Japanese for Ham QSOs -- Part 2 Those of you who have been bravely trying out your Japanese on hapless JAs will want to go beyond the few phrases I gave you in the December issue of Ye Olde Rf Output. Remember, place equal stress on each syllable. I mark long syllables by doubling the final vowel. Where I believe the Hepburn transliteration could be misleading, I have placed a similar sounding english sound in brackets. For example shi[she]. This means that everytime you see the transliteration shi you will pronounce it as "she". Your can improve your Japanese pronunciation by getting used to hearing the language. Tune in the Radio Japan International broadcast in Japanese on 5.960 MHz every night at 9 PM EST and listen for awhile. You will soon be able to pick out the syllabic units I am separating with dashes here. Notice the equal stress on each syllable. You will also hear changes in pitch within words. Don't worry about this pitch accent in Japanese; only rarely does it change the meaning of a word. Radio Japan also broadcasts a Japanese language lesson during the last ten or fifteen minutes of the hour-long English language broadcast which begins at 10 PM on 5.960 MHz. Listening to spoken Japanese as you begin to study Japanese is very helpful. There is nothing worse than learning bad pronunciation and then working hard later on to repair the damage. There was a misprint in the first Japanese phrase on page 5 of the December issue of Ye Olde Rf Output. To-te-mo ta-no-shi[she] QSO o do-mo a-ri-ga-to go-zai-ma-shi- ta. Thank you for a very enjoyable QSO. You don't need to master this pronunciation guide to produce recognizable Japanese, since Japanese pronunciation is very easy. But at least take a look at it. This guide will help you pronounce Japanese more accurately. Brief Pronunciation Guide a [as al in calm but shorter] ka sa [sah] ta i [as e in set] ki [key] shi [she] chi [chee] u [as oo in soon but shorter] ku su [sue] tsu [ts lights] e [as in set] ke [kay] se [say] te [tay] o [as aw in law but shorter] ko so to na ha ma ya ra [short la] ni hi [he] mi ri [short lee] nu hu mu yu ru [short lou] ne [nay] he [hey] me [may but shorter] re [short lay] no ho mo yo ro [short low] Su-mi-ma-sen ga (QRM) (QRN) (ni-hon-go ga heta) kara (QTH) (na-mae) ga wa-ka-ri-ma-sen-de-shi-ta. I'm sorry, but because of (QRM) (QRN) (my poor Japanese) I didn't get your (QTH) (name). Moo i-chi-do ku-da-sai. Please repeat one more time. QSL kaa-do wa bu-roo ni tsu-ji-tte o-ku-ri-ma-su. I will send you the QSL card via the bureau. Kyoo wa (ii) (a-tsu-i) (su-zu-shi) (sa-mu-i) ten-ki desu. The weather is (fine) (hot) (cool) (cold) today. Yu-ki ga fu-ri-ma-shi-ta kara ko-do-mo-ta-chi wa tai-hen yo-ro-ko- bi-ma-shi-ta. The children are very happy because snow fell. Ri-gu wa (Kenwood) (Icom) (Ya-e-su) (etc.) desu. Numbers in Japanese 1 i-chi 2 ni 3 san 4 yon 5 go 6 ro-ku 7 shi-chi 8 ha-chi 9 kyu 10 juu 11 juu-i-chi 12 juu-ni 13 juu-san 20 ni-juu 21 ni-juu-i-chi 30 san-juu 40 yon-juu 50 go-juu 60 ro-ku juu 70 shi-chi-juu 80 ha-chi juu 90 kyuu-juu 100 hya-ku 135 hya-ku san-juu-go 200 ni-hya-ku 300 san-hya-ku 1000 sen 10,000 man 1,000,000 hya-ku man Cardinals (Things) 1 hi-to-tsu 2 fu-ta-tsu 3 mi-ttsu 4 yo-ttsu (People) 1 hi-to-ri 2 fu-ta-ri 4 san-nin 4 yon-nin etc. (Time -- o'clock) 1 i-chi-ji 2 ni-ji 3 san-ji 4 yo-ji 5 go-ji 6 ro-ku ji 7 shi-chi ji 8 ha-chi-ji 9 ku-ji 10 juu-ji 11 juu-i-chi-ji 12 juu-ni-ji I-ma a-me-ri-ka no hi-ga-shi kai-gan de wa go-go no ro-ku-ji de- su. It is now 6 PM on the east coast of the USA. I-ma ni-hon de wa (a-sa) (go-zen) no ha-chi-ji san-juu ni fun. In Japan it is now 8:32 (AM) (in the morning). A-me-ri-ka jin no he-ta ni-hon-go no ha-tsu-on o ki-ki-ma-shi-ta- ka-ra [Tono]-san no mi-mi ga i-tai de-su ka? U-re-shi-te ku-da-sai. Do your ears hurt from listening to an American's awful Japanese pronunciation? Please forgive me. Kyoo wa hi[he]-joo ni sa-mu-i ten-ki de-su. On-do wa re-i ka juu do ku-rai desu. It is very cold today. The temperature is about 10 degrees (Celsius) below zero. You should be starting to get a feel for Japanese sentence structure. The basic word order is subject-object-predicate. Often the subject is understood and omitted. The particle "wa" marks the subject. "De-su" at the end of the subject is a form of the verb "to be". "No" means of, "ka-ra" means from. Hang in there. Soon you will be able to compose your own Japanese sentences. 73 de Dave WA1LBP contact: WA1LBP@N4QQ