Anime Review (1): Aria the Animation

Picture this: Italy on Mars paved with endless blue, blue sea. Then you have gondoliers as your tour guides around this Neo Italian city. A smile on this young female tour guide showing the lovely sites. Everyone seems content and relaxed. This is what this anime provides. It shows you the wonderful world of Neo Venezia through the eyes of Akari Mizunashi as she trains her way to be a professional gondolier meeting new people and experiences.
Oh Aria... Such a wonderful Anime. The ultimate slice-of-life anime out there with a fantastical edge. :]
My top favourite anime out there. I full-out recommend it. Like most slice of life, not a lot is progressed in the series. But after you watch season 1 and 2, a lot of changes happen in the last season (there's 3 seasons in total) in the most epic way. It's one of those series where it gets better in each season. Each character is likeable, relateable and has a story.

You can purchase it on DVD here :]

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Japanese Lesson (7): Pronouns

Very different from English, the Japanese language has various, variations (haha) on how to describe "I" and "you"
It mostly just depends on how you see yourself as in terms of femininity and masculinity.
Here's the mostly used-terms for "I":

• 私 watashi (unisex, standard); sounds like WA-ta-SHEE
• 私 atashi (female use); sounds like AH-ta-SHEE 
• 私 watakushi (selfish); sounds like WA-ta-koo-SHEE
• 僕 boku (male); sounds like BOU-koo
• 俺 ore ("manly" male); sounds like Oh-leh

In Japanese culture, it's really not polite to use "I" every so often. But when prompted, these are the terms you would use. Japanese people are usually seen as indirect and unselfish being that's their culture and they value of being discreet. Which is why they probably view the U.S. as stereotypically obnoxious whenever we use our pronouns.

Here's the mostly-used terms for "you" (which are all not usually polite to use, unless there's no choice in the matter)

• あなた anata (general); sounds like Ah-nah-tah
  note: wives usually refer to their husbands as that term though I'm unsure if the kanji is different, but the sound is the same.
• あんた anta; sounds like Ahn-tah (more informal and sometimes rude)
• 君　kimi; sounds like KEE-me (used for friends and probably little kids)

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Anime/Manga & Japanese Lessons (3&6): Kansai and ラブ★コン

何でよね！

Like any country, there are various dialects that is somewhat different from its standard language. One dialect in Japan I'll be talking about is Kansai dialect. It's a pretty funny dialect that is often used in Japanese comedic groups. It's most prevalent in the city of Osaka in the Kansai region.

In the anime world, characters from Osaka are often seen as side characters. You can say they're like the 'hick' part of Japan. Often teased about by the way they talk and their different customs. It's nothing to be offended about since we do it ourselves when you think about it.

A great anime to watch with prevalent Kansai dialect would be Lovely Complex (usually seen written as ラブ★コン　in Japanese media). When you watch plenty of anime and then watch Lovely Complex, you start to hear differences. Honestly, rarely you would find the main character with a Kansai accent/dialect in various anime. This is a great recommendation to notice standard Japanese and not-so standard haha.

Don't forget kids, that the U.S. has various dialects as well. We can understand each other (most of the time), we just sound different and sometimes funny.

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A short Anime/Manga lesson (3): Seiyuu

For those wondering, the term seiyuu (pronounced as SAY-you) just means voice acter/actress usually for anime.

It's seen written like this 声優. A nifty thing to note is that the kanji for  声 means voice.

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Anime/Manga Lesson (2): About the term "Anime"

the term "anime" (as seen written as "アニメ" and pronounced as AH-nee-meh) is pretty much the Japanese term for a Japanese animation, Japanese animated cartoon, Japanese animated film.
Therefore, there's no need at all to say something like "Japanese anime." It's already implied that it's Japanese. (It's annoying when people say it like that... and it's almost redundant)
This is not to be confused with the term "manga" (pronounced as 'mahn-gAH' NOT pronounced similiar to 'mango'). Manga contains still images out of Japanese orgin (think of a comic book only that bookstores like to call it "graphic novels" being that they tend to be real thick). Again, there's no need to say something weird like "Japanese manga." It's implied to be Japanese.
Got it? Good.

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Japanese Lesson (5) Addressing Strangers

Of course, there are times when you meet someone without introducing each other. Usually, we would just call them "miss", "madame", "mister", and the like. Japanese has titles for strangers as well.
When addressing... (far left as formal to far right as informal tense)

• a woman much older than you = obasama, obasan, obachan
• a man much older than you = ojisama, ojisan, ojichan
  
  Careful when you use them; otherwise, you may offend someone. Unless that person has some gray/white hairs, it may be better to use titles addressed to an older sister/brother which again are...
  
• older sister/stranger = (O)neesan and/or (O)neechan
• older brother/stranger = (O)niisan and/or (O)niichan
  using the '-sama' prefix is rather rare. You wouldn't call a stranger in such a highly received way would you?  Older cousins are titled in this way as well.
  A person getting offended (especially females) might be because those titles ("oba" and "oji") sound closely to addressing a granparenst which are...
  
• female grandparent = (O)baasama, (O)baasan, (O)baachan
• male grandparent = (O)jiisama, (O)jiisan, (O)jiichan
  notice it's only one letter/syllable away from the stranger title to a grandparent title (someone who's of senior citizen age) 

and as always, younger people don't have a special title to them. They're just not really addressed; if anything, say something like "that girl", "that boy", etc.

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Japanese Lesson (4) Family

Now that you know about prefixes, it'll be easier to talk about family.

Far left as the more formal to far right as informal form... When you're addressing...

• Mother, Mom, Mommy = (O)kaasama, (O)kaasan, (O)kaachan; Hahaue (this term was used in samurai families prior to the Meiji period)
  Notice that we use prefixes when addressing 'mom.' It's the same idea throughtout. The '(O)' part is optional, but it is often used. Reason probably being is that putting an 'O' in everything is probably tiresome, though probably is the most proper way of speaking.
• Father, Dad, Daddy = (O)tousama, (O)tousan, (O)touchan; Chichiue (used in samurai families as well)
  
• Older/elder Sister = (O)neesama, (O)neesan, (O)neechan; Aneki is another but rarely used
  
  you can insert the person's name before mentioning the"nee"+prefix part which is the same for elder brother and sometimes but rarely to mother/father
• Older/elder Brother = (O)niisama, (O)niisan, (O)niichan; Aniki is another but is rarely used as well

Similar to the "sempai" idea (as seen here), younger brothers and sisters don't have a title. To the older brother and sister, they would just call their younger siblings by their names. And being they are in a close relationship, they would use the -chan prefix or without a prefix at all.

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