RateItAll: The Opinion Network

I love Japanese culture and language. It is very unique.

I never had the patience to learn more than a couple of curse words when I was in Okinawa, and even those I've forgetten...

UPDATE: Almost forgot, I used to know how to describe myself as being well hung. Thank you, Sgt Reardon.

Just grates on my ears. It's not mellifluous and pleasant sounding to me. Then again i dont find any Asian languages easy listening

Interesting story, when I tried to enjoy anime, I wanted to learn the language, so I went to the library and I got a book. I took the book back the next day. It's too hard. It seems nearly impossible to learn. My brain hurts!!

I think it is a beautiful language, but I don't think I'd want to learn it. Plus, I know a TON of elitist anime nerds who just want to learn it so they can watch their silly anime shows in the original form...and think they're cool and superior just because they say baka (idiot) and nani? (what?) all the time...

This language will probably die off someday, like the other Asian languages. It is impossibly difficult to learn and master, and probably pointless. There are two easy alphabets to learn, the hiragana and the katakana. However, the third and most used alphabet, the kanji, is a nightmare. Most diligent Westerners will never truly master the Japanese language, there are literally thousands of these complicated kanji. Having taken the class for fun in college, I realized Japan was not the place I thought it was. If you take this class in college, be prepared for the geeks you'll meet in 101. The Japanese TA assumed that we all knew Japanese the first day...not to mention she was a Sadist. I wouldn't recommend Japanese or Japan after taking two years of classes, it's a messed up culture, and one worth avoiding.

Not as tough as you think, but still requires some work. The grammar isn't too complicated -- the tough part really is learning 3 different alphabets!!!

It's interesting. But I thought this was tough. It's a bad language an I can't say the numbers in Japanese.

grew up in japan. love the language and everything about the place. probably speak it better then english.

Easy to learn! A lot less difficult than many others! Konnechiwa! Watashi wa Ladyshark!

I tried to teach myself Japanese once or twice, and failed nearly utterly. I watched The Last Samurai the other day, and I understood two words without looking at the subtitles: Nihonjin (Japanese) and hai (yes). Now I'm determined to have aother go at it. I've been shamed into trying again.

The three true Japanese alphabets are Harigana (derived from the chinese kanji characters by the ladies of the imperial court around the year 900, but are curved into a single or very few lines), Katakana (similar to Harigana but with straighter lines and blockier shapes) and Kanji (same as the Chinese characters but with different pronunciation). However in learning this completely alien language I would first advise learning romanji (Japanese translated into the roman alphabet). Due to the emphasis on individual syllables, learning Japanese starts off as cracking a code but as you get better at it one finds themselves forming flowing sentences in a truly beautiful language.

I hope to be fluent in this language by the time I graduate college.

In adopting/adapting the Chinese model, the Japanese selected the worst possible writing system for their language (which is linguistically unrelated to Chinese), and Japanese children devote much more time and effort to learning kanji and kanas (writing systems) than is required by children learning Roman-script languages.