Q: what is the japanese staple diet -  smith
A: I’m not sure really, I guess it depends on where you live.  I’m in Tokyo this week and everyone seems to exist on beer, coffee and balls of rice!   In the countryside, where I live, the usual meal everyday is that everyone has a bowl of rice then there are dishes of vegetables, pickles or fish in the table and you pick and eat what you like.   It’s all nice stuff though!  I’m starting my national tour this week so I think I might start up a Japanese food blog!

Q: Genki Arabic please -   Sophie

A: It’s on its way!  The problem we are having is which dialect to base it on.

For the time being I’d highly recommend the Michel Thomas Arabic course.  It really is the best method for learning a language and it’s amazing they have an Arabic version.  I’ve tried and reviewed the French, German & Spanish ones and they are amazing.  Highly recommended (especially at Amazon’s prices).  At Christmas I also bought the Michel Thomas Chinese course, which I’ve just had a quick look at but it seems great as well.

Or you could have a look at www.GenkiChinese.com

Q: how do you say 2008? -  aman

A: You’d write it as 2008 and say it as 二千八年　(ni sen hachi nen).  It’s quite easy if you’ve done the Japanese Numbers video.

You could be posh and say 平成２０年　(hei sei ni jyu nen) but you only really see that on formal things like when applying for your driving license or something!

Q: I would first like to say thank you as many have, I hope that this site will offer accurate translations, though it is hard to translate Japanese into English do to alot of differences.

A: Thanks for the nice words!  The translations are as accurate as they can be,  and going from English to Japanese I run it by a few people to make sure I haven’t missed anything!  I will translate things according to how we use them, rather than a standard dictionary way, so pretty much anything can be translated.

I would also hope that you would keep this free to the public.

I plan to! It does cost money to host the sites and make the materials, but as people are buying the mp3s and recommending the site to friends so hopefully it will be free for a long time to come!

I feel that in the future it will be a necessity to learn. I would like to know if you plan on adding a chatroom for this site for others to share and perhaps practice their form of grammer in japanese with each other. This I feel will help others that might have trouble learning it. -  Christopher

This is something that keeps coming up.  On my GenkiEnglish site I also have several thousand Japanese people who are wanting to learn English and it would be great if I could join you all up somehow.  I’m not quite sure how to do it though, any ideas would be much appreciated!

Be genki,

Richard

Q: Hello! It’s me, Kirari again. XD What do ‘zutto’ and ‘demo’ mean?
~Kirari

Zutto （ずっと）　means “forever”, you hear it a lot! e.g. how long will you live here, forever?

Demo でも　is also a really, really good word to learn in Japanese as it means “but” when you join two sentences together.

Q: How do you say bad in japanese? - Carly
A: Bad is 悪い　= wa ru i.  But more often than not you’d usually say 良くない　= yo ku na i, which means “not good”

Be genki,

Richard

Q: What would “very” be in Japanese?  Sinead

A:  Very is とても =to te mo.   You do hear it a lot!

Be genki,

Richard

Q: Hello! I just love this site. It is so informational; I like it a lot!! I am wondering what does the word “futari” mean? I see that sometimes quite a few times in songs.  Kirari

A: This is an easy one, “futari” means “two people”, which is quite easy to work out when you see it written in kanji:  二人.

In songs it usually means something like “you and I” or “both of us together”, but it’s also really useful in restaurants as one of the first question you’ll get asked is:

何人ですか？　= nan nin desu ka? = How many people?

So if it’s just the two of you you’d say “futari”.

Be genki,

Richard

Q: Hey Richard I love your website! But however I have a quick question. I might be going to Japan soon and I’m worried that I would pronounce things wrong of say something I didn’t mean/get lost Yikes! What is some simple Kanji for Women’s bathroom or Men’s bathroom, or maybe even just some basic “must know” things. Thanks! -  Jackie

First of all don’t worry about pronouncing things wrong, people will often assume you speak no Japanese at all ( I even get that after doing an hour’s presentation in Japanese!) so any mistakes will be politely ignored!

With regards the bathrooms, the two kanji you need are:

女　(onnna = women’s bathroom)

男　(otoko = men’s bathroom)

Hopefully they should be easy to remember!

You should be fine to get around with little Japanese, maybe the word that will give you the most mileage is:

ありがとう　= a ri ga to u = thank you!

Be genki,

Richard

Q: how do you say hi in Japanese?

A: Good question!  “Hello” is usually translated as こんにちは konnichiwa, and you’d also use that for friends when going out etc.  I don’t think there is really anything we use like “hi”,  although just saying “元気？= genki?”　is quite common, meaning “What’s up?”

Be genki,

Richard