Shanghai?

[edededed]

Not Vampire Hunter D, good ol' American AD&D! I never even watched Vampire Hunter D!

Fong: cool, that does sound very nice!

[mixjourneyman]

hahaha

The thing is that D, from Vampire Hunter D has a parasite that lives in his hand and talks to him and whatnot.

[edededed]

Ptui! His name is "D?" Er, that is, like, SO typically Japanimationlikeesquechik. Hkptublech!

[mixjourneyman]

Yeah, whats up with the Japanese and the English letter D?
One of my favourite Visuru bands is called D.
Any insights on why that particular letter is so used in J-media?

[edededed]

I can answer nearly any question about Japan you like.

D or "Dee" is a "foreign sound" in the minds of Japanese, i.e. because it does not exist as a mora (phonetic syllable) in Japanese (you don't ever have to use the sound "dee" when speaking Japanese), it sounds cool. In English, we have the Alphabet, and thus we don't really pay attention to certain moras that we do not use (like noone cares about the "zha" sound (zh as in the s in measure)), but as Japanese uses a writing system that specifies the moras (i.e. hiragana and katakana), it is much more easy to notice.

It seems weird, but in Japanese, even though there are "dah" (da), "deh" (de), and "doh" (do) sounds, there isn't a "dee" (di) or "doo" (du) sound.

So, anyway, foreign-sounding things sound cool. As such, foreign-sounding or foreign-looking names (that are not actually foreign) are often used in product names and such here. Other popular foreign-ish sounds/spellings include anything with a "v," using a "c" instead of a "k," many combinations of "f," and so on.

For example, some recent product names:

Diga
Viera
Vaio

The tendency for these "foreign" spellings is quite high - if you are ever sitting in a Japanese train, just look around at the advertisements.

Some stupid famous people even use the "foreign" letters to write their names (like "Tomiko Van," for example, who is really "Tomiko Ban" (and not a type of automobile (guess she doesn't know that definition))). Some non-famous people even do this on their namecards, which is stupid.

[mixjourneyman]

Yeah, I'm totally familiar with hirigana and katakana, I figured it probably was a foreign sounding thing.
Thing is, when I think of the letter D, I just think of taking a massive pre natal shit, thats all.

[nianfong]

hirAgana

[mixjourneyman]

hirAgana

Quiet you!
Correct spellings are not allowed!

I just got a really fun idea for a drinking game.
Get a hiragana alphabet sheet and get really drunk and try to say each of the vowels as fast as you can.
That would be really fun. Too bad I don't drink.

[edededed]

Actually, it is totally the fault of hiragana and katakana, at least in the way it is taught today. Note:

A I U E O
Ka Ki Ku Ke Ko
Sa Shi Su Se So
Ta Chi Tsu Te To
Na Ni Nu Ne No
Ha Hi Fu He Ho
Ma Mi Mu Me Mo
Ya - Yu - Yo
Ra Ri Ru Re Ro
Wa - - -Wo
N

Basically, they put rows of consonants and columns of vowels to make a matrix, except that it is WRONG.

Ka Ki Ku Ke Ko
Ra Ri Ru Re Ro

These are okay, but WTF were they thinking for:

Ta Chi Tsu Te To
Sa Shi Su Se So

Because of this (wrong) juxtaposition, basically most Japanese assume that the different consonants in the rows are all the same.

They should revise it into something like:

Ta Ti Tu Te To
Cha Chi Chu Che Cho
Tsa Tsi Tsu Tse Tso

...and so on.

[mixjourneyman]

I never thought of that.
One thing I love about how hiragana is organized though is that you can sort of sing the letters out as a song.
Thats pretty fun.

[edededed]

The song is older and better and goes like this:

Ir Ro Ha Ni Ho He To
Chi Ri Nu Ru Wo
Wa Ka Yo Ta Re So
Tsu Ne Na Ra Mu
U Wi No O Ku Ya Ma
Ke Fu Ko E Te
A Sa Ki Yu Me Mi Shi
We Hi Mo Se Su
(N)

Note that the old kana of "We" and "Wi" are still in this song.

Although not grouped by sound like the modern version, the modern version did it wrong, so we might as well revert to the cool song instead.

[mixjourneyman]

Oh Ed, I have a quick question for you re nihongo pronunciation:
I have noticed that the particle "O" is sometimes pronounced "Wo" in popular music.
Why is that?
Example "Anata O" become "Anata Wo".
What up wit dat?

[CaliG]

Anyone know of lhbf in Shanghai?
I have heard there are a few guys, but don't know if they are good.

This guy is there.



I hear that there are some good guys on Nanjing Lu on Sunday mornings walking away from the Bund.

I've been told that Shanghai is the place for LHBF by a long time LHBF player, but that's all I really know about that.

If you click my youtube screen name on that vid "gregoryfromcali" you can see a bunch of other Shanghai players at the Double Dragon Alliance doing their forms.

Let me know when you'll be out there, you could also probably find out about a lot about other Shanghai teachers from Shen Laoshi's students. He tends to attract foreigners looking for hardcore IMAs and some of them know of other teachers.

There's also a lot of ZhaoBao there as well, if that interest you.