Hi,

As I study Japanese, I've become increasingly aware of the importance of hierarchy! Furthermore, I'll be vacationing in Japan and anticipate my most common interactions with be with service workers (e.g. wait staff, cashiers, hotel staff).

Thus, I was wondering how I can most respectfully interact with Japanese service workers, while respecting the social hierarchy!

Should I use formal language, or just keigo with colloquialisms? Is it okay to refer to them as お兄さん or お姉さん^(1), or is that too casual^(2)? Are there any other unspoken rules/advice I wouldn't even think to ask about?

Thanks!

^(1)A brief tangent, but is お姉ちゃん preferred over お姉さん or is it too diminutizing/condescending?

^(2)btw I'm probably younger than or the same age as most of them, in case relative age matters

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##Past Threads

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I know this might be a pretty tall order, but as someone who wants to start immersing, after years of avoiding it, I would love to have a podcast that every now and then gives me an English summary of the things being said. I just want to know if what I think I understood lines up with what has been said.

Honestly I think, especially for beginners, a podcast that would do one sentence in Japanese and then translates that said sentence into English would probably be quite popular IMHO.

So maybe my wishes can become true and there is something similar already out there, so I wanted to ask.

Thanks

Hey everyone, I use the Migaku Course as my primary study method and havent found anything online about that specific question. I am about 25 percent finished and when I access some easy japanese website it also displays a comprehension of arround 20 percent. I also occasionally watch some YouTube Videos about grammar or the Cure Dolly Sensei Course. Has anyone used Migaku Course your primary study tool and how much comprehension did you actually get after finishing it on day to day media like news and anime?

If you are looking for free resources for daily immersion, try downloading Tver app and use japanese vpn. Totally free to watch japanese drama with japanese subs or news. I use it daily

I’m in Japan and I can usually handle basic Japanese fine ordering food, quick exchanges, no problem. Or at least I thought so.

Today I went into a food store to grab something simple. I picked my items, went to pay, and the staff asked me a question. I think it was something like “温めますか？” or about bagging. Nothing complicated. But my brain just… stalled. I knew I recognized the words, but I couldn’t process them fast enough in real time. So instead of thinking, I just panicked and said:

“あ、はい…お願いします。”

Even though I wasn’t even sure what I was agreeing to. The staff paused, I smiled awkwardly, and just kind of nodded my way through the rest of it. Walked out still unsure what I actually said yes to. Later it hit me that it was probably just a super normal question. It’s wild how different it feels knowing Japanese in your head vs. actually hearing it in the moment.

Anyone else get that weird brain freeze in simple situations like this?

People who have passed N2, could you watch movies without subtitles at ease? Read books? Have in depth conversations?

Those are just some examples but what could YOU personally do at N2?

And if applicable, how did it differ to what you can do with N1?

I love the Nihongo con Teppei podcasts but a consistent issue with all of the ones I've listened to (For Beginners, Z, and Original) is that the audio at the beginning and end of every podcast is like 2-3 times louder than Teppei's voice and it makes it too hard to understand what he's saying. This is especially egregious on the outros for the Original series. The last 90 seconds of every podcast is essentially whispering with music blasting over the top. I have to set my audio levels to 50 in order to hear Teppei clearly, but when the music comes on I have to turn it down to 30 to avoid waking up my next door neighbors (literally - you can hear it through the walls).

Is there a version where someone has edited out the music? Or some configuration I can tweak in my Spotify or operating system settings to boost the voice or cut the background noise or something? I've Googled for this but apparently nobody else has this issue.

This thread is for all the simple questions (what does that mean?) and minor posts that don't need their own thread, as well as for first-time posters who can't create new threads yet. Feel free to share anything on your mind.

The daily thread updates every day at 9am JST, or 0am UTC.

↓ Welcome to r/LearnJapanese! ↓

• New to Japanese? Read the Starter's Guide and FAQ.

• New to the subreddit? Read the rules.

• Read also the pinned comment below for proper question etiquette & answers to common questions!

Please make sure to check the wiki and search for old posts before asking your question, to see if it's already been addressed. Don't forget about Google or sites like Stack Exchange either!

This subreddit is also loosely partnered with this language exchange Discord, which you can likewise join to look for resources, discuss study methods in the #japanese_study channel, ask questions in #japanese_questions, or do language exchange(!) and chat with the Japanese people in the server.

---

##Past Threads

You can find past iterations of this thread by using the search function. Consider browsing the previous day or two for unanswered questions.

Really wanting native speakers' feedback on this question. But advanced speakers are also welcome. I think it'd be helpful if you read the whole post.

I'm watching CIJ and they're playing 21 questions about what movie someone is thinking of. The question was if the main character(s) were ひとり. So asking if there was just a single main character. The other person said yes. If the main character was an animal (maybe an animal documentary) or something anthropomorphic (like zoolanders), how would that question be answered?

Would they say "はい、ひとり" because there is one main character. Or would they say "いいえ” and leave it at that and they'd have to guess いっぴき in another question. Or would they say "はい、いっぴ" or "いいえ、いっぴき" or would it just depend heavily on the person that's answering and how "nice" they want to be?

Basically I'm not sure if the word ひとり is actually the words "one person" or if it's just "one" with the implied meaning that it's a person, but can still work if the response is counting other things.

My main reason for bringing up this question is because in a textbook I learned from a long time ago, I saw an example dialogue that was something like ”家族は何人いますか” and the answer was I think "四人と一匹います”

This was the example I pulled from a tweet:

Gペン縛り軽い塗り練

Does the meaning still get across?