Japanese

So I've been having a lot of fun with Japanese lately. :D I haven't had more than a few hours of actually studying since the year started. It's amazing how time flies when you live with all your friends, right? Still, somehow the basic structure is coming to me. The trick seems to be letting your preconception of grammar fly away, and replace it with... I don't know. It's odd. But today I managed a short something in a formula I'd never memorized, and which was utterly different from English. And Mayumi actually said it was 100% correct. :P

Kyo wa Finansu desu ka?

Lit: Today - is it finance?

Fig: So do you have Finance first today?


So here's the closest I can get to describing what I'm starting to understand about Japanese:

1.) The particals function a bit like cases. But don't try to cookie cut them to match the cases you know. They're more often about the importance a word has in expressing the meaning, or some other such, than the word's strict grammatical function.

2.) If it is implied, don't say it. Seriously. If you're not worried about being polite, one word will sometimes work fine for a sentence. Be polite and you've got two, one essentially meaningless. And this is OK. Let is go... :P

I can't wait to see Mrs. Hirayoshi and tell her about Mayumi and how much I like Miso soup now and that I can finally read about 95% of the Kana and even a few very useful Kanji and I'm putting together real original sentences and it's seeming less impossible with every minute.

And a special thanks to Finnish for proving that one can draw blood from a stone - even a seemingly impenetrable language begins to give up it's secrets. That's about where I am with Finnish - oh, it's still foreign, oh I can't read anything... maybe with pictures too I get a main idea... but it's no longer impossible. I see eye to eye with it and I could take it if I had the time and desire both. If I can get to that point with Japanese, I'll be thrilled. And I've just taken a significant step in that direction.