I still cant memorize katakana or kanji after 3years of learning it.
Live in Mexico and tried to learn Japanese, asked one of my teachers if he knew English, he got visibly upset and said English was too easy, that hed gone to Mexico to learn Spanish, because to quote "that's challenging to learn" XD
So true, Chinese is quite simple to understand it’s more of a buildup of vocabulary and correct pronunciation that’s harder, I’ve dabbled with Korean and Japanese and for certain Japanese was the most difficult to me
@Tim Yee OMG ITS A JOJO REFERENCE LOL XD IM SO FUNNY JOJO IS SO GOOD BECAUSE THE ENTIRE FANBASE IS TOXICS AND FORCES ITS ANIME TO EVERYBODY IN MEMES AND HATE COMMENTS TO ANYBODY WHO HATES ON THE GOD THAT I WORSHIP.
El inglés es rarisimo lptm Edit: THIS IS A JOKE, ESTO ES UNA BROMA, UNA MENTIRA, ESTO NO ES REAL ESTO NO ES LA REALIDAD. Ya conseguí 30 mensajes de gente diciendo q el inglés es fácil. I. K N O W
Mattias Pilhede is a low-key motivational/inspirational channel disguised as an art or comedy channel. I love it so much because I know the guy behind the videos is trying really hard to say something meaningful that will inspire and impact others in a positive way. And believe me when I say he is succeeding. :-)
I just started attending a Japanese class last week and this is pure accurate. I saw a girl attending there.She's been in that class for 4 years but still haven't finished learning. The teacher told us that she's the only student left and she's been studying and attending class alone for 4 years straight. He also told us that all the other students left after figuring out that this would take years. I'm also starting to think about quiting after learn the basics TwT
Most of Native Japanese learn hiragana”ひらがな” and katakana”カタカナ” from baby to 6 years old. Besides we learn kanji”漢字” for 10 years from elementary school to high school. But most of Japanese can’t explain the grammar since meaning of particles is very vague. I’m sorry that my sentence is awful. What I want you to know is that Japanese people struggle to learn Japanese as well as you.
When you are studying a totally foreign language, it will be difficult, meaningless, the difference is that when you are Japanese, you live in Japan, you speak Japanese, everything around you is Japanese.
Your sentences are good! You have very few errors and as a native English speaker I can understand you perfectly. : ) English is not an easy language to learn, so most native speakers are forgiving of mistakes. But your sentences are good! You just have some minor errors. And your words are encouraging. It makes me happy to know that it takes native Japanese speakers 6 years to learn hiragana/katakana, and 10 years to learn kanji. As somebody who's learning Japanese that's really encouraging and reminds me that learning Japanese takes years of practice and diligence.
Mowwtie !!! The more kanji you learn (especially how to write them out by hand), the more they all seem like little variations of the same bits over and over Once you’ve written the same little bits dozens and dozens, hundreds and hundreds, thousands and thousands of times, it’s only natural that you’ll start to look at a kanji you’ve never seen before and instantly pick all of them out and be able to remember the kanji as a whole, and most of the time the stroke order will also be immediately obvious too The brain is a pattern-recognition powerhouse, but it can’t recognize patterns we don’t feed it through exposure (practice being deliberate “exposure training” so to speak, but also through any kind of exposure)
Mario Hatake I don’t know what it’s like to learn them in the Japanese school system, but what helped me to learn how to write them as a foreigner is a book called Remembering the Kanji by James Heisig. I make notes of them in a flashcard software, and when the “keyword” (which basically represents the meaning) comes up I have to write them out by memory. If I get it right the card will talk longer to show up again, and if I get it wrong it’ll show up more Basically it gives little parts of kanji their own meanings and shows you how to use your imagination to create images to represent ways those meanings might come together to form the overall meaning of the kanji in ways that you can remember (because you make those up yourself). It’s really interesting, actually Btw, your English is really good! Out of curiosity, how did you learn?
I heard Kanji is similar to Chinese characters, but I don’t know it it’s simplified Chinese characters or traditional, cause if it’s traditional then ahaha haha haha good luck. For comparison, here: Simplified: 台湾 Traditional 臺灣 ....... Yeah.
I tried to take Japanese in college because I thought it would be fun and I was okay with it until three weeks into the class. My teacher told the class that we should be dreaming in Japanese at that point or we would definitely fail the class (completely serious) which freaked me out so I quit.
That teacher is an asshole. I've been studying japanese for more than a year and I've learned so much but never dreamed in japanese. I even struggle to make basic sentences. That doesn't mean I'm not gonna make it. Your teacher basically wanted you to reach proficiency in 3 weeks to pass a fucking college class, how a human can be such an idiot? Btw, if you still think japanese is fun, I encourage you to start learning it again. It's indeed very funny, and there are plenty of different methods online you can use and many classes that you can take.
@@Ocer. She was unfortunately serious. She told us the story of how she learned English and how she was dreaming in English after 3 weeks and how that is how she knew she was doing it right... She also had on the syllabus we got on the first day that for the class' final project we would each have to somehow get in contact with a native Japanese speaker and record having a full conversation with them in Japanese, and no one could use the same person. At the time I sorta just thought I would reach that hurdle when I got there and didn't pay it much mind but looking back that also feels tough taking into mind where I went to college.
@@AetherealDragon_LOL damn, but of course what she was saying wasn't true. Even if you weren't dreaming in Japanese you could still objectively and definitely pass the class
As a Korean, learning how to “speak” Japanese is most easiest thing in all of the languages but when I also try learn how to “write” Japanese, since there are a lot of kanjis, so that is the tough thing and the reason why is Japanese difficult.
I love this video, because I am the exact guy that wanted to learn English because he wanted to watch English RUclips videos without needing subs, and I am damn proud of what I archieved.
Abajur Everybody feels discouraged when learning a language at one point, everybody has what it takes to learn Any language, it just may be more difficult depending on the language.
I identify as the first guy. And yes, whenever I get stressed with work, or have too much to do, Japanese studying is usually the first thing that gets dropped. Learning Japanese is not a priority for me, and I'm not doing it for any other reason than because I like doing it.
Mattias Hermansson Same cuz 1- Go Draw 2 - Go watch anime 3- Go fap to Hentai 4- Go play osu to be a new to player 5- Do useless coments on RUclips. 6- Look up at dank memes
Teacher: In the time it takes to learn japanese you could've learned spanish, french, german and swedish. Me: Ok, but learning those languages won't allow me to watch anime without subtitles.
i hate those languages for some reasons. From then i was a little child everybody barged about how great it is and that i have to learn them so here I am learning japanese 😄😊
@@fenohikari If it was me I'd say that spanish is convenient bc its widespread and other three are just "rich-european-countries" languages that people learn mostly for bragging purposes.
In honesty, it feels rlly helpful to hear that something doesn't have to be top tier best. It's something an entire system can fail to show, that being where every bit of a single life can be in constant pressure over a number being one away from what the world sees as perfect.
And the thing is that it's not the fault of the educator. It's the fault of the students in our culture. In the US, kids have a tendency to underestimate how hard it would be to learn things, and you really have to drill into them the idea that it won't be easy and that they know nothing starting out. But, most people don't realize this until they are past all the stumbles of their learning phase. We also have a tendency in the US to discount the experiences of older people, as if human nature ever changes at all (hint hint, it doesn't).
It’s funny you say that most people are interested in Japanese because they have an interest in Japan, but it was the opposite for me. I got into Japanese because I fell in love with the kanji writing system. I found it so fascinating how different it was to any of the writing systems I’ve seen, with a mix of kana and kanji, sometimes variably. I later found an interest I Japanese culture after I started learning it because they both go hand in hand.
"I'm bored, let's learn Japanese." That's kinda how I got started with my journey into Japanese. The grammar is a hot mess coming from English but after a while I actually like it and it's not as hard as it seemed when I first learned it. Kanji is probably still the hardest part of Japanese. Vocabulary alone is a problem in most languages. That, plus the fact that I have to memorize characters makes it a huge pain in the ass. Still, I'm gonna continue to do this lol みんな、頑張ってください。
the kanjis are the dumbest thing I've seen in any language, they are the reason why the language is difficult, they have no more reason to exist than the "cultural value," and it makes the language learning hard even to them.
@@PEDROGARCIA-qj3gr as someone who takes a Japanese class in college i lowkey agree. They could've gone with Koreans way, Koreans just use hangul in daily basis and their kanji (i forgot what it's called) is only used to shows specifications (like to differentiate shops, old names, etc) that way we can learn it easier and use the language more efficient..
@@侘寂-z6p That's true, i find korean kanji alot easier because of the way it's taught. I know a shit ton more japanese compared to korean and i can construct basic sentences if spoken, but when it comes to writing in text. I'd rather die.
As a non-native english speaker, this is great. It's the first time i've seen someone explain the beauty and logistics of learning a language so well. The truth is that learning about a different culture can really change your life in many wonderful ways.
It's Me, Cousin Nicky Im from Argentina, so my main language is spanish. I've been practicing for roughly five years now. It might seem like learning a language takes a lot of work, but once you get wrapped up in all the culture and new things it stops feeling like something hard and it becomes a really fun and exiting thing.
I'm also a non-native speaker, and is funny how I learned English by simply playing games, watching films and listening to music. And I agree, learning a new language expand your knowledge about other cultures, and is impressive how I get obsessed to learn new languages, but that's not good.
@@itsmecousinnicky4310 yes , I can understand too...I'm from Italy and I've been studying English for 3 years. I'm doing a linguistic highschool this year and I'm studying Spanish and German too.....it's really difficult for me
"The girl who's here because there wasn't a class for Korean" - that just hit hard because I started learning Chinese for the same reason... actually started liking it a bit later
I learned Mandarin in college to learn kanji, then I ended up too deep in this mess to ever get out. Oh well, I can accept this fate; I'm part-way to learning Cantonese now too so I can't complain.
Well, I don't speak Japanese fluently, or even good, so keep that in mind, but I don't think that's an effective method at all. I know because I tried it, but I learned much more kanji and vocabulary by simply reading actual Japanese text with the help of rikaikun (which is an extension for Chrome that shows you the dictionary entry for a Japanese word when you hover your mouse over it). Even if the definition is not precise, after a while you start recognizing the kanji, the words, and based on context you can refine their meaning. So at least for me, I had more success this way. It's also similar to how I learned English, I just tried to read and threw the words I didn't know on Google; tho English was way easier to me because of the writing system, lots of similar words to my language, and being SVO.
I slightly remember watching this video when it first came out, and now it shows up on my recommended once more the day I found out the high school Japanese class I signed up for was actually a dual enrollment class. *I regret nothing and everything.*
I think the best way for Kanji is to learn the basics, and just go with constantly encountering the words for the rest. In the first place I think that memorizing hundreds of characters, the vast majority of which that you might see once or twice in your daily practice/study/use of the language *outside* of Japan is a complete waste of time. Sure you won't ever be completely fluid if you don't know every context and homophone, but for me, my goal is not to write essays in Japanese. It's mostly so I can consume the media (anime, manga, social media). I can always use a Kanji dictionary for that. For example with all those VNs and anime, etc. I can understand more by listening to the conversation than trying to read the Kanji without any guiding/pronounciation notes.
Actually Japanese is the hardest language. It has three writing systems, and even tho there are alot of Chinese characters, the grammar in Japanese is more complicated
That sounds terrible. I had to wait until my senior year before my teacher did that. Most definitely would have quit years if my teacher had done that.
@@finiamh5032 Eh, it was ok for me since I watched anime ever since I was in 5th grade but I know some others who were probably thinking the class was too difficult dropped it to take another language class. She had pictures on the screen to help us figure out what she was saying though, it's not like we were completely in the dark
I'm 20, been in more or less regular Japanese lessons for six years. I'm not proficient yet, and I failed every JLPT I've done before passing them. I regret nothing! Japanese has been a lovely constant to have even during the worst times in my life. I've learned so much, and I'm excited to keep on learning. Learning something, whatever it is, will never be a "useless" endeavour.
Antonio Giuseppe you could get proficient in 1,5-2 years. Actually getting native level is harder ofcourse. And can take as long as your life. But it does for natives too.
A motivational video huh! I never felt so motivated, I will never forget these three when studying Japanese, difficult, long-term and not worth it. Thanks for the motivation!
I mean, if you want reasons I've been taking Japanese classes for years now and regularly study. I'm half Japanese on my mother's side, and am a 4th generation Japanese-American. After the internment camp fiasco, many Japanese Americans felt the need to reject their culture and heritage and to try to be more "white". To be more "American" and fit in and be accepted. My family was one of them, so my Mom received a western name and wore more western clothes and was raised to speak English. Its to the point where no one alive really knows the language any more, and can't even write our surnames in whatever their original Kanji symbols were. I wanted to try to preserve what I can and to feel more connected to my culture and heritage. That and anime is awesome
Meanwhile I'm just an African American with no real ties to Japan who likes to draw and loves anime and just wanted to be able to sing a few theme songs and maybe curse people out in different languages- I mean my parents both like anything Japanese so maybe that counts haha- (My dad likes the food my mom likes the media)
Learning about Japan is cool and all, and I am doing the same thing. But it isn't really YOUR culture if it was lost before you were born. If you go to Japan, you might look Japanese and the people might assume you are, but ultimately you will only be a foreigner like any of the rest of us that would visit Japan.
They're both hard as fuck but according to the US's Foreign Service Institute they put a little asterisk next to Japanese indicating it's just a bit harder than every other category 5 language
Well I know both English and Chinese and I’d say Chinese is a bit harder than Japanese for native English speakers. This is because how different Chinese and English are, Chinese doesn’t have an alphabet while English heavily depends on one. Besides, Japanese also has an alphabet so yea...
I'm actually on my 4th year of learning Japanese in high school right now, and lockdown has really been destroying my self-esteem with this class. I was feeling like I'm not up to par with how I used to be back in my freshman, sophomore, and junior years with this class, and that I'm not enjoying it as much anymore. This video really helped me remember what exactly made it so enjoyable in those years, and why it is that I've come this far with the class, being in the smallest group of Japanese students, filled with people who, like me, have stuck with the class ever since freshmen year. I think I'll make the best of my time as I can now, and I'll bounce back strong as this quarter ends and the last one begins. Thank you for posting this.
@@nourashraf5023 Well i got the girlfriend because I could speak Japanese, and I also got my job because of it. I did other things while I studied it so it was not like I wasted my life
Hmm.... Can u help a student in Japanese fellow to get good at it? Like I have learned the kanas, some basic grammar , numbers (but I forgot most of the previous stuff since I am in school and I needed to study non Japanese materials so I have forgotten a good amount of what I have learnt but it would be easy to get them back when starting Japanese again) and actually I am learning Japanese to be able to talk with the Japanese ppl since they don't drop the word San (and it's synonyms) and also because it is a cute language although being ugly in learning..... Well can u?
I majored in Japanese for 4 years, got a Bachelor's degree in it. Can confirm: Japanese is extremely difficult, my degree is useless, and studying it was not the best use of my time. HOWEVER, studying abroad in Japan for a semester was an amazing experience, one of the best things I've done in my life.
Kelley McMorris Semester There sounds wonderful! Quick question - why would you say your degree is useless? Are there translator jobs or other such available after bachelors?
@@TM-vx9xs In my very limited experience - just being able to speak Japanese, on it's own, doesn't make for much of a resume. Translator jobs and teaching English in Japan is probably as far as that alone will get you. Additionally, despite earning a degree, I found that 4 years of study outside of Japan wasn't enough to become fluent. Who wants to hire someone whose only skill is being sorta ok at a single language? IMO, you either need to be fluent or you need to have another skill to which Japanese is complementary.
In my country you usually have to take a second/main topic you study, japanese is only a side topic. You will make the bachelor in both things. So you can combine it with economics (to useful for a company that has lots of contact with japanese companies) or literature or something else you like. Is Japanese really the only thing you can study? I didn't even know that existed as a main topic in universities.
thank you for this comment. I'm studying Japanese right now, wanted to change primary language since day 1 but still hesitated (my major requires to have at least 2 foreign languages one of which is English). 1 year in, another language is gonna be hard to learn. But your comment reminded me that if Japanese and Japan in general is not something I'm passionate about, my degree is gonna be useless at the end anyway.
for me, i actually like the language itself a lot more than the culture and the media, and i dont study to speak it but i study to be able to read and write. I really like the grammar and the kanjis.
me at the beginning: * highly discouraged * me in between: * a little more encouraged * me at the end: **slightly discouraged and slightly encouraged**
My father once told me that he went to Japanese class, and it was Japanese 01. so he thought that it would be good and easy at first, but apparently everyone else in the class already knew Japanese, and the teacher was like oh, well ok! everybody skip to chapter 26. and my dad dropped out of Japanese class
I am Japanese but I tell you, Kanji is the most terrifying thing in the world edit: guys, both Chinese and Japanese are equally hard, pls stop edit 2: ok guys, it’s completely normal to disagree with me. I really hope y’all get this but this comment is a joke, I didn’t actually mean that kanji is the most scariest thing ever so like, ummm it’s not really my actual opinion on kanji?? y’know what I’m saying?? don’t attack me lol
See there's the easy ones like "hoshi" and "haru". But then there are the absolute monstrosities of "yume" and the having to change characters to fit gender 😭
Well, I'm brazilian (with japanese descent) and I am studying japanese. I don't think I'll ever learn kanji. But they are really necessary to live in Japan?
@@anderson16281 oh ok never mind, just watch RUclips videos and study grammar and stuff and you’ll learn English, I grew up speaking English but never lived in an English speaking country so RUclips videos helped me a lot
And ironically that's how my japanese teacher started to learn japanese. He wanted to learn korean but there wasn't enough students, so he had to study japanese instead.
"Alright, so any questions?" (Literally all the class raise their hand) "Kay great. Right them down so you can Google them later." I need a teacher like that
That was me. I wrote down questions in class and didn’t ask any question when professor asked around. Went home and had google answer my questions. Google is my sensei
When I started learning Japanese I watched the first part of this video. I was so confident and sure that I would finish my studies no matter what that I just left the video midway. After almost a year, I've finally watched it all. And yeah, it's true. Out of all 30 people we were, only 8 remain. And us, who kept on going no matter what, have been through a lot together. It's difficult. It demands time, practice, dedication and, most of all, determination. Many of the people that still study with me do it out of habit at this point (me included) so we don't feel it as heavy, but one can't help but wonder if it's really REALLY worth it.
I thought this was a Japanese class not an existential crisis class.
Japanese is an existential crisis!
And the difference🤔
@@sayaninhudini1152 lmao
you get it as a bonus for learning the language
@@Kitsunegami oh cool! so more existential crisis? well goddamn, sign me up then!
"The girl whose here because there wasn't a class for Korean." - hit different
Totally me in university years
fr lmao
KIJKAKAKSJA i get you..
This actually is what happened to me. But it was a very fun class and I had the best teacher ever.
*Meanwhile in another alternate universe*
"The boy whose here (for French/German class) because there wasn't a class for Italian."
Wow this video really felt like I was watching a teacher having a existential crisis, (like always). Good job
yes
Foreign language teacher be like”I study Japanese for all of my life and all I can do now is teaching you guys.”
secco bb
My basic experience trying to learn Japanese:
Starting off: So the syllabary only has one way to pronounce each character and anything written in katakana is more than likely an English word I already know. This is surprisingly easy and, in some ways, makes more sense than English.
Later on: Kanji is a crime against the very concepts of communication, writing and comprehension.
So is english spelling though. Take it as you would english, one word at a time. Slowly you start getting a sense for kanji meaning (usually just the onyomi reading, although kanji meaning literally doesn’t matter, word meaning does.)
But no writing is fucked beyond anything that makes sense.
Kanji is amazing helpful for reading quickly and expressing concepts in a small amount of space (think buddhist 4 kanji phrases or word play based on kanji). Its just damn tedious to learn and maintain. The use of kanji and hiragana/katakana makes it easier to parse sentences quickly too, at least I have found that kanji visually stand out and impart the core elements of the sentence (nouns and verbs, with the order somewhat implying the grammar).
Kanji is difficult but amazing.
I can see that Kanji has both artistic and poetic merits. I never thought about its usefulness in distinguishing homophones before and that is honestly a really good positive about them.
But my distaste for Kanji comes from parts of my native language that I dislike. In English, spelling and pronunciation are often disconnected. If I hear a new word, I only have, at best, a vague idea of how it is spelled. And if I read a new word, I only vaguely know how it might be pronounced.
This problem doesn’t exist with hiragana and katakana. If I see a word written in them, I know the correct pronunciation immediately, and if I hear a word, I know how to spell it correctly. Granted, there might be instances where I do not know which syllabary to use, but since most katakana words are borrowed English ones, those situations are few and far between.
But if a word is partially or fully expressed through Kanji, it creates an even worse problem of what I dislike about English. If I see the word written out but have not encountered the Kanji before, I do not have any clues to go on how that word is supposed to sound. And if I am told a new word that utilizes Kanji, I have to have it written out for me if I want to write it correctly.
Japanese has an elegant simple solution to problems I face in my own language nearly everyday (my family name has a non-silent “e” at the end of it and not one person in my entire life has pronounced it correctly without being told how to). But that solution is attached to the hip to a system that is anything but simple.
Japanese easily has the most horrible writing system out of any modern language.
Chinese uses Kanji as well pretty much but at least there's only one way to pronounce each character. In Japanese there could be Onyomi reading or Kunyomi reading and often depending on the Kanji they're paired with there are multiple ways to pronounce these readings too. There being more than 10000 Kanji doesn't help either.
Kanjis origin come from creating characters for everything and every action because people back than had no writing system and didn't know any better. Like 日 representing the sun (obviously)...
It's not even just the Kanjis that are dated. Why would there be both Katakana and Hiragana?? There is zero difference in pronounciation of a Katakana and its Hiragana counterpart. I know Katakana are just used for sounds and foreign words but why on earth would you not use one for everything?? Do you really enjoy learning 40+ "new" characters for no good reason???
Japanese is a dated hot mess and they should finally abandon their writing system (or at least Kanjis). Anyone who says otherwhise doesn't know Japanese well enough, is a Japanese obsessed with Bushido or a weeb.
The further I got into the video, the more his eye bags looked like his eyes and his eyes were his eyebrows
Haven theArtist 🤯😂
You did not just do this to me
Looks Japanese now
No I can’t unsee it
I can never unsee this 😐
"I've played video games for more than 2000 hours, so I can study Japanese for 2000 hours." Is what I tell myself everyday when I ponder my decision....
just what I was thinking. steam.
Dude, my words exactly
Same lol
Thata good motivation!
Exactly
lol one my friends is in a Japanese class at the college. When he started there were 30 students. Now there's only 11 left in the class.
My ap lit class in high school started with 20 kids and we have 7 now
KillerGnomes My Ap Japanese class only has 3 people including myself...
Dude, you're spot on. This year in my class we started with like 30, and then soon enough there were only 9 including me. Idk if it was because of Zoom meetings/virus shit or what, but our last class had only about 4 other kids show up
YoungsterJack
Frik that’s sad
Lmao I'm using Duolingo I feel like such a noob
when the weebs didn't say a japanese word
you know that shit is serious
LMAO OMG CHILL!
Ore wa manko daisuki nanda yo!
N-NANI?
Konichiwasup! Gomenesorry! Arigathanks!
日本語のくらす。idk
Imagine learning japanese because that manga or doujin doesn't have any english translation
haha..
stop exposing me
and untranslated eroge vns
I didn't come here to be attacked-
あらあら~
A few years ago I decided that I wanted to learn Spanish just so that I can read uhm, sinful comics. What sucks about that is the fact that I deadass dedicated a major part of that year to learn Spanish until I eventually realized that most of these comics start with “hola” and end in “Te amo” so I just kinda gave up the language and the “comics”. And now all I remember from what I learned is how to pronounce the word “Spanish” in spanish so um? That was a good ending I suppose lol.
The professor's eye bags are accurate for a language teacher. I'm not a teacher but I learn different languages xD
I like your pfp
lmao
Same here I’m learning Japanese, Swedish, German, And Scandinavian
@@officialanxme7041 scandinavian isn't a language. It's a group of languages such as danish, norwegian, swedish, etc. Unless if you're learning all of them.
So do u have an eye bag?
This video went from edgy to wholesome really fast.
@cory Shut up weeb
Edgy? It's the truth. Everyone who pursue a hobby has to learn this at some point
Patapax and I don’t like it
I bet we are all weebs. Weebs love to make fun of weebs but at the end we are all trash
i know the comment is a year old but... that was not edgy.. at all...
I'm japanese. no matter what motivation you have, I'm glad that you've been interested japanes culture and learned japanese language.
Wow, they didn’t even know Oppai? smh
*b o o b s*
Or senpai? *sigh*
Or hentai?!
Or onchinchin fucking pathetic excuses for weebs.
Princess J basically what all those words are
There is a joke in Japan.
"Why do the Japanese believe that Japanese is the most difficult language in the world?"
"Because we don't know how to use it ourselves."
I believe that most people in the world don’t really know how their native language works. Which makes learning any one of them as a foreigner a pain
Announannoun... What does that mean?
@@alecxander9573 Probably just nonsense. It’s the first 5 characters just repeated.
@@theblackryvius6613 but on the other hand, the more you study different languages, the more you learn about your own by comparing them. Like really knowing how it works, not just speaking it thoughtlessly like we do most of the time. It’s a wonderful experience and we only have to gain from it
@@NothingFunnyAboutTheseCarpets That’s true. I was more so speaking about how it’s a pain due to the fact that you can’t always expect a satisfying/correct answer from a native speaker. Often it just “is what it is”, but I find that there’s always a reason for why a certain structure works. (Though genders in Indo-European languages are probably the biggest “we don’t know” in linguistics that I’ve come across.)
Teacher: Do you know anything at all about Japanese?
Me: の
you clever shit
no? :>>
Goddammit this comment is beautiful
Clever XD
That username, profile pic, and the fact that I had to use google to understand that joke means you deserve a like you cleaver piece of shit.
2:53 "you chose Japanese because you had an interest in Japan"
Girl who wanted to learn Korean: 😑
Lmao still cuz K-pop artists do sing in Japanese ;v;✋
And if you knew basic Japanese, so it's easier to sing a song from your favorite K-pop group in Korean and Japanese
@@Hani_In_Here k-pop.. “Korean pop” j-pop.. “Japanese pop” there is a difference 😬
@@Melodix130 Yeah I know ;v;
@@Hani_In_Here 😰
The grammar structures are incredibly similar lol.
*duolingo wants to know your location*
*Duolingo already knows.*
*SOFTWILLY DE DIABLO EL DIOS DE DISCORD LE MEMES*
NANI?
@@CemeteryDriveClown デュオはあなたが日本語であなたの人生を頼むことを望んでいます。
@@ioannispolemarkhos7364 ワタシハただやるのライティングシステムひらがなそしてカタカナ。
Duolingo: You better not fail this class too...
_Not like you did with your spanish class_
“Hola, que día más bonito, no?”
XD
@Kyle H "looks like our notifications aren't working..."
*intruder alert*
oh my god i've seen you 3 times in the comment section already... Oh wait its only 3
*knock knock it's not the FBI*
Now I've made Japanese subtitle for this vids.
It's very interesting for us Japanese too because we think that we shouldn't use English unless it's perfect.
That’s it for me, until now.
Thank you for giving me this opportunity.
Thank you for the subtitles!
I'm curious how people might react, and I hope people don't take the first minutes too badly.
日本語字幕ありがとうございます
私は英語を勉強して苦労してるので
この方々と日本人の脳を交換したいです
Thanks. It doesn't just help the Japanese viewers, but also people who are learning Japanese.
Bro us Americans can't even speak our own English there's like 20 way to do it
I get you! Not only in Japan, us in Latin America are supposed to speak english fluently without any mistake, not to mention our accent. We should sound american, otherwise you'll get mocked or summ. That happens everywhere.
(By the way, your english is so good, don't stress too much over it please ^^)
Hi, Japanese here.
I can understand learning Japanese is difficult for English speaker as it's difficult to learn English for Japanese speaker. Cuz it's completely different:DD
And, I saw some of people said that Chinese language is the hardest one. But I don't think so. Chinese and English are similar in terms of grammar but Japanese!!! The grammar is crazy and there are 3 types of character. One of them (Kanji) has more than 3k character. OMG
plus, sadly, it's true that you won't be worth knowing Japanese since it's only spoken in Japan :(
BUT, I'm more than happy that you guys are interested in Japan! And don't worry, Kanji is difficult even for the Japanese people. In fact, I cannot write most of them lol
Tysm for taking your time to read this and GOOD LUCK 🤗
(I apologize if there's any grammar mistakes. I'm still learning 😂)
lol i have a japanese person and i chatted with him in english and he said that he cant speak english because its hard. and i said to him that i cant also speak japanese because its hard. that was the last time i chatted with him lol.
I'm an asian so it was pretty easy to figure out the grammar part, since almost all asian countries have similar grammar(especially my country language and japanese). But even so, I still cant memorize katakana or kanji after 3years of learning it.
漢字は、日本の中学生レベルまでを習得すれば大丈夫です。
高校生レベル以降は、大学で文系に進む人なのみが勉強します！
Live in Mexico and tried to learn Japanese, asked one of my teachers if he knew English, he got visibly upset and said English was too easy, that hed gone to Mexico to learn Spanish, because to quote "that's challenging to learn" XD
So true, Chinese is quite simple to understand it’s more of a buildup of vocabulary and correct pronunciation that’s harder, I’ve dabbled with Korean and Japanese and for certain Japanese was the most difficult to me
"What do you call this?"
"The world"
"Now add an accent"
"za warudo"
"wai-"
This deserves more recognition
@Tim Yee OMG ITS A JOJO REFERENCE LOL XD IM SO FUNNY JOJO IS SO GOOD BECAUSE THE ENTIRE FANBASE IS TOXICS AND FORCES ITS ANIME TO EVERYBODY IN MEMES AND HATE COMMENTS TO ANYBODY WHO HATES ON THE GOD THAT I WORSHIP.
@Tim Yee uh... you wanna talk about something? Seems a little extreme.
Cant escape the community
@@kio7320 Thats because everything is a JoJo reference. Cherries, breathing, Mozzarella, Jesus, and even dying
The guy who knows spanish: *laughs in pronunciation*
El inglés es rarisimo lptm
Edit: THIS IS A JOKE, ESTO ES UNA BROMA, UNA MENTIRA, ESTO NO ES REAL ESTO NO ES LA REALIDAD. Ya conseguí 30 mensajes de gente diciendo q el inglés es fácil. I. K N O W
@@noonecansavethedamageisdon9725 Confirmo >:v
Also the guy who knows French:
Also Brazilians:
JAJAJAJA SI
Mattias Pilhede is a low-key motivational/inspirational channel disguised as an art or comedy channel. I love it so much because I know the guy behind the videos is trying really hard to say something meaningful that will inspire and impact others in a positive way. And believe me when I say he is succeeding. :-)
Hello there sir.
Yup.
Hello There
+
I just started attending a Japanese class last week and this is pure accurate.
I saw a girl attending there.She's been in that class for 4 years but still haven't finished learning. The teacher told us that she's the only student left and she's been studying and attending class alone for 4 years straight. He also told us that all the other students left after figuring out that this would take years. I'm also starting to think about quiting after learn the basics TwT
ruclips.net/video/xS3vpBCiL2c/видео.html
There is no finish to learning.
Most of Native Japanese learn hiragana”ひらがな” and katakana”カタカナ” from baby to 6 years old.
Besides we learn kanji”漢字” for 10 years from elementary school to high school.
But most of Japanese can’t explain the grammar since meaning of particles is very vague.
I’m sorry that my sentence is awful.
What I want you to know is that Japanese people struggle to learn Japanese as well as you.
#sedlyf
Yep, I'm Japanese and it's true.But it makes sense so it doesn't matter.Easy:)
When you are studying a totally foreign language, it will be difficult, meaningless, the difference is that when you are Japanese, you live in Japan, you speak Japanese, everything around you is Japanese.
Your sentences are good! You have very few errors and as a native English speaker I can understand you perfectly. : )
English is not an easy language to learn, so most native speakers are forgiving of mistakes. But your sentences are good! You just have some minor errors.
And your words are encouraging. It makes me happy to know that it takes native Japanese speakers 6 years to learn hiragana/katakana, and 10 years to learn kanji. As somebody who's learning Japanese that's really encouraging and reminds me that learning Japanese takes years of practice and diligence.
dang that's a lot of learning
Japanese: exists
Kanji: *let's make this harder*
I get why people feel this way, but in my opinion kanji actually makes Japanese easier in a lot of ways
@@littlefishbigmountain it does, but the characters........
Mowwtie !!!
The more kanji you learn (especially how to write them out by hand), the more they all seem like little variations of the same bits over and over
Once you’ve written the same little bits dozens and dozens, hundreds and hundreds, thousands and thousands of times, it’s only natural that you’ll start to look at a kanji you’ve never seen before and instantly pick all of them out and be able to remember the kanji as a whole, and most of the time the stroke order will also be immediately obvious too
The brain is a pattern-recognition powerhouse, but it can’t recognize patterns we don’t feed it through exposure (practice being deliberate “exposure training” so to speak, but also through any kind of exposure)
Mario Hatake
I don’t know what it’s like to learn them in the Japanese school system, but what helped me to learn how to write them as a foreigner is a book called Remembering the Kanji by James Heisig.
I make notes of them in a flashcard software, and when the “keyword” (which basically represents the meaning) comes up I have to write them out by memory. If I get it right the card will talk longer to show up again, and if I get it wrong it’ll show up more
Basically it gives little parts of kanji their own meanings and shows you how to use your imagination to create images to represent ways those meanings might come together to form the overall meaning of the kanji in ways that you can remember (because you make those up yourself). It’s really interesting, actually
Btw, your English is really good! Out of curiosity, how did you learn?
I heard Kanji is similar to Chinese characters, but I don’t know it it’s simplified Chinese characters or traditional, cause if it’s traditional then ahaha haha haha good luck. For comparison, here: Simplified: 台湾 Traditional 臺灣 ....... Yeah.
"hey teacher is the only reason ur giving this speech because you don't know fluent Japanese"
" no "
の
いいえ
この野党
¥
@@SpaghettiRuin oh really? なぜ駄目なのですか。
I tried to take Japanese in college because I thought it would be fun and I was okay with it until three weeks into the class. My teacher told the class that we should be dreaming in Japanese at that point or we would definitely fail the class (completely serious) which freaked me out so I quit.
feel you
That teacher is an asshole. I've been studying japanese for more than a year and I've learned so much but never dreamed in japanese. I even struggle to make basic sentences. That doesn't mean I'm not gonna make it.
Your teacher basically wanted you to reach proficiency in 3 weeks to pass a fucking college class, how a human can be such an idiot?
Btw, if you still think japanese is fun, I encourage you to start learning it again. It's indeed very funny, and there are plenty of different methods online you can use and many classes that you can take.
There is absolutely no way he was completely serious about that only 3 weeks in, you must've missed that he was sarcastic
@@Ocer. She was unfortunately serious. She told us the story of how she learned English and how she was dreaming in English after 3 weeks and how that is how she knew she was doing it right... She also had on the syllabus we got on the first day that for the class' final project we would each have to somehow get in contact with a native Japanese speaker and record having a full conversation with them in Japanese, and no one could use the same person. At the time I sorta just thought I would reach that hurdle when I got there and didn't pay it much mind but looking back that also feels tough taking into mind where I went to college.
@@AetherealDragon_LOL damn, but of course what she was saying wasn't true. Even if you weren't dreaming in Japanese you could still objectively and definitely pass the class
“Learning Japanese takes a long time”
Me who has been learning it for 5 years: No shit.
Nice australorp
How has it been going like are u almost fluent? Intermediate?
@@cherryoung4410 Why, I can't even hold the lamest of conversations and I feel like a complete idiot.
Languages are not my forte, sadly.
Wow, saaaaaaaaame
As a Korean, learning how to “speak” Japanese is most easiest thing in all of the languages but when I also try learn how to “write” Japanese, since there are a lot of kanjis, so that is the tough thing and the reason why is Japanese difficult.
First Japanese class
After class :
"Did you understand something?"
Me : の
HAHA NOO
I especially love that it's の and not even いいえ
草
あああああああああああああ
ははは みと
"Write it down so you can Google it later" ngl, sounds like something my history teacher would say
@Emre As I should 😌✨
@Emre what
@Emre iyi misin emre kardeş
ngl?
@@ajiaquito6601 ngl = not gonna lie
I love this video, because I am the exact guy that wanted to learn English because he wanted to watch English RUclips videos without needing subs, and I am damn proud of what I archieved.
Pro gamer move, there.
This discouraged me to learn japanese, and then encouraged me again.
what the-
Nice pfp
Abajur Everybody feels discouraged when learning a language at one point, everybody has what it takes to learn Any language, it just may be more difficult depending on the language.
Actually same
I think you meant NANI-
Hey, if you learn Japanese you can get those exlusive outfits in Splatoon, like that agent outfit.
"Do you know any words? Anyone? Weebs?"
*weebs u had failed me.*
*in the weeb's head* : "oni chan~ ikuuuuuuuuuu~"
-uuuuh nope... nope sir i don't speak a single word of japanese..."
@@cheshirecat1169 O P P A I
Nani?!
@@cheshirecat1169 yamete kudasai kyaa
Aaahh kimochi naa
*Everyone gangsta until the Japanese Class becomes a Life Lesson*
If your kids are ALL quitting your class, thats on you
Why are we still here? Just to suffer?
_Day 1 after Japanese class_
*Worewa still hereu? Just to sufferu?*
I love the comment tbh
Day 2 after Japanese class, ORA ORA ORA ORA ORA ORA ORA ORA, You thought it was Japanese Lessons but it was I DIO!
@@livedandletdie wAS tHAt a JojO REfrENCe??
なんで私たちは まだここにいるんだ？ただ苦しむため？
Kai Shimada
Sonotouri
I identify as the first guy. And yes, whenever I get stressed with work, or have too much to do, Japanese studying is usually the first thing that gets dropped.
Learning Japanese is not a priority for me, and I'm not doing it for any other reason than because I like doing it.
I'm a mixture between the first and the second guy
Mattias Hermansson
Yes , you can turn also something you like , into a priority to learn w/ more efficiency.
@@gaspz5974 that would eat into the time of my other hobbies though.
Mattias Hermansson
Same cuz
1- Go Draw
2 - Go watch anime
3- Go fap to Hentai
4- Go play osu to be a new to player
5- Do useless coments on RUclips.
6- Look up at dank memes
I identify as the modern weeb
Teacher: In the time it takes to learn japanese you could've learned spanish, french, german and swedish.
Me: Ok, but learning those languages won't allow me to watch anime without subtitles.
i hate those languages for some reasons. From then i was a little child everybody barged about how great it is and that i have to learn them so here I am learning japanese 😄😊
@@fenohikari If it was me I'd say that spanish is convenient bc its widespread and other three are just "rich-european-countries" languages that people learn mostly for bragging purposes.
@@fenohikari Nej, svenska är häftigt. IKEA FOR LIFE.
Meanwhile I am learning a dead language that only diehard Catholics and priests speak
@@therealspeedwagon1451 lol is it latin? If so me too
In honesty, it feels rlly helpful to hear that something doesn't have to be top tier best. It's something an entire system can fail to show, that being where every bit of a single life can be in constant pressure over a number being one away from what the world sees as perfect.
“And there’s the guy who has already been learning. Japanese and came here for an easy grade”
That felt like a direct call out to me.
i felt the same.
Same, but I don't think it's going to be easy next year. Hopefully me and my friend make it 😂
Same
Any one here after AP Japanese exams?
even though i don’t watch anime i still love the language and want to learn it
張り紙の「日本語でおk」がツボにハマった
👈🏻(´ - ヮ - ｀)それ笑
それな
それな
それな
それな
Starts off by insulting them and telling them they aren’t going to succeed
Every one is discouraged
*pikachu face*
Dewberry150 american public school education in a nutshell
Naomi !
Why is this so accurate
@@chipifarts most of education systems, tbh
And the thing is that it's not the fault of the educator. It's the fault of the students in our culture. In the US, kids have a tendency to underestimate how hard it would be to learn things, and you really have to drill into them the idea that it won't be easy and that they know nothing starting out.
But, most people don't realize this until they are past all the stumbles of their learning phase. We also have a tendency in the US to discount the experiences of older people, as if human nature ever changes at all (hint hint, it doesn't).
Dead meme
*well there’s no turning back now*
im suprised the weebs didnt immediately spout out "NANI!"
Big Nerd I’m surprised the wannabe blogger chick didn’t shout “KAWAII!”
O mae wa mou shindeiru
Idk and idc if that's how it's spelled
My weeb ass would yell "BAKA!"
@@corpsemachine6949 nani
Orewa ochinchin ga daisuke nandayo
i was really sad because i want to learn japanese and then i was encouraged again this was a really good rollercoaster 10/10 would do it again
“Because there wasn’t a class in korean-“
😂😂 don’t expose her
Dont expost m e*
@@beepbopboop9926 lol shes exposing all of us
literally the whole kpop fandom
*army’s want to know your location*
Dude I had the opposite. Now I can read and write korean but can't speak korean-
It’s funny you say that most people are interested in Japanese because they have an interest in Japan, but it was the opposite for me. I got into Japanese because I fell in love with the kanji writing system. I found it so fascinating how different it was to any of the writing systems I’ve seen, with a mix of kana and kanji, sometimes variably. I later found an interest I Japanese culture after I started learning it because they both go hand in hand.
Kanji are really cool! I love the pictographic history behind them.
"I'm bored, let's learn Japanese." That's kinda how I got started with my journey into Japanese.
The grammar is a hot mess coming from English but after a while I actually like it and it's not as hard as it seemed when I first learned it.
Kanji is probably still the hardest part of Japanese. Vocabulary alone is a problem in most languages. That, plus the fact that I have to memorize characters makes it a huge pain in the ass.
Still, I'm gonna continue to do this lol
みんな、頑張ってください。
the kanjis are the dumbest thing I've seen in any language, they are the reason why the language is difficult, they have no more reason to exist than the "cultural value," and it makes the language learning hard even to them.
@@PEDROGARCIA-qj3gr as someone who takes a Japanese class in college i lowkey agree. They could've gone with Koreans way, Koreans just use hangul in daily basis and their kanji (i forgot what it's called) is only used to shows specifications (like to differentiate shops, old names, etc) that way we can learn it easier and use the language more efficient..
The kanji’s are paiiiiin I feel ya (I’m pretty sure even native Japanese speakers don’t even know half of all the existing symbols)
@@TheIllusioner they don't. There are plenty interviews about the Japanese people themselves not knowing plenty of kanjis even though they are native
@@侘寂-z6p That's true, i find korean kanji alot easier because of the way it's taught. I know a shit ton more japanese compared to korean and i can construct basic sentences if spoken, but when it comes to writing in text. I'd rather die.
English : Apple
Japanese : "りんご リンゴ 林檎 アップル" they all mean apple :)
English: l
Japanese:"俺 私 僕 オイラ あたし あたい 俺様 オデ わたくし あたくし あちき ワイ ワテ ワテクシ わっち あっち あちきし ぼくちん ボクちゃん ちん 我輩 我 己 うぬ それがし 余 妾"
I still have it
@カーネル・サンダース ぽまえとは言わんやろw
To English
Don't worry, Japanese people can't understand Japanese,too☝🏻
By Japanese
@@にこにこ-v8k I agree with him
By Japanese
ちなみに鹿児島弁で「おい」が「俺」で「わい」が「君」っていうね…
As a non-native english speaker, this is great. It's the first time i've seen someone explain the beauty and logistics of learning a language so well. The truth is that learning about a different culture can really change your life in many wonderful ways.
For a non-native, your articulation is superb. ❤️
@@Midnight_Rain_Wolfgang-Telos thanks, it really means a lot to me
It's Me, Cousin Nicky Im from Argentina, so my main language is spanish.
I've been practicing for roughly five years now.
It might seem like learning a language takes a lot of work, but once you get wrapped up in all the culture and new things it stops feeling like something hard and it becomes a really fun and exiting thing.
I'm also a non-native speaker, and is funny how I learned English by simply playing games, watching films and listening to music.
And I agree, learning a new language expand your knowledge about other cultures, and is impressive how I get obsessed to learn new languages, but that's not good.
@@itsmecousinnicky4310 yes , I can understand too...I'm from Italy and I've been studying English for 3 years.
I'm doing a linguistic highschool this year and I'm studying Spanish and German too.....it's really difficult for me
I miss language classes so much, learning other cultures is so fun.
I've decided to learn Japanese cause I hear it is the dark souls of language.
I wish. It turns out it's the Samurai Shodown III of languages.
Na it's !Xóõ
It's actually really easy
@@kuro758 just like dark souls
@@thatonestormtrooper2760 that line hit me
"The girl who's here because there wasn't a class for Korean" - that just hit hard because I started learning Chinese for the same reason... actually started liking it a bit later
I learned Mandarin in college to learn kanji, then I ended up too deep in this mess to ever get out. Oh well, I can accept this fate; I'm part-way to learning Cantonese now too so I can't complain.
Me: *deep breath*
你 怎麼在學華語啊！?
我已經在六年幾了，而且我
還不知道怎麼跟我的表妹。
講。話。。。
*福~*
Well, I don't speak Japanese fluently, or even good, so keep that in mind, but I don't think that's an effective method at all. I know because I tried it, but I learned much more kanji and vocabulary by simply reading actual Japanese text with the help of rikaikun (which is an extension for Chrome that shows you the dictionary entry for a Japanese word when you hover your mouse over it). Even if the definition is not precise, after a while you start recognizing the kanji, the words, and based on context you can refine their meaning. So at least for me, I had more success this way. It's also similar to how I learned English, I just tried to read and threw the words I didn't know on Google; tho English was way easier to me because of the writing system, lots of similar words to my language, and being SVO.
I slightly remember watching this video when it first came out, and now it shows up on my recommended once more the day I found out the high school Japanese class I signed up for was actually a dual enrollment class. *I regret nothing and everything.*
Teach me english please 🙏 i Will teach You spanish
@@anderson16281 What do you want to know?
@@imsorryforarguingbut4555 Well, everything about English like grammar, phonetics and vocabulary, I want to understand English when they speak it.
@@anderson16281 Then why are you watching a video about japanese ?
@@anderson16281 google English for Spanish speakers , good luck 😊
Half way through the eyes became eye brows and the bag lines became the eyes
I can’t un-see that now. big round eyebrows
*Me:* Hiragana is SO easy Japanese is going to be fun 🤩
*Kanji:* I’m gonna end this whole man career
I think the best way for Kanji is to learn the basics, and just go with constantly encountering the words for the rest. In the first place I think that memorizing hundreds of characters, the vast majority of which that you might see once or twice in your daily practice/study/use of the language *outside* of Japan is a complete waste of time. Sure you won't ever be completely fluid if you don't know every context and homophone, but for me, my goal is not to write essays in Japanese. It's mostly so I can consume the media (anime, manga, social media). I can always use a Kanji dictionary for that.
For example with all those VNs and anime, etc. I can understand more by listening to the conversation than trying to read the Kanji without any guiding/pronounciation notes.
*laughs in Chinese*
me: _laughs in chinese_
@@qvyuqi hello there my fellow chinese person lmao
I may be a filthy monolingual but I can definitely say: Yeah, logographic writing systems do be like that
you really nailed the deadass quiet classroom I've come to know and fear
日本人からしても日本語はとても難しいから、喋れなくても日本に興味持ってくれてることは嬉しいし、だいたい言葉とか文章おかしくても何となく伝わる
分かりみが深い
初っ端から日本語ボッコボコで草
@@hydrogen8740
""言葉とか文章おかしくても何となく伝わる""
@さてぅーん【Sateun1221】 いやそうじゃなくて「難しい」「時間掛かる」「それだけの価値がない」って言われててボコボコにされてるなって思ったから
「日本語ボッコボコ」ってきっと最初の人は日本語がめっちゃ貧されてるwwって意味で言ったんだろうけど次の人はコメ主の日本語おかしすぎって意味で受けとったんだろうなって…日本語って難しいね…(T_T)
Thanks this actually gave me the motivation I needed, big arigathanks 👍👍👍👍👍👍
"Japanese is the most difficult language in the world"
Mandarin Chinese : Who am i to you?
v
Actually Japanese is the hardest language. It has three writing systems, and even tho there are alot of Chinese characters, the grammar in Japanese is more complicated
Mandarin is very easy to pick up for English speakers. It's just the pronunciation and characters that get a bit tricky
honestly if you put the kanjis stuff aside japanes is kinda easy
@@kimjiwoo9031 try Arabic.
@@nurfaezzah6814 in fact, I am learning this at school, it is hard tho
If Japanese is so good why isn’t there a Japanese 2?
Interesting... Why?
They where developing a prequel but it didn't turn out well
Facts
Korean
@@bramble6367 Korean is closer to a Chinese 2, isn’t it?
The teacher had his eyes closed the whole time, he just has very big and round eyebrows
What have you done!?
oMg
How dare you?
DAMN U
I can't unsee it oh no
Whys this so heartfelt D:
Sorry this is inaccurate, my teacher started speaking to us in full Japanese right off the bat
Yikes! My teacher was native Japanese but didn't pull such a stunt.
@@psymar Yeah, I think in my school district they tell the world language teachers to speak in the language right away to get us used to it
That sounds terrible. I had to wait until my senior year before my teacher did that. Most definitely would have quit years if my teacher had done that.
@@finiamh5032 Eh, it was ok for me since I watched anime ever since I was in 5th grade but I know some others who were probably thinking the class was too difficult dropped it to take another language class. She had pictures on the screen to help us figure out what she was saying though, it's not like we were completely in the dark
@@psymar same
"Write down your questions so you can google them later."
Woah. I didn't know Japanese and Physics had so much in common.
Ok this isn’t accurate.
When he asked for words in Japanese the weebs didn’t say *NANI*
No basic girl said Kawaii
Weebs dont speak with people irl
no one said omae wa mou shindeiru.
or kuso
Or senpai (¿
I'm 20, been in more or less regular Japanese lessons for six years. I'm not proficient yet, and I failed every JLPT I've done before passing them.
I regret nothing! Japanese has been a lovely constant to have even during the worst times in my life. I've learned so much, and I'm excited to keep on learning. Learning something, whatever it is, will never be a "useless" endeavour.
Losers - translates Japanese to English in their minds
Me the intellectual - translates Japanese into Spanish and then into English.
NANI!?
¿Qué?
What?
Hva?
O que?
I've been at it for 3 years now. I'm nowhere near proficient but I'm slowly getting somewhere. Bit by bit.
Oh shit you're in 3 years too?
Same
Hello my fellow three year japanese students, same as you man.. same as you
Antonio Giuseppe you could get proficient in 1,5-2 years. Actually getting native level is harder ofcourse. And can take as long as your life. But it does for natives too.
頑張ろうね
"The girl who came here because there wasn't a class for korean" THAT HITS CLOSE TO HOME XDDDDD
i chose japanese for my language class this year because there either wasn't a class for korean or i didn't know about the class >:(
@@enterchannelname7514 Watch anime, you’ll like Japanese ( ͡° ͜ʖ ͡°)
A motivational video huh! I never felt so motivated, I will never forget these three when studying Japanese, difficult, long-term and not worth it. Thanks for the motivation!
I mean, if you want reasons
I've been taking Japanese classes for years now and regularly study. I'm half Japanese on my mother's side, and am a 4th generation Japanese-American. After the internment camp fiasco, many Japanese Americans felt the need to reject their culture and heritage and to try to be more "white". To be more "American" and fit in and be accepted. My family was one of them, so my Mom received a western name and wore more western clothes and was raised to speak English. Its to the point where no one alive really knows the language any more, and can't even write our surnames in whatever their original Kanji symbols were. I wanted to try to preserve what I can and to feel more connected to my culture and heritage.
That and anime is awesome
Meanwhile I'm just an African American with no real ties to Japan who likes to draw and loves anime and just wanted to be able to sing a few theme songs and maybe curse people out in different languages-
I mean my parents both like anything Japanese so maybe that counts haha- (My dad likes the food my mom likes the media)
Meanwhile I’m just a white autistic 15 year old who likes anime and Japanese culture
meanwhile im not even trying to learn japanese, i just clicked on this video because i was bored
Meanwhile, I'm just here trying to learn Japanese because I want to impress my friends and annoy them.
Learning about Japan is cool and all, and I am doing the same thing. But it isn't really YOUR culture if it was lost before you were born. If you go to Japan, you might look Japanese and the people might assume you are, but ultimately you will only be a foreigner like any of the rest of us that would visit Japan.
'Japanese is the most difficult language for native English speakers to learn.'
Laugh in Chinese
Yeah I'm an spanish speaker and I think chinese is harder too. But well it obviously depends on the person in some degree.
They're both hard as fuck but according to the US's Foreign Service Institute they put a little asterisk next to Japanese indicating it's just a bit harder than every other category 5 language
Well I know both English and Chinese and I’d say Chinese is a bit harder than Japanese for native English speakers. This is because how different Chinese and English are, Chinese doesn’t have an alphabet while English heavily depends on one. Besides, Japanese also has an alphabet so yea...
And people always say Kenji is the hardest part of Japanese while Chinese is literally a language only composing of Kenji but even harder
Alfred o Chinese grammer is not that hard though. We don’t have bunch of tenses while most other languages have
I'm actually on my 4th year of learning Japanese in high school right now, and lockdown has really been destroying my self-esteem with this class. I was feeling like I'm not up to par with how I used to be back in my freshman, sophomore, and junior years with this class, and that I'm not enjoying it as much anymore. This video really helped me remember what exactly made it so enjoyable in those years, and why it is that I've come this far with the class, being in the smallest group of Japanese students, filled with people who, like me, have stuck with the class ever since freshmen year. I think I'll make the best of my time as I can now, and I'll bounce back strong as this quarter ends and the last one begins. Thank you for posting this.
Watch anime, you'll be impressed with how much you know.
ruclips.net/video/xS3vpBCiL2c/видео.html
how did it work out?
“This is the girl who thought this is Korean class”-
Me: *Pibby?*
LITTARLY ME -
Lmao
“Say one Japanese word.”
“Ochinchin.”
“Now listen here you little-”
I hate that I know this
"Ochinchin daisuke desu yo" some would get what I mean
What does that mean?
@@innkblot5224 U don't need to know u innocent baby
Innk Blot - 🍆
I made it. It took me lite 6-7 years of on and off studying, but it wasn't until I met my Japanese girlfriend I became fluent
*you wasted your lifetime dude..you should had just..got a japanese girlfriend then..*
@@nourashraf5023 Well i got the girlfriend because I could speak Japanese, and I also got my job because of it. I did other things while I studied it so it was not like I wasted my life
@@nourashraf5023 wowow, slow down friend.
Hmm.... Can u help a student in Japanese fellow to get good at it? Like I have learned the kanas, some basic grammar , numbers (but I forgot most of the previous stuff since I am in school and I needed to study non Japanese materials so I have forgotten a good amount of what I have learnt but it would be easy to get them back when starting Japanese again) and actually I am learning Japanese to be able to talk with the Japanese ppl since they don't drop the word San (and it's synonyms) and also because it is a cute language although being ugly in learning..... Well can u?
Just in case u agreed my discord account is
soul_eater_evan#8555
Teacher: Who knows any simple japanese?
Jojo fans: This is my moment.
Kono jorono jovanna niwa ume ga aru...
Question Mark Ho, mukatte kuru no ka? Nigezu ni kono Dio ni chikadzuite kuru no ka?
@@Gayassraccoon nigerundayooooo smokiiiii
braka monoga!!!!
oI GG
An amazing video I first saw around 2019, the year I started Japanese. Will eb rewatching this as the years go by
I started learning in 2020 and I've come back to this video every few months as well.
The ending 😂 "Any Questions? Okay then write them down and you can google them later."
"Write them down then ggrks"
It's literally my spanish teacher
I oofed out loud
Will there be weekly quizzes?
Google it.
I majored in Japanese for 4 years, got a Bachelor's degree in it. Can confirm: Japanese is extremely difficult, my degree is useless, and studying it was not the best use of my time. HOWEVER, studying abroad in Japan for a semester was an amazing experience, one of the best things I've done in my life.
Kelley McMorris Semester There sounds wonderful! Quick question - why would you say your degree is useless? Are there translator jobs or other such available after bachelors?
@@TM-vx9xs In my very limited experience - just being able to speak Japanese, on it's own, doesn't make for much of a resume. Translator jobs and teaching English in Japan is probably as far as that alone will get you. Additionally, despite earning a degree, I found that 4 years of study outside of Japan wasn't enough to become fluent. Who wants to hire someone whose only skill is being sorta ok at a single language? IMO, you either need to be fluent or you need to have another skill to which Japanese is complementary.
@Kelley Same. Your comment hit hard. 😭😭😭
In my country you usually have to take a second/main topic you study, japanese is only a side topic. You will make the bachelor in both things. So you can combine it with economics (to useful for a company that has lots of contact with japanese companies) or literature or something else you like.
Is Japanese really the only thing you can study? I didn't even know that existed as a main topic in universities.
thank you for this comment. I'm studying Japanese right now, wanted to change primary language since day 1 but still hesitated (my major requires to have at least 2 foreign languages one of which is English). 1 year in, another language is gonna be hard to learn. But your comment reminded me that if Japanese and Japan in general is not something I'm passionate about, my degree is gonna be useless at the end anyway.
Teacher: So any of you know any Japanese words?
Weebs: SHINEI!, NANI?!?! NANDATOOOOO!!!!
Teacher: *its worse than I thought*
b-baka >.
Yare yare daze
*SHINEEEEEEEEEEEE*
Oppai hehehehhe
SHINRA TENSEI
for me, i actually like the language itself a lot more than the culture and the media, and i dont study to speak it but i study to be able to read and write. I really like the grammar and the kanjis.
The speed of which i clicked this video had a power level of 9001
Teacher : do you have any japanese words ?
Students : .....
Teacher : *OMAE WA MO SHINDEIRU*
Students : *NANI*
I was about to make the students say all of that as a joke but eh this is too close what I was gonna do is not even worth it
/facepalm/ XD
Kawaii
👏👏👏
You made me laugh
me at the beginning: * highly discouraged *
me in between: * a little more encouraged *
me at the end: **slightly discouraged and slightly encouraged**
My man just entered the classroom and proceeded to roast the entire body of students
My father once told me that he went to Japanese class, and it was Japanese 01. so he thought that it would be good and easy at first, but apparently everyone else in the class already knew Japanese, and the teacher was like oh, well ok! everybody skip to chapter 26. and my dad dropped out of Japanese class
Yikes. That sounds worse than my Japanese class (we started with 20-plus and 6 finished the four semesters the school required for language)
Started reading this like it was "All Star" by Smash Mouth because of the "My father once told" part smh
This guy: it’s difficu-
Me: *URUSAI BAAAKA*
Tsundere be like:
I read this in Killua’s voice-
I read this in Ishigami's voice
@Yoru u
Yeah lol same here
Cringe
I am Japanese but I tell you, Kanji is the most terrifying thing in the world
edit: guys, both Chinese and Japanese are equally hard, pls stop
edit 2: ok guys, it’s completely normal to disagree with me. I really hope y’all get this but this comment is a joke, I didn’t actually mean that kanji is the most scariest thing ever
so like, ummm it’s not really my actual opinion on kanji?? y’know what I’m saying?? don’t attack me lol
See there's the easy ones like "hoshi" and "haru". But then there are the absolute monstrosities of "yume" and the having to change characters to fit gender 😭
Agreed.
Well, I'm brazilian (with japanese descent) and I am studying japanese. I don't think I'll ever learn kanji. But they are really necessary to live in Japan?
I KNOW RIGHT?!? I DON’T U N D E R S T A N D
Lmao literally there are characters that has some gore background/ representation to it
This video was a rollercoaster ride, didn't expect that.
Everyone: “Japanese is so hard.”
Me: **laughs in traditional Chinese**
Teach me english please 🙏
@@anderson16281 你會說中文嗎？
@@miniko_artsy what, i don't understand haha
@@anderson16281 oh ok never mind, just watch RUclips videos and study grammar and stuff and you’ll learn English, I grew up speaking English but never lived in an English speaking country so RUclips videos helped me a lot
@@miniko_artsy from which country do you come from?
"The girl who's here beacuase there wasn't a class for Korean"
🤣🤣🤣
@nanana
And ironically that's how my japanese teacher started to learn japanese. He wanted to learn korean but there wasn't enough students, so he had to study japanese instead.
@@yue1103in my opinion japanese>korean
@@LukeC13 lol its just a language
@@LukeC13lol why compare it's just language
I came for laughs and got roasted in the first two minutes
Thank you, I needed that.
When you study Japanese to read Hentai but can't admit to your teacher.
When you study Japanese to read hentai and you admit it to your teacher so he doesn't get shocked when you study weird kanjis.
Guess you're the only one lol
I only studied so I could have decent conversations with my parents
in my Japanese class every one (includng the teacher) is a weeb. woo
You know that most hentai doesn't have a good narrative don't you?
Lol
@@miso-ge1gz That's what i thought
“Can someone tell me any Japanese words we already know?”
Weebs: “Nani kawaii desu sugoi senpai kouhai oppai arigatou kampai ecchi hentai.”
Ore wa ochichin daisuki nandayo
@@wataname8693 its time to stop
Don’t forget Shonen, yabai, kuso, and kusoyara
*kanpai
@@thahiliachase8078 *kusoyaro
"Alright, so any questions?"
(Literally all the class raise their hand)
"Kay great. Right them down so you can Google them later."
I need a teacher like that
That was me. I wrote down questions in class and didn’t ask any question when professor asked around. Went home and had google answer my questions. Google is my sensei
My professors at my school are like that lol.
When I started learning Japanese I watched the first part of this video. I was so confident and sure that I would finish my studies no matter what that I just left the video midway.
After almost a year, I've finally watched it all. And yeah, it's true.
Out of all 30 people we were, only 8 remain. And us, who kept on going no matter what, have been through a lot together.
It's difficult. It demands time, practice, dedication and, most of all, determination. Many of the people that still study with me do it out of habit at this point (me included) so we don't feel it as heavy, but one can't help but wonder if it's really REALLY worth it.
wow