TCJ Blog

When taking a taxi in Japan, it’s more than just transportation—it’s a chance to experience Japan’s culture of omotenashi (hospitality). Today, we’ll explore practical phrases to make your taxi ride smoother, while also highlighting cultural aspects unique to taxis in Japan. Go beyond the language barrier and deepen your understanding of Japanese culture.

"たばこ：Tobacco（tabako）” and "たまご：egg（tamago）", "にく：meat（niku）" and "くに：country（kuni）" are Japanese words with similar readings but different meanings. There are also many things that have different meanings when said in different ways. In this article, I would like to introduce some expressions that Japanese language learners find easy to make mistakes in, from the point of view of a Japanese language teacher.

“I like you” or “我喜欢你” (Chinese). This is the phrase used in English or Chinese when saying “I like you.” However, when translating them into Japanese, there are many ways to say “I,” such as “Watashi wa anata ga suki desu,” “Ore wa kimi ga suki desu,” or “Uchi wa anata ga suki desu.” These “I” or “我” (which means “I” in Chinese) are called first-person pronouns. First-person pronouns are used to describe the speaker or writer. Japanese first-person pronouns have a variety of options besides “watashi.”

Japanese has various words expressing weather, not only “sunny,” “cloudy,” “rainy” and “snowy.” Also, it has lots of words to express the movement of the sun and time. Let’s check Japanese words related to “weather” that we often use in conversation.

This article explains the automatic verbs that Japanese people often use in their daily lives. Depending on the learner's native language, the distinction between automatic and transitive verbs may not be very clear, which can be difficult, but we encourage you to study with this article as a reference.