Here are some more everyday phrases and words to get you started in Japanese. The lists below will give the kanji, hiragana/katakana, romaji, and English of the days of the week, months, times of the day, and household items. We hope this list is helpful!

Months

Times of the Day

The following list details how to say each hour in Japanese. If you want to say half past an hour, simply add 半 (han) to the end of the word. For example, one o’clock is 一時 (ichiji) in Japanese, so one thirty would be 一時半 (ichijihan). If you want to say AM place ごせん in front of the time. To say PM, placeごごin front of the time.

The following list contains the kanji, hiragana, and romaji for counting 1-20 in Japanese. Japanese numbers are normally written in kanji, although many modern day Japanese also write numbers in Arabic numerals.

Counting in Japanese is easy to learn because it is very repetitive. As you will see below, the Japanese word for the number 5 is written 五 and 10 is written 十. If you want to write 15, all you have to do is combine the two numbers with the character for ten in the front. Fifteen is 十五, read “jyuugo” which is simply both of the character’s readings combined into one.

Ordering in a Japanese restaurant can be really easy if you can read hiragana, katakana, and some kanji. Ordering will be a lot more difficult if you don’t read these systems, but you can still get by!

In most restaurants in Japan, a waiter or waitress will greet you as you walk in with “いらっしゃいませ”(irasshaimase). This is simply the greeting most employees use for telling customers “Welcome!” After being seated, you may first be asked for your drink orders. The server will most likely ask, “おのみものはいかがですか” (onomimono wa ikaga desu ka), which means “What would you like to drink?” If you can read the menu, you can easily order what you want. If you can’t read the menu and there are no pictures, you can try ordering water, cola, beer, or tea. Most restaurants will have all of these drinks.

To order a drink, simply state the name of the drink followed by “をください” (o kudasai). おちゃ (ocha) is tea, みず(mizu) is water, コーラ(kora) is cola, and ビール(biiru) is beer. If you wanted to order tea, you would say “おちゃをください” (ocha o kudasai).

The menu, depending on the restaurant, may or may not have pictures. If you can recognize the picture of the food you want, you can simply point to the picture and say “これをおねがいします” (kore o onegai shimasu) which means “Please bring me this.” This is sufficient for ordering in Japan. If there are no pictures but you can recognize some of the writing, you can also point to the dish on the menu and say the above sentence.

If you are not sure of what something is, you can point to it on the menu and ask “これはなんですか” (kore wa nan desu ka) which means “What is this?” You should listen for a reply that includes something like とり(tori), にく(niku), さかな(sakana), とんかつ(tonkatsu), or やさい(yasai). These words mean chicken, meat (beef), fish, pork, and vegetables respectively.

You can also inquire if a dish is a certain meat or not by saying “これはなんですか。さかなですか。” (Kore wa nan desu ka? Sakana desu ka?) which translates to “What is this? Is it fish?” To this, your server can tell you “はいさかなです。” (Hai, sakana desu) which means “Yes, it is fish” or “いいえさかなじゃありません。にくです。” (Iie, sakana jya arimasen. Niku desu) meaning “No, it isn’t fish. It’s beef.”

Ordering food is definitely much easier if you can make out some of the writing, so if you’re planning a trip to Japan, prepare beforehand!

Asking for directions in Japanese requires the knowledge of directional terms, a few verbs, and several grammatical structures.

The following conversation will demonstrate how to ask for directions in Japanese. The explanation and word lists that follow the conversation will show you how to formulate your own direction questions.

Japanese version:
A: ゆうびんきょくはどこですか。(yuubinkyoku wa doko desu ka?)
B: まっすぐいって、ふたつめのかどをひだりにまがってください。そして、ひとつめのしんごうをみぎにまがってください。ゆうびんきょくはみちのひだりがわにありますよ。ぎんこうとデパートのあいだです。(massugu itte, futatsume no kado o hidari ni magatte kudasai. Soshite, hitotsume no shingou o migi ni magatte kudasai. Yuubinkyoku wa michi no hidari gawa ni arimasu yo. Ginkou to depa-to no aida desu.)
A: ありがとうございます。(arigatou gozaimasu.)

The English translation reads:
A: Where is the post office?
B: Go straight and turn left at the second corner. Then, turn right at the first signal. The post office is on the left side of the street. It is between the bank and department store.
A: Thank you!

Below are lists of other vocabulary you may need in order to ask directions.

Directions:
North きた        (kita)
South みなみ    (minami)
East ひがし    (ushiro)
West にし        (nishi)

Placement Terms:
Front まえ        (mae)
Behind うしろ    (ushiro)
Right みぎ        (migi)
Left ひだり    (hidari)
Near そば        (soba)
Next to となり    (tonari)
In between あいだ    (aida)
*These terms are used like this: XはYのまえです。(X wa Y no mae desu.) X is in front of Y. This is true for all of the placement terms except for in between which follows this pattern: XはYとZのあいだです。( X wa Y to Z no aida desu.) X is in between Y and Z.

Useful Phrases:
Turn right みぎにまがる    (migi ni magaru)
Turn left ひだりにまがる    (hidari ni magaru)
Go straight まっすぐいく    (massugu iku)
Turn right at first signal ひとつめのしんごうをみぎにまがる
(hitotsume no shingou o migi ni magaru)
Turn left at second corner ふたつめのかどをひだりにまがる
                (futatsume no kado o hidari ni magaru)
Cross the street みちをわたる    (michi o wataru)
Left side of the street みちのひだりがわ    (michi no hidari gawa)
Right side of the street みちのみぎがわ    (michi no migi gawa)

In order to ask where anything is, simply use Xはどこですか。(X wa doko desu ka) which means, “Where is X?”
The following sentences will be used to explain some grammar points:
XはYのうしろです。まっすぐいって、ふたつめのかどをひだりにまがってください。(X wa Y no ushiro desu. Massugu itte, futatsume no kado o hidari ni magatte kudasai.) These Japanese sentences translate to, “X is behind Y. Go straight and turn left at the second corner.” The verb for “go” is いく(iku) but it must be conjugated intoいって(itte) in this sentence because it is being connected to the rest of the sentence.  The verb for turn is まがる(magaru) but must be conjugated intoまがって(magatte) because it is followed by ください(kudasai). The ending ください is simply a polite ending somewhat equivalent to “please.” まがるmust be changed to まがって in order to come before ください.

Romaji refers to Japanese text written phonetically with the Roman alphabet. The process of transliterating Japanese symbols into Roman characters is called “Romanization.” When a student of Japanese is a native English speaker, he or she will often encounter Japanese sentences and lessons that are written in Japanese characters and supplemented by the Romanization of the text. The purpose of this supplementary material is to help the native English speaker learn Japanese quickly.

Romaji is not a native Japanese writing system; in fact, it is not often used by native speakers unless they are trying to communicate with a foreigner. Romaji was developed for the benefit of foreigners. Many Westerners find the process of learning Japanese less frightening when presented with Romaji instead of Japanese characters. Since European languages use the Roman alphabet, Romaji is ideal for Western learners. They are already familiar with the alphabet, so there are no new symbols to learn. Japanese pronunciation of Roman characters will most likely differ from the Western learner’s native tongue; however, this is a small obstacle.

Romaji helps many foreigners get the hang of Japanese characters. When beginning to learn Japanese, most Western learners are presented with a table of Japanese characters called hiragana. The table usually includes the Romaji counterparts of this Japanese alphabet. The learner can then associate a Japanese symbol with the Roman character counterpart and therefore learn how to pronounce the symbol. After some practice, one can rely on connecting the symbol to the pronunciation without the use of Romaji.

There are several systems for the Romanization of Japanese text. The system most used outside of Japan is the Hepburn system. This method of Romanization was developed for English speakers. The system used within Japan is typically the Kunrei-shiki system. Other systems do exist but they are not as common as Hepburn and Kunrei-shiki.
Romaji is extremely useful to Western learners as it helps to jump-start their language learning process. Below are some easy to read examples of Romaji:

• Watashi wa daigakusei desu. (I am a college student.)
• Are wa koneko desu. (That over there is a kitten.)
• Sono kaban wa watashi no desu. (That bag is mine.)
• Nihongo de hanashite mo ii desu ka? (Is it okay if I speak in Japanese?)
• Ano hito wa Tachibana-san desu. (That person over there is Tachibana.)

Overview

The kanji system is made up of over 50,000 Chinese characters. These characters were adopted by the Japanese as their main writing system. While the characters remained basically the same as traditional Chinese characters, the pronunciations of the characters were changed to fit the Japanese language. There are approximately 2,000-3,000 kanji that are considered common in Japan. This means they appear in everyday life. The remaining kanji characters are not as common; you can get by in Japan as long as you know the essential kanji. Below are some of the everyday kanji.

It can take many years to learn kanji. Children in Japan begin learning kanji at a very young age and continue to learn kanji all throughout their schooling. Since kanji is the most complicated writing system in Japanese, it is important to learn hiragana and katakana first. After mastering those two alphabets, kanji should be introduced.

Significance

Kanji are important because the symbols stand for an entire word or idea. The syllables that make up hiragana and katakana simply stand for syllables. Native Japanese words can be written in hiragana and kanji, but the kanji are more specific. There are many words in Japanese that are spelled the same way in hiragana, but their kanji symbols are different. Only by knowing the kanji symbol or the context can you tell which word is really being used. The context a kanji symbol is found in will determine its pronunciation (if it has more than one). Some kanji symbols can stand alone and mean one word, but be combined with another symbol and mean a completely different word.

For example: 気reads “ki.” Alone, this symbol means “spirit.” The symbol 天 reads “ten,” and when it’s combined with 気 to form 天気, the meaning changes to “weather.” 天気is read “tenki.”

Traditionally, kanji was written vertically instead of horizontally. It was also written from right to left. This is the complete opposite of how English is written. In modern times, it is still common to find kanji written like this in books, magazines, newspapers, and other works. When written on a computer, kanji is written like English; left to right and horizontally.

An Overview of the Kana Systems

Kana refers to the two syllabic alphabets in Japanese. The alphabets are syllabic because most symbols represent a syllable instead of just a letter. Hiragana and katakana are both made up of forty-six main symbols. Each symbol in hiragana has a counterpart in katakana that reads the same way. The difference is that hiragana is used to write native Japanese words and katakana is used to write loan words. Loan words are foreign words that have been adopted into Japanese. The majority of these loan words have been borrowed from English. Katakana gives the Japanese people a way to say and write loan words with Japanese sounds. The following words have been adopted from English and are written in katakana:

Hiragana, unlike katakana, can be used to write verb endings. For example, 聞くis the dictionary (unconjugated) form of the verb “to listen.” The first character is kanji and reads “ki.” The second character is hiragana and reads “ku.” When the verb is conjugated, the first symbol will remain the same, but the hiragana symbol will change. Every kanji character can be written in hiragana, but not all uses of hiragana can be replaced with a kanji symbol. The sentences below have been written entirely in hiragana, even where kanji could be used.

As previously stated, both kana alphabets are syllabic, meaning the symbols stand for whole syllables instead of letters. The main exception to this rule is んin hiragana and ン in katakana, both of which stand for “n.”

The main reason hiragana and katakana are different from kanji is because kana symbols stand for syllables and kanji symbols stand for words.

In both hiragana and katakana, many of the symbols can be slightly altered to get a different sound. Some symbols can also be combined to make other sounds. This creates more symbols than the original forty-six, but once the main ones are mastered, the alterations become very easy.

Overview

Why would anyone want to learn Japanese? There are many great reasons to learn Japanese. Japanese is a useful language for business, trading, translation services, and many other jobs. Japanese is a fun language to learn; by learning Japanese, you can open up a hidden world of entertainment! Japan’s popular culture includes many animated television shows and movies as well as dramas. Imagine being able to watch and understand them! Learning Japanese can bring you opportunities you may have never considered, such as teaching English in a Japanese school. Many Japanese schools wish to hire native English speakers; you don’t even need a teaching license! Whether you are interested in business, jobs, or entertainment, Japanese is a great language to learn.

One of the main differences in learning Japanese as opposed to learning English is the sentence structure and style. English sentences follow the Subject-Verb-Object structure whereas Japanese sentences follow Subject-Object-Verb form. Japanese sentences always end in a verb, which can be weird for English speakers. For example, in English we would say, “I kicked the ball.” That sentence in Japanese structure would read, “I (the) ball kicked.”

Another difference between English and Japanese is that Japanese does not have articles. If you wanted to say a sentence about kicking the ball in Japanese, you would omit the English word “the” because there is no Japanese equivalent. Generally, the Japanese language is vague whereas English is more specific. English sentences usually have a subject; Japanese sentences tend to omit the subject in many cases, especially when the subject is “I.”

Character Systems

The Japanese language consists of three character systems. The first two are referred to collectively as kana. The two alphabets that make up kana are hiragana and katakana.  Hiragana is an alphabet that is used to write native Japanese words.  Katakana is the alphabet used to write foreign words that have been absorbed into Japanese. The symbols that make up both the hiragana and katakana alphabets stand for syllables. Kanji, the third and final character system, consists of characters borrowed from traditional Chinese. These symbols stand for an entire word or idea instead of just a syllable. Kanji characters are also typically more complicated to learn and write than hiragana or katakana. In order to fully master Japanese, you need to learn all three writing systems! For beginners, however, hiragana and katakana are sufficient starting points.

One of the best ways to learn Japanese, short of living in Japan or meeting regularly with a bilingual teacher, is to use one of the many learning programs available out there.  But how do you choose one? There are tons to choose from and it can be overwhelming and stressful at times.  That said, we have explored and read reviews of several of the programs out there, and so we want to provide you a list of a few of the best programs, along with our reviews of each.  We really hope that they are helpful to you! Check out the links below for a description of the programs themselves.

Package programs

Package programs are programs that you can use and refer to now, or years in the future. We like these, because when you purchase them, you are not under any time constraint to use them immediately. For example, you might expect to have ten hours a week to dedicate to it, but then your work schedule picks up and suddenly you are left helpless.  With these programs, you can take a few months or years off and pick up right where you left off! Or, on the other hand, you might just want to crank through the program in a few short weeks in preparation of an international trip. Either way, these programs can be super helpful. Three programs that we would recommend are found below.

Rocket Japanese

Rocket Japanese is part of the most well respected language-learning companies today, Rocket Languages. With the Japanese program, you have access to audio lessons, language lessons, writing lessons (both kanji, katakana and romaji), culture lessons, and other practical topics. What we liked is that the course is loaded with audio lessons and places a huge emphasis on learning vocabulary. The course also offers a forum where you can pose questions and see topics of discussion from other language learners too. Through that, you might also be able to find a conversation partner.

Click here to check it out for free!

Nihongo Japanese

Nihongo Japanese is another course that we liked, and the main difference is that this is more textbook driven.  There are some supplemental tools as well, such as audio lessons and kanji flashcards, but the bulk of the material is in the textbook. Other things you will learn include the proper strokes to write kanji, and the program also includes some reference cards for the character sets.

If you’re interested, click here to learn more.

Japanese Proficiency Power

This program is geared specifically at Japanese language learners who are focused on learning the language in order to pass the Japanese Language Proficiency Test (JLPT). Whereas the other programs, such as Rocket Japanese, are meant more for students who simply want to become conversational in the language before traveling or working with someone, Japanese Proficiency Power is for those looking to ace their tests.

The price is about the same as the lowest level of the Rocket Japanese program, but if you consider how much time you will save not having to study if you pass the test the first time around, it is well worth it.

Grab your copy here.

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Were these programs helpful? If you have tried any of them, or tried other ones and have had success with them, leave a comment below! We love hearing from our readers.

-The Japanese Tutorial team

We get a lot of questions all the time about what books we would recommend to learn Japanese. Without further ado, here is the list! For convenience, we have broken it down into these main categories:

• Learning Japanese
• Grammar & character systems
• Reference books & dictionaries
• Culture

Learning Japanese

Japanese, Conversational: Learn to Speak and Understand Japanese with Pimsleur Language Programs

Japanese Step by Step : An Innovative Approach to Speaking and Reading Japanese

Japanese for Busy People I: Kana Version includes CD

Learn Japanese the Fast and Fun Way

Japanese I, Comprehensive: Learn to Speak and Understand Japanese with Pimsleur Language Programs

Grammar and character systems

Hiragana, the Basics of Japanese

Let’s Learn Hiragana: First Book of Basic Japanese Writing

Let’s Learn Katakana: Second Book of Basic Japanese Writing

Let’s Learn Kanji: An Introduction to Radicals, Components and 250 Very Basic Kanji

Read Japanese Today: The Easy Way to Learn 400 Practical Kanji

Essential Kanji: 2,000 Basic Japanese Characters Systematically Arranged For Learning And Reference

Reference Books & Dictionaries

Japanese Phrases For Dummies

Dirty Japanese: Everyday Slang from “What’s Up?” to “F*** Off!” (Dirty Everyday Slang)

Random House Japanese-English English-Japanese Dictionary

Kana Flashcards (Japanese and English Edition)

Kanji Pict-O-Graphix: Over 1,000 Japanese Kanji and Kana Mnemonics

Culture

Japanese Culture, 4th Edition (Updated and Expanded)

The Japanese Mind: Understanding Contemporary Japanese Culture

Zen and Japanese Culture

Etiquette Guide to Japan: Know the Rules that Make the Difference!

Japan – Culture Smart!: the essential guide to customs & culture