February - Greer's Japanese Lessons

Greer is going to tell you about her Japanese lessons:
Hajime Mashite! Nice to meet you! This is Greer and I am going to tell you about my first Japanese Lesson! So my Sensei and I went over structure, noun connecters, endings, and basic words. Some words I already knew from my Papa like tomodachi (friend) or mizu (water). Some I didn't. I learned a few simple sentences like My name is Greer Donnalley. Here is how you say it: Watashi-no namae-wa Greer Donnalley desu. To say the sentence correctly, make sure all vowels are pronounced separately and the u in desu  is silent. (At the end of this entry, check for sound downloads.) Also, if you want to introduce someone like your mother, friend, or father, you say it like this: Kore-wa watashi-no okaasan/tomodachi/otoosan -no _______ desu. Well, after learning simple sentences, and the structure, I was on overload! I had a huge brain overload and I think my mom learned more just by listening! Did you know if you drink two cups of water before a class, you retain 60% more information? I wish I had drunk a gallon of water (mizu) before my Japanese (Ni-hon-go) lesson.

Greer's sound downloads
(Sorry for the poor pictures.  Can't just upload an audio file.  Needs to be made into a video.)

This is related to Japanese in a very exciting way! So I had invited Zoe (tomodachi) over and we had just finished eating dinner. After that, we decided to go to a little bakery called the Little Mermaid down at the subway station. When we arrived, we got these huge chocolate chip cookies that were bread so it looked like a huge bread ball with a sprinkling of chocolate chips. It was normal for me to say arigatou gozaimasu (thank you very much) to the cashier so that wasn't very exciting. As Zoe and I headed home, it began to rain. Thankfully we had coats, but it was really hot so we kept our hoods off. As we ran to catch the light, it turned to red and the rain continued. A nice lady with a very nice store selling purses invited us to stand under her awning. Then, what do you know? She started to talk to us in Japanese and Zoe and I (did I tell you she moved the same time I did?) stood with confused looks on our faces until she got the courage to say we don't speak Japanese. Then I said, "Wait." I quickly introduced me and Zoe. Then I also said I speak a little (sukoshi) Japanese (Ni-hon-go). She than smiled and said in English we were very pretty girls. As the light changed, we waved, said good-bye (sayonara) and headed home.
We told my mother (okaasan) and my sensei (teacher) that I spoke Japanese to someone who wasn't teaching me!!! I was so happy! I am awesome right?  (Sayonara) Bye!
Greer <3 <3 <3 <3 <3
(I had to ask Greer what was after her name.  Those are hearts.)

I thought Greer was going to talk more about her lessons overall, but I guess she had other ideas.  So I'll just add some stuff.  I won't write about her two teachers, though.  I'll have her do that in a later posting.  Greer and I are both taking lessons from Tokyo Lingual, one of the two choices we have from Exxon.  Tokyo Lingual utilizes the Kitani Method in its teaching.  I won't go into the details of the Kitani Method, but suffice it to say that we're supposed to learn Japanese much faster this way. :)  The first lesson is with Mark (Motohiko) Kitani, the linguist who developed the Kitani Method.  In that lesson, he gives an overview of the Japanese language and a preview of the lessons to come.  (This is the lesson about which Greer talked in the above paragraph.)  Then he assigns two different teachers, who each come to the apartment for an hour's lesson each week.  Greer and I each had our introductory lesson (we are doing separate lessons instead of a joint one) in early February.  Then we started our twice weekly lessons.  Greer's teachers are Mari sensei and Eri sensei and my teachers are Umino-san and Kaneko-san.  We've each had about half a dozen lessons.  It is a little joke between us to say to each other, "Japanese is a simple language."  That's what Mark Kitani said several times during our introductory lesson, and Greer and I are not sure we agree.  

However, while Greer argues that English is easy, we all know it's not really.