How Difficult Is It To Learn Japanese? [Ft. jakenbakeLIVE] 

How was your experience learning Japanese...let us know down below! 😎

Yeah...never touched keigo (formal form) in my life haha...us gaijin are exempt from the rule 😂

Tokyo Creative team, thanks for Tea time, but please consider expanding it to podcast form. You're almost there anyway since episodes do not require visuals. Maybe you'd have to voice participant names at the beginning, but you will surely get more audience...

Thanks for having me for Tea Time! 😊❤️

3 levels of Japanese: - with the boss - standard - with the homies

I remember I called up a restaurant to make a reservation. I usually start every phone conversation with 「すみません、外国人ですけど…」(Sorry, I am a foreigner...) and I actually managed to understand and tell them what I wanted. This was probably one of the proudest moments in my Japanese learning path. They may have made the conversation easier for me but I didn't care at that point haha

I’m half Japanese like Shizuka and I spoke Japanese when I was little but my kindergarten teacher told my mom to stop talking to me in Japanese to understand what the teacher was saying and I had to study Japanese on my own several years later (which was kind of hard) and I’m pretty fluent now! I speak other languages as well now too! :)

The phone rang in my hotel one morning when I went to Japan. I thought my listening skill was fairly good, but once I answered the phone, I couldn't understating a single word. Took me few minutes to realize it wasn't even a real person talking, but rather an automated wake up call! lol

試着 (shichaku) is combination of 試す (tamesu, try) and 着る (kiru, wear). There's also 試食 (shishoku, (food) sampling).

the real reason the Japanese is hard is because literally every japanese person tells you your japanese is really good even when it's not at all lol they are just being nice or surprised and happy that you speak japanese but do not trust them lol

Strictly speaking, I was taught in my elementary school in Japan that there are 4 politeness forms in spoken Japanese. In addition to the casual way and the normal way that you mentioned in the video, the formal way can be divided into 2 forms. One is called 謙譲語(kenjo-go) which you should use only when you are mentioning yourself and need to put your position down. まいる/まいります(mairi-masu) which basically means to go/come is one of them, but you are not supposed to use まいります against the interlocutor because it would sound like you are looking down on him or her. The other is called 尊敬語(sonkei-go). いらっしゃる/いらっしゃいます(irasshai-masu) is included in this form and you can use them when you want to describe someone else's action but yours unlike 謙譲語(kenjo-go) because it would sound like you're paying respect to yourself if you used 尊敬語(sonkei-go) against your action. So for example, let’s say you’re in a certain restaurant. You can always hear the front staff say いらっしゃいませ, which is sonkei-go, and this is because they're paying respect to you. But on the other hand, when they say "I'm coming right now", They say「ただいま(right now) まいります」. This is because they are putting down their position so that you as a customer/guest can stand above relatively.

I would love for this to be expanded into a podcast!

can we just have a "day in the life of Jake" video, where he uses all his brash, shortened impolite Japanese on regular people?

I think Paris is right about いらっしゃる meaning "to go." In my Japanese textbook it says that it's the honorific of 行く、来る、and いる.

It's good they got a beginner on the show to show the comparison between 1 week of study and few years of study

I don't know if anyone said this alread, but the masu form is teineigo 丁寧語. To me the hardest part is still vocabulary. Learning lists by haert is so boring that I can't do it, and it sucks because learning English there are so many words with latin origins that as an Italian the process was definitely more organic. And yeah, when I visited in February, as soon as you show some confidence in your speaking, you remove the limiters and hit you with the fastest stuff in the books, leaving you with a dumb face saying "I know I sounded like I'm good, but thats really not the case"

Thanks for this! Loved putting this on and listening to it doing the housework!!!

jnb52 (if you know you know)

Love this video! Really informative and helpful. Thanks so much guys! I you really make my day😁🔥

Actually [いらっしゃいます] is Going, Coming and Present. Present as in [いる]、or [おる]。The Black lady was right. [行かれる] is often used when Japanese forget how to say the higher/more appropriate keigo levels or if they want to feel less uncomfortable as keigo can be uncomfortable depending on what keigo is being used. [られる] and [される] are actually the lower levels of keigo. Keigo is split into 3 parts; ていねいご= which is standard keigo, そんけいご＝which is Honorific keigo, and けんじょうご＝which is humble keigo. けんじょうご＝ is the most common used keigo in Japan as it is easier to put oneself below the person of higher class during conversation than it is to raise the person's class. Some company's require そんけいご＝but it usually depends of the level of importance of the Job or the reputation of the company. Hello, I'm a Matcha Gai and I am a Japanese Tutor at Eastern Michigan University for Japanese Business Practices. I personally love keigo and I think with the right opportunity to learn and use it, it can be a really quick way to super increase your vocabulary. Hope this helps. 又日本語を頑張って下さい。将来に皆さんが何がするつもりか知らへんですが、止まらなく敬語をだんだん上手になって下さい。

Thanks for the video, I found it very useful. Right now I'm just trying to get into the rhythm of doing Japanese everyday, its very hard to get started especially if you are also at university for a different major but I'll try my best as I want to go to Japan :D

A Japanese database would store kanji and all other text characters (including western letters) in Unicode, which is 16 bits per character. So an English name which would take up 25 bytes in ASCII, will take up 50 bytes in Unicode. And I guess that is more than the database designers plan for, but they really should.

Definitely there is a huge listening gap between real life listening and test listening, people mutter, people speak softly, fast, they use a lot of slang, figures of speech, there are background noises, people talk over each other.

I think even Japanese people don't have all the kanji memorized enough to write it down. I watched a Jun and Rachel video and Jun had issues remembering some kanji strokes.

I just learned that keigo thing last semester :P we call it uchi-yoso ue-shita. Omochikaeru > mottekaeru > takeout. Iku mairimasu irasshaimasu. Kuru mairimasu irasshaimasu. Irasshaimasu comes out quite a lot and it was confusing. I use takeaway once, no one understand until a staff saying, takeout desuka? Ahaha.

Random old dude (very polite and pleasant) sat next to me in an onsen in Aomori and started chatting me up. As we were both buck naked and I have never had a stranger chat me up ever in an onsen, it was definitely the most awkward practice session of my limited Japanese I've ever had. I thought it was kind of cool though that a Japanese guy would chat up a foreigner like that, especially in that kind of environment.

My take on this tea time topic I am glad to hear that even seemingly well integrated people have issues with Japanese. I of course expect that not everything is always smooth, but know other people have issues with grammar, and others thing that some people my see as easy can be still difficult for others. It helps keep my head up, and to keep trying. Thank for coving this today.

Random suggestion: open your snacks and put them on a plate or something so people can grab them easily :) 🥳

Being exposed to the language on a daily basis is so important to learn it. After learning 6 years of Japanese and only being able to talk with my grandma on a few occasions, all my Japanese was forgotten and I can't hold simple conversations anymore. It's frustrating and a damn shame as a Yon-sei.

Love jake n bake live!

Thanks jake for representing the „with the homies“ way of speaking japanese :‘D

Keigo actually has two different sets of words. Respect form (尊敬語), which is used to talk about the other person's actions and has the effect of "raising" their position. And Humble form (謙譲語), which is used to talk about your own actions and has the effect of "lowering" your position. For 行く, the respect form is いらっしゃる, おいでになる, or 行かれる (please don't ask me why there's three different ones😅). The humble form is 参る. So both Paris and Shizuka were right :) I'm convinced the existence of keigo is a conspiracy to make us learners' lives misery. 😂

What! He made this! I'm already learning Japanese. It's actually pretty easy, other than conquering a few normal speaking niches like any other language, it is a mighty fine language that is more than conquerable.

I’m half Japanese, I studied a bit before I come to Japan and I live here for about 8 years, but when people ask me if I can speak Japanese, my answer is always “no”. Because even if you say that, they’ll try to talk to you, but slower. Once in a while, you should show that you really didn’t understand or else they talk faster and faster... 🤓

this is so good guys

I'm traveling Japan now and every time I speak a little bit people just roll with it in a whole conversation. Same as Paris, I have to stop them because even though I understand some parts, I can't answer. I have started learning Japanese formally mid-last year and so far my listening skill has the most improved - as in I can understand ½ episode of Terrace House ^^. But speaking is the hardest because I don't have much opportunities in Canada and I can't never stick to the "record yourself" tip long enough.

Spicy Mustard

I'm currently taking Japanese Beginning 1200 in college and my biggest struggle is grammar like te form. Kanji is also a struggle because some of them are similar and it frustrates me when I forget a line or draw a line wrong.

Its eazy , Konichiwa bljad !

I find WaniKani really good for learning Kanji and their pronunciation.

The mustard shirt!!!

they all look faded especially Jake lol

So what if you only speak casual Japanese but if you're speaking with someone new you make that clear and apologize for the informality? How is that received? In the video you say "you kinda get a pass if it's clear you're not a native speaker" but is that a "I'll put up with it I guess" pass in general, or is it more commonly a more positive sentiment?

iku＜iki masu＜ukagai masu＜o ukagai itashi masu かな。。。 iku=iku yo= iku ne=iku zo=iku wa There are a lot of expressions that say I go.😱 Even in Japanese, kanji with a large number of strokes have become difficult to write recently. Because we convert hiragana automatically now, it is only memorized in the whole image. We have forgotten the details. I think there are many Japanese who can read kanji but can not write it correctly.

We ordered pizza online, and then I got a phone call after a while and I couldn't understand anything and just said "I don't understand" over and over. After a while I realized it must be the pizza delivery, so I opened the door, and of course he stood outside. It was so akwward paying and everything after that phonecall and after that I was scared of phone calls. Also, when I went to the doctors when I was sick for 2 weeks and she said I had a sinus infection and everything was fine, but she asked so many questions about what kind of feeling I had and what my snot was like by using onomatopea. I don't know the difference between most of them haha.

I remember my time dating a Japanese girl. I could only speak very little Japanese which was in Teinei (Simple Polite) form. After a while, she started to tell me that I sounded too formal in front of her lol By the way, I am still struggling with basic level Japanese...

Jake came to Japan to study Japanese Kapp

Missed a huge opportunity to speak Japanese with one-another here.

いらっしゃる　is the honorific form of 行く、来る、&いる. -according to GENKI II

My Japanese learning experience is similar to Jake's. I studied Chinese for years before I studied Japanese and went to Japan. I could understand the meaning of Kanji but didn't know how to read it.

I love Jake

Me a Chinese learning Japanese at the very beginning level, I can understand the meaning of kanji about 90%, but can't read it out until look up a dictionary. BTW, we've struggling English for decades

So if you can speak casual Japanese, and someone asks if you know the language, would it help to respond by telling them you can only speak casual Japanese?

Im currently self learning Japanese hiragana was ok to learn now im busy with katakana and kanji and this is where the frustrating part starts ( im trying my best though and honestly the hardest part is mixing my scedule/freetime )

"How do you guys feel about kanji" THE PUN SETUP WAS RIGHT THERE BUT UNUSED 😭

Not me, but the guy that teaches me and some others, learned 2000 or 3000 kanji and got to a level of a national fluent japanese speaker in 4-6 months i think.

Ok. I will accept that I didn't know the name of Elsa. Will be forever BunnyTokyo to me

2am here in Toronto :)

Can’t you write your name in katakana on your bank card? Or is that seen as not officially your name? And is that still too long?

i didn't take japanese in school. i taught my self mostly by watching japanese tv shows, so my listening skill is like 90%. i have nobody to talk to so my speaking is like 60%, but like 40% in practice because i have no confidence. reading is like 20% because kanji are crazy.

Me: Stares at different writting systems. Writting systems: Omae wa mou shindeiru. Me: Nani?!

I just ignore keigo for now... Casual and teinei will be sufficient for most things, I don't see any reason to ever really speak keigo. Understanding keigo, though... yeah, that could be useful.

I thought いらっしゃいます was the polite version of います

Im here for jake

Im still in that first year but hopefully itll get there someday

I mostly learn through the app memerise. Kanji is so hard i hate it.

Cant tell if Jake is being ironic and sarcastic thru out or he has magically been able to live in japan without knowing japanese. Well done Jake 👏🏽

What's been your experience with pitch accent? This is a question to anyone reading this, so I encourage any replies.

Left to right. Top to bottom. In writing Kanji (some exceptions exist :P)

And the higher form of “iku/行く” or “ikimasu/行きます” would be like “itteorimasu/行っております” or something like that! :)

What HSK level did Jake pass?

Can you comment on this (order: plain, polite, honorific): だ、です、でございます. Have you ever heard the honorific form of desu in speech?

The kegel line?

あざす？　how do you write thanks that jake said ?

My full name is António Ramalho Ortigão Balcão Reis. If I try getting a debit card I’m absolutely fucked...

Jake is a very handsome boi

行きますは、丁寧語かな？teineigo

Goes to China for two years > Learns fluent Chinese Goes to Japan for two years > Doesn't know what Keigo is

probably not hard to find a size for shizuka she's like a stick figure!

Jakenbakelive is my second favourite streamer after CJ rides !!

Short answer: hard

jake japanese very good

Jake looks so awkward in this. LUL

Jake look so lost.

52 btw

Imagine being Indian and trying to get a credit card

the two kana you can easily learn in a day, kanji you will NEVER learn (to be fair, not even Japanese fully know it,... if you disagree ask a native how to write " earthworm " ), keigo is essentially a different language and let's please not talk about Japanese dialects and pre-war kanji ...

kapp

My full name is António Ramalho Ortigão Balcão Reis. If I try getting a debit card I’m absolutely fucked...