至 and friends

A kanji cluster, with notes to help me (and you?) remember them.  Heavily informed by KanjiPortraits.

至:  an arrow (the top half) hitting the ground (土):  the climax, conclusion, attainment of its final result.

室, as in 寝室 (bedroom):  when that arrow is fired in the house, it'll never make it out of the room you're in.

屋 (roof, shop, store, seller, house):  I think of the top and left part as an awning for a shop, so this elementary kanji is easy for me and the first I learned of this group.  It's like a one-room shop (薬屋、果物屋、肉屋、etc.) or its manager.

握: What you might do with your hand at a (sushi) shop is grip, hold, and mold sushi.

到: Apparently the sword to the right used to be a person, but changed (!).  So when a person, maybe with a sword to cut off the process (?), reaches the climax, conclusion, attainment, etc. of 至, we say that person is arriving.

倒: Whoever reaches the climax of his ambitions -- especially with the sword -- is bound to fail, collapse, break down, and be overthrown.

 致:  The teacher with the stick in hand (right half) makes/causes you to reach the climax, conclusion, attainment of your instruction.

緻:  When your teacher has helped you reach the resolution of your learning, you'll be rich enough to afford fine-weave threads.

窒:  Bringing that hole 穴 to resolution, climax, etc., would be plugging or obstructing it, leading to suffocation if it's your air supply.

動物えんに父 (Dad at the zoo) 第 3 章

Skip the notes if you don't need them.

I assume the reader knows how to read kana, plus the basics of Japanese sentences, －て form,and particles.  For kanji, you may want rikaichan or rikaikun for automatic furigana.

Kanji notes:  重 means "heavy"; put it together with 力 to get 動 "move," as in うん動 "exercise," 自動車 "automobile" (literally "self move vehicle"), and 動物 "animal" (literally, "move thing").

A person 人 who's doing a lot of movement 動 is likely working 働く.

Vocabulary

運動	exercise	食べ物	food
ええー	Yeah...	手伝う	help
大きい or 大きな	big	どうぞ	Please have this/here you go
オーケー	OK	とら	tiger
男の人	man	箱	box
お願いします!	Please!	働く	work
重い	heavy	見る	see
ください	Please	休み	time off/holiday

父は男の人と大きな箱を見ます。
父：何をしていますか？
男：働いていますね。
父：ええー
男：うん。重い箱です。手伝ってください、オーケー？いい運動です！
父：ここで働きません。今日は休みです。
男：お願いします！
父：これは何ですか？
男：とらの食べ物です。
父：はい！どうぞ！

とら：いいですね！

どう物えんに父 (Dad at the zoo) 第 2 章

Skip the notes if you don't need them.

I assume the reader knows how to read kana, plus the basics of Japanese sentences, －て form,and particles.  For kanji, you may want rikaichan or rikaikun for automatic furigana.

Kanji notes:  the radical 豕 (pig) shows up in several kanji.  You can think of it as a pig lying with its snout to the fence, front legs down left, and perky tail sticking up.  It's a largish animal; give it the big ears you see here (?) 象 and you've got a huge one: "elephant."  Put a person (a sculptor?) next to that and you've got "statue."

Grammar notes:  (Verb)ことができる means "can do (verb)."

Vocabulary

え〜っ!	Argh!	話す	speak
こと	abstract thing	本当	truth
象	elephant	見る	see
像	statue	もの	thing
父	father, daddy	わかる	understand
何	what	私	I, me

---

父：    何ですか？[父は象を見ています。]
もの：私はぞうです。
父：    象？
もの：いいえ。像じゃないです。象です。
父：    像？
もの：いいえ。像じゃないです。
父：    象の像？
もの：いいえ。象です。
父：    わかりません。
もの：像は話すことができません。
父：    象も話すことはできません。
もの：本当です。
父：    え〜っ！

どう物えんに父 (Dad at the zoo) 第 1 章

Skip the notes if you don't need them.

I assume the reader knows how to read kana, plus the basics of Japanese sentences, －て form,and particles.  For kanji, you may want rikaichan or rikaikun for automatic furigana.

Kanji notes:  牛 means cow.  (I tend to think of the left top tweak as a messed-up horn.)  Put it together with something that looks like it has long tusks (an elephant, though it's not the kanji for elephant), and you get 物, meaning "stuff" in a very general sense.  You can find it in many compounds:  食べ物、飲み物、どう物 and どう物えん ("animal" and "animal park"; yes, I'm leaving part of that in kana, to keep the words simple).

 第１章, meaning "Chapter 1," is a combination of 第, which is an ordinal marker, and 章, "chapter."  第 shows up in other compounds:  第１号 ("the first"); 第１話 (also "Chapter 1").

Vocabulary

牛肉	beef	とら	tiger
サンドイッチ	sandwich	フー！	Whew!
父	father, daddy	持つ	have, hold
食べ物	food	やった！	[I] did it!
どう物えん	zoo, animal park	私	I, me
どうぞ	Please have...	思う	think

父はどう物えんにいます。牛肉のサンドイッチを持っています。
父：　すみません。どこにいますか？
とら：どう物えんにいます。私はとらです。　
父：　私は男です。
とら：いいえ。食べ物です。
父：　いいえ！　牛肉をどうぞ。
とら：いいですね。　
父（おもう）：　フー！
とら（おもう）：やった！*

*I later learned this word: うまくいった, meaning something like "That did the trick!"  Too complicated for such a basic story, but... cool.

醜い、か女性らしい？

おめでとう？

十二月間私は日本語を勉強していました。

And in that time, I have learned about 1100 漢字, with some 200 more still in my "currently learning" list on Kanji Study, so the end is in sight.  I've started ruling out remaining ones that aren't in the common use but are used for proper names or not much at all.

I was able to read ジャックと豆の木 (Jack and the Beanstalk) on Wasabi with only occasionally looking at the translation for a word.  Admittedly I've reviewed it a few times and had vague memory of some words it uses a lot.

Haven't turned the corner I keep hoping for, though, past which reading is more fun than work.  I can almost feel it with ジャック, though.

Next up:  Japanese Graded Readers.  I've ordered the first.  I'll let you know.

ラーーー、七月四日で

七月四日私の家族は博物館に行きました。恐竜（きょうりゅう、dinosaur）の博物館です。

息子は日本語を習いますから、彼のため(behalf)に日本語のphrasesのリストを作りました。(I'm embarrassed to say how long it took me to get the right conjugation of 作る there.)  These were the phrases:

スーは食べることができます。I know I'm assuming you have rikaikun/rikaichan going, and know some vocabulary like 食べる and 博物館, but sentence patterns are harder, so: This says

Sue, the famous T. Rex from  South Dakota.  (We didn't actually see her, but we did see a couple of T. Rex-like monsters.) 車のなかにスーの音楽を 聞きました。 私達は大好きです。

スー    は         食べる こと が でいます.
Sue   as-for     eat     thing           can                or
Sue can do the eating thing:  Sue can eat.

 (こと, "abstract thing," makes a verb usable as a noun, and dictionary-form-verb こたができます, "can do verb," is a common construction, I think.  Rosetta finally got funny doing this.  猫 （ねこ, cat）は走るができます。猫は読む（よむ, read) ができません。)

スーは私たちを食べることができます。
スーは私たちを食べたい。
だめです！ 
食べない！ 食べない！(Yes, that's not right, but we'll correct it later.)
きょうりゅうが大好きです。

息子はリストを書きましたが、we didn't actually say the more complex ones that much.  We did say, however:  スーです！食べない！食べない！