[Tobold]

I do not speak any japanese. But I would like to be able to tell that to the japanese players who speak to me. So I googled for it, and now I'm more confused than ever, because I found so many different ways and don't know which one is best. I am looking for something which is reasonably short, I don't want to be rude, but I don't want to type 20 words either.

Can you give me your opinions on:

Nihongo wa hanashimasen
Watashi wa nihongo ga hanasemasen
Watachi nihongo yomemasen
Nihongo wakirimasen

I figured that "nihongo" means "japanese". Is "masen" the negation, and "hanashi/hanase", "yome", "wakiri" the verbs? And what does the "wa" mean, which I have also seen written as "wo" or "o"?

[chorozon]

just use the translator. [greetings] > "Hello!" [language] > "i don`t understand"

[Ragura]

I always use :

Nihongo dekinai

or if I feel like trying my best at Japanese I say

nihongo wa amari dekinai no

which translates as I don't speak Japanese WELL.

Hope that helps.

[Lily]

As I understand it:

Watashi wa nihongo ga wakarimasen.

Means, "I don't speak a word of japanese."

Correct me anyone, if I am wrong, and apologies in advance if I am.

[PetriW]

"watashi" = I
"wa" is a topic marker, in this case marking you yourself as the topic of the sentence.
"wo" (in this case pronounced "o") is a particle indicating direct objects, there are other particles like "ga", "de", "ni", "he" etc.
"hanasu" = to speak
"wakaru" = to understand
"yomu" = to read

Note that the verbs change slight when bent to their polite negative form, ie "hasasu" = "hanashimasen" and "wakaru" = "wakarimasen".

[Tobold]

So as I'm trying to express that I don't understand, would

watashi wa nihongo wakarimasen

be the best way to express it? If I understood you well, that would mean "I (the subject of this phrase) japanese not understand"

[Persephone]

Just do what chorozon said and use the translator (hint: this is why they made it) to tell them.

Simply type the letter I, the hit Tab and choose the phrase "I don't understand." and hit enter. Ta-da! Instant satisfaction.

If you prefer to get all fancy and type it out yourself then you're asking for confusion. (hint: translator was made to decrease confusion)

I get replies from Japanese players all the time who use the "I don't understand." But now if they got all fancy and learned how to type out, "Hello! Sorry, but I do not speak the English language." Well then I'd mistakenly assume he might be able to understand certain words or simple phrases since he managed to say that much. Then we'd have a mess as I try to send messages like "trade? kazham party? you need help? poisona me please?" and them not even having a clue what I'm saying regardless of the relatively well written initial reply.

Your intentions are nice to make an effort to have a personal reply, but you'd be best off using the translator within the community.

[Tobold]

Are you sure that will prevent confusion? Will they see that I was using the translator? Otherwise they might think that I didn't understand what they said for another reason than me not speaking japanese.

Can I somehow macro the translator? I would have been able to do that with a romanji phrase.

Anyway, I'll try the translator too and see what the reactions to it are.

[Gaunt]

I find that using the translator is fun, one phrase in there is "Do you speak english?", that seems to work well.

To use the translator, type the first few letters of a word and hit the TAB key, the phrases in there that start with those letters will list.

The other day i asked a Red Mage in artifact armor that was chopping woood in Fort, "Kill" "Dragoon" "Quest"

He went and duo'd the Dragon with me and got me my flag.

[Lily]

You can use the macros to store pre-made replies, yes.

Just use the tab key to formulate what you want to say for each line.

So like on line one:

/p [then you could hit the TAB key, scroll down the list to Languages select "Do you speak English, then hit enter.]

It would show:

/p Do you speak English?

And, the colour of the writing will be pale blue, to show you that you plucked it from the auto-translator, rather than typing it.

I use this in all my spell macros where I can, so everytime I cast a spell, it's been chosen from the Spells category, so it'll appear in english to EN players and japanese to the JP players.

For example:

ctrl + 1:
/ma "Cure" <stpc>
/p Cure - <lastst> | MP: <mpp>

the "Cure" in line 1 I've just typed in normally as always.

Anyway, you might find you'll be using a lot of macros with pre-formed japanese, lol.. could be hard memorising all your macros.

[Omena]

I always use : Nihongo dekinai or if I feel like trying my best at Japanese I say nihongo wa amari dekinai no which translates as I don't speak Japanese WELL. Hope that helps.

Sorry to bump an older thread like this, but I just have to ask this.

Wouldn't "nihongo wa amari ii deki no" be the correct way to say it? I'm quite the noob at Japanese, so I don't really know if that is a good way to say it. To me it seems like "amari dekinai" would be closer to "is not of not very quality" when translated directly.

Also, you don't mention yourself at all in the sentence. I know Japanese is very much based on understanding the context, but couldn't saying that phrase seem like you are mocking the Japanese language?

Oh and hello to everyone. I recently ordered the game and it should arrive around Christmas. I'm looking forward to meeting some of you people online. :spin:

[Maxim]

"Nihongo wa amari ii deki no" isn't the proper way to say it. That's the equivalent of saying, "My Japanese good sort of is do you see." Makes no sense. XD

I would just use, "Gomennasai. Nihongo wa wakarimasen." You don't necessarily have to put the "Watashi wa" in front because through context they can tell you're talking about yourself.

Also, I wouldn't encourage people to go out and say, "Nihongo wa hanashimasen." That's like saying, "I refuse to speak Japanese" which can be taken the wrong way.

[Omena]

Oh wow!

Either my dictionary is way off or that's way too advanced for me. I think I'll just stick to that "Gomennasai. Nihongo wa wakarimasen" then. It reflects my level of skill much better anyway. :sweat:

[moonglo]

A bit off topic, but I wish FFXI had a translation option for "I'm using a translator." I had someone speak to me in Japanese about a PT and all I could do was say that I couldn't understand in English. I was looking up how to use the translator and they said "goodnit" and I used the translator to say "Good Night!" as well and they replied in Japanese and I didn't know what they were saying.. :sweat: I didn't know how to say that I was using the translator to be polite...

[Junun]

Heres a great web site with alot of common phrases us English speaking persons can use.

http://xeubie.tripod.com/ff11jpn/id7.html