JPNS 1010
Dialogue for
Presentation 7
(Supplements for
the textbook
Genki: An Integrated Approach, Vol. 1)
Click here to listen to the
entire dialogue.
Click on the links
below to listen to each individual sentence.
John and Akiko are
talking about her trip last week.
ジョン：あきこさん、せんしゅう、なにをしましたか。
あきこ：京とに、おてらを見に行きました。
ジョン：そうですか。おてらはどうでしたか。
あきこ：ふるくて、しずかで、おおきかったですよ。
ジョン：そうですか。たくさん人がいましたか。
あきこ：いいえ、あまりいませんでした。十人ぐらいいました。
Notes
John starts this
dialogue by asking Akiko what she did last week (せんしゅう). Akiko responds that she went to
The pattern Japanese
use to say someone “went to [destination] to [purpose]” is 「destinationにpurposeにいく」. The verb describing the purpose must be
in the stem form. (For more details see, p. 140 in your textbook.) You can also use other verbs of movement
in the place of いく, for instance くる (to come) or かえる (to return home).
John says, “Oh,
really?” Then he asks her how
the temples were. Akiko responds
that they were old, quiet, and big.
When people join sentences to form compound sentences, the end of all
but the last sentence should be in the –te form. This goes for adjectives and noun phrases
as well as verbs. In order to see
how to form the –te forms of adjectives and
noun phrases, please consult p. 139 of your textbook. Notice that in the sentence ふるくて、しずかで、おおきかったですよ, Akiko combines
three sentences. If she were to say
them separately, they would be as follows.
ふるかったです。
しずかでした。
おおきかったです。
However, instead of
making three little itty-bitty sentences, Japanese people would likely combine
them into one smooth sentence, just as Americans would too: “They were
old, quiet, and big.”
John says, “Oh,
really?” then asks her if there were a lot of people. Akiko answers there were not that
many. Do you remember the word あまり from lesson 3? (If not, see p. 63 where it appears as
one of the frequency adverbs. Remember
that the word あまり meaning “not
much” always appears with a negative verb.)
Akiko then says that
there were about ten people [at the temples]. The counter for people is 人, but the way this
kanji is read depends on the number it is combined with. As your book explains on p. 141, there
are two irregular words used for counting people. These are the words for “one person”
(一人 which is read ひとり) and “two
people” (二人 which is read ふたり). If the number of people is greater or equal
to three, the counter for people 人is simply read にん.
For instance in this case, 十人 (ten people) is read じゅうにん. How would you read the following numbers
of people: 百人 (100 people)、千人 (1,000 people)、一万人 (10,000 people)、百万人 (one million
people)?
Here are the answers…
百人 ひゃくにん
千人 せんにん
一万人 いちまんにん
百万人 ひゃくまんにん
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of Jeffrey Angles
Updated March 13, 2008