Welcome to Gaia! ::

Before we begin, I want you all to know this: MASTERY OVER FAMILIARITY!!!

Its the advice that my sensei gave to me, all his students, and what I give to you. This advice pretty much sums up the entire basis of the training. In Japanese, there are many words that sound the same, but don't mean the same thing.

ex.) the word, Kami which can mean: God, paper, and/or Hair.

Ex 2.) The Japanese word for Colorblind...and the Japanese word for Horny. I'm not even going to bother giving you the word since someone else can.

All you have to do is just mess up on pronouncing it and it means either nothing or worse, something else entirely.

Thats why, like my sensei, I stress the fact of Mastery over familiarity.

Lesson 1: Basic Sentence Structure and first 5 hiragana

The basic sentence structure in MOST Japanese sentence structure is the WA pattern.

The particle WA in japanese is the particle that marks the subject of the sentence. as most of you know by now looking through most of the other threads here, theres a lot of sentences with WA in them.

ex.) Watashi wa _____ desu; kore wa dame desu., blah blah blah.

The subject you're talking will always be before the particle. Of course, this being a language, there will always be exception to this rule, when we're talking about japanese casual form and slang, but thats another show.

KORE, SORE, ARE, DORE-- Simple words at the beginning of a sentence that means (in order) Here, there, OVER THERE, and Where.

Ex.) what is that over there? are wa nan desu ka?

The difference between there and OVER there, is where its at. There, refers to close to the person you're speaking to. OVER there is far from both speaker and listener. So don't screw up when saying the things over there by the tree when you're talking about the pencil close to the guy you're asking.

ANO, SONO, KONO, DONO-- similar to the above four which mean (In order) That object over there, That object, This object and which object.

ex.) kono enpitsu ha dare no enpitsu desu ka? This pencil is whose?

The only special effect that they have is refering to where the subject of the sentence is.

ex.) Ano hito wa nihonjin desu ka? Is that person over there a Japanese person?

Hiragana:

This section tells you how to write hiragana and it's memory devices.

A　－－あ：　First start with the line across then a line down, then make another crossing the first line and around it.
Memory Device: It looks like an Antenna doesn't it?

E　－－え：A line at a downward angle then make a z with a wavy line at the end.
Memory Device:　An Elf...you know with a hat on top and its running to work in santa's shop

I　－－い：　One line down and hooked up slightly to the right and a short line down.
Memory Device:　Two　（I)-els

O　－－お：　Similar to A so don't screw up.　Line across, Line down and curves around.　Finish with a small line next to the curve.
Memory Device: A Golf hole.

U　－－う：Simple. A small line at a diagonal with a large curve beneath.
Memory Device: What does grandma say when she's gonna be hit with a brick? OOH!

See, this was what I was talking about when I said some words sound the same, but mean different thing.

Dono, the title for a guest or superior being, is a suffix added to the name of the person

e.g.) Kathy-dono, kono enpitsu wa omae no enpitsu degozaimasu ka?
Miss Kathy, is this pencil yours?((Honorifics, you'll learn them later...much later))

dono in this form is a phrase that asks which of these objects is yours and is put before the subject.

e.g.) dono tsukue wa kathy-san no tsukue desu ka?

Which desk is kathy's desk?

As for Kanji, it pretty much chinese characters stolen by assimilated by japanese people to write words faster. I mean, why write shinkansen ((Bullet Train)) out when you could write the 3 kanji which is the equivelent?

dou itashimashite.