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Whether dodging traffic in Tokyo or eating your way through Osaka, knowing some common Japanese phrases before you go is a must. A land known for honor, Japanese people will bestow kindness and ...
A lazy greeting is regarded with the type of disdain that would accompany a limp handshake in parts of the West. The most common greetings are ohayō gozaimasu (おはようございます) or "good morning", used until about 11:00 a.m. but may be used at any time of day.
Pages in category "Japanese words and phrases" The following 200 pages are in this category, out of approximately 386 total. This list may not reflect recent changes .
Many restaurants and homes in Japan are equipped with Western-style chairs and tables. However, traditional Japanese low tables and cushions, usually found on tatami floors, are also very common. Tatami mats, which are made of straw, can be easily damaged and are hard to clean, thus shoes or any type of footwear are always taken off when ...
The Japanese word お辞儀 (ojigi) was derived from the homophone お時宜, which originally meant "the opportune timing to do something". It did not start to denote specifically the act of bowing in the contemporary sense until late Edo period (1603–1868), when samurai bowing etiquette had spread to the common populace.
Yojijukugo in the broad sense refers to Japanese compound words consisting of four kanji characters, which may contain an idiomatic meaning or simply be a compound noun. [3] However, in the narrow or strict sense, the term refers only to four- kanji compounds that have a particular (idiomatic) meaning, which cannot be inferred from the meanings ...
Japanese commonly use proverbs, often citing just the first part of common phrases for brevity. For example, one might say i no naka no kawazu (井の中の蛙, 'a frog in a well') to refer to the proverb i no naka no kawazu, taikai o shirazu (井の中の蛙、大海を知らず, 'a frog in a well cannot conceive of the ocean').
Word order is normally subject–object–verb with particles marking the grammatical function of words, and sentence structure is topic–comment. Its phrases are exclusively head-final and compound sentences are exclusively left-branching. [a] Sentence-final particles are used to add emotional or emphatic impact, or make questions.