Welcome to lesson four. This whole section is based on something which
Juugo reminded me about, I hadn't covered this section yet - and its important too
This, That and That other thing
You already know how to say "this" - "kore", well depending on where the object being talked about is there are variants that follow this pattern. "sore" means the same as "that" and theres a third one I'll tell you about "are" which means "that over there". Heres how they work:
"
kore" - something near the person talking
"
sore" - something near the person being talked to
"
are" - something that's not near anybody
Here are some rather deadly examples:
"
Kore wa pisutoru desu." - "
This is a
pistol."
"
Sore wa bakudan desu!" - "
That is a
bomb!"
"
Are wa hikooki desu." - "
That over there is a
plane."
In the first sentence, the person is talking about something that they're holding. In the second one, the person they're talking to is either holding a bomb or standing near one. In the third sentence, the plane "Hikooki" isn't near either person in the conversation. In regular conversation, "sore" and "are" are a bit more flexible than that, but it's better to remember it correctly.
If your wondering about the word for "which" its "dore" which I'll cover more when we get to asking questions.
Ko-So-A-Do!
You might have noticed a bit of a pattern with these words - they all end in "re". This is very handy, because there are several other sets of words in Japanese that use the same pattern - they have a "ko-something", "so-something", "a-something", and "do-something". These are sometimes cleverly called "kosoado kotoba" ("kotoba" means "word").
For now, to keep your head from exploding, we'll only look at one more set. These will be your very first set of adjectives, which all end in "no":
"
kono katana" - "
this Sword"
"
sono terebi" - "
that TV"
"
ano hito" - "
that person over there"
"
dono bakudan" - "
which bomb"
They all work just like the same words in English - you just stick them before any noun, and then, instead of talking about just any old object, you can identify one in particular. Handy for pointing out something if there are many similar ones nearby. For example, compare these two sentences:
"
Terebi desu." - "
It's a
TV."
"Kono
terebi desu." - "This
TV."
This is again, all building up to asking questions.
This and This?
You might be getting confused by the difference between "kono" and "kore", since they both seem to mean "this". They do - in English, "kore" and "kono" are both written "this", but even in English they're two different this-es.
The important thing to remember is that "kore" is a noun - you can use it for the subject of a sentence.
"
This is something." - that "this" is "
kore".
"Kono", however, is an adjective; you use it to modify a noun.
"
This car is Red."- that "this" is "
kono".
Put simply, "kono" is for describing. Get it? More confused now than before? If so, forget you ever read this - "
kono" - paragraph.
Recap
Lets go over the useful ways to use This's and that's - "no"'s
"Kono (something)" - "
This (
something)"
"Sono (something)" - "
That (
something)"
"Ano (something)" - "
That (
something over there)"
"
Dono (something)" - "
Which (
something)"
And combining it all...
Kono (something) wa (something) desu" - "
This (
something) is (
something)"
(Name) wa (something) desu" - "(
name) is (
something)"
Example time!
1 "Sore wa boku no mono desu." - "That belongs to me."
2 "Are wa Oni desu." - "That over there is an Ogre."
3 "Ano Katana wa boku no mono desu." - "That sword over there belongs to me."
4 "Sono kami wa okane desu." - "That paper is money."
5 "Mastaz-Sama wa Shinjin desu." - "Mastaz is Godlike."
More useful words here "okane" means "money"
"Boku" is another way of saying "me"
"Shinjin" Means "godlike person" and "Oni" Means among other things, "Ogre"
The "Sama" after Mastaz has no translation into English, Its whats called a Honorific - A kind of title which I'll cover in the next lesson.
Number three is worth an extra look at, pay attention to where the particles are in the sentance. "wa" is being used to explain that the sword is the subject and "no" is linking the object to the owner. "desu" is functioning as the "s" on the end of "belong" If your unsure, go back to lesson 2 and read over the "Desu" part again.
Join me in lesson five if you haven't collapsed.
See you there!