Japanese language page.

 
          "Greetings.   My name is David.   I am happy to meet you".
    That's what it says above, though actually, it could be written right 
to left, but nowadays it often follows the western style of left to right,
especially when the context is foreign loan words. If the context was solely
Japanese words, then traditionally, it would need to be up and down as well
as right to left. Also different characters would be used, but that will be
covered below. I have been fascinated with the Japanese, (Nihongo more 
properly), language for some time, with it's sounds, and wonderfully written
letters. I find that the simple black and white Japanese characters are 
often more beautiful than the best color painting. Their intrinsic ability,
stems as much from the blank spaces, as the brush strokes, and the lettering
 is an art unto itself, that has a rich & lengthy history.                     
  
     Firstly, I am in no way, a teacher, (sensei desu), or even Japanese.
I am a native Texan, and as a student of Japanese, simply wish to share my
fascination of it. For those of you with a better understanding of it than
myself, feel free to use the email on the main page, to inform me of my 
mistakes, and I will correct them. For someone interested in a foreign 
country, and/or it's language, the internet is a wonderful place to help
you learn, especially if you can't afford to go there and learn first hand.
): I have found so many great sites, (and barely scratched the surface I 
am sure), and there are many more appearing all the time.           

      Japanese is a wonderful language, and not as hard to 
learn as one might think. Most words in Japanese do not have double and
triple meanings, as in English, and the R's roll similar to those in
Spanish, though once only, (or it is often referred to as a soft "D",
as in the word, "Adam"),  and the two share similar sounding vowels.
Spain and Portugal were two of the first known western traders to Japan,
in the 1600's, and began the assimilation of western words into the
country. Partly because of this, Japan has two alphabets. "Hiragana",
which is used for every day reading and writing, in proper Japanese.
And "Katakana, which is used for foreign loan words borrowed from 
other countries, for street signs, marquis, and all kinds of
advertisement, (and probably for a good deal more than I know). Two 
different alphabets might seem daunting at first. Yet though you have
to memorized two sets of characters, there are basically only one set
of phonetics, with only a couple of minor differences between them.
So you really get 2 systems for one.                            

     As far as the non phonetic kanji, (of which there are a
couple of thousand in every day use in Nihon), they can be
learned later, at your own pace, from a Kanji dictionary. However 
from what I have read of Kanji, Japanese school children are taught
from a very early age, in repetitive drills in the class room. And 
this is probably the best way to learn them. Kanji is far older 
than the kana's, originally borrowed from China in the 6th century.
The duel phonetic systems being devised from kanji later in
the 900's, in an attempt to better fit the developing Japanese
spoken word of the time, which differed too much from the non phonetic 
Chinese kanji, that had been used since then. At the time it 
was introduced to Japan, The Chinese had used kanji for over 
a thousand years, though it had changed many times, from simple 
drawings of the actual objects, to the more squared off linear images
we see today. The Japanese kanji, may have also gone through changes,
though I do not know as to how much different it is today, compared
to it's inception. What little I know is that there are old, unused kanji,
that the Japanese no longer use in their everyday lives.           

       I have heard the two schools of thought on which to study
first, and most books I have read say that Hiragana should be first,
it being the more important of the two used in everyday Japanese life,
correspondence, legal letters, and the phonetic system of the spoken
language. Katakana will undoubtedly be easier for most foreigners
to pick up, since many of the loan-words are taken verbatim, from
Spanish, Portuguese, English, Russian, and many other countries, 
with only mild differences in pronunciation from the original.
English makes up the largest amount of loan words, and English 
speaking people, will immediately recognize thousands of words, once 
the characters are memorized.                                 

  I have found that for myself, the Hiragana alphabet is harder
to memorize. Maybe it's because I can actually read Katakana, as I
already know most of the words, or perhaps it's the squiggly lines of  
Hiragana that seem harder to memorize to me. I have had some great help
lately, re learning both , with the aid of some awesome flash card
& Japanese word processing programs I found free off the net. If you are 
studying Japanese, and want a Japanese word processor, I recommend 
Glenn  Rosenthal's JWPCE. It's what I used to make most of the Japanese
characters on my site. You can copy and paste it to paint or wherever you
like. And it comes with an English/Japanese-Japanese/English dictionary. 
It is a wonderful program, and absolutely free. You can find it on Jim 
Breen's, "Monash Nihongo ftp" link below. Be prepared to spend some time
there if you love Japanese on your computer. Lots to see and have for free,
(thanks Jim and all). Also there are some great Japanese looking fonts on
the net for your regular word processor, (see the links below for all of 
these mentioned here).