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As I prepare for my trip to Japan later in the month I’ve been spending some time trying to think of how I can leverage what I’ve learned so far. I’ve hit a wall on a few key ideas that I suspect I’ll need to express more than once. I was hoping for some help on good phrases or keywords that will help me say:
1) “Vegetarian” – I’ve looked this up in the past, and everything I’ve found claims most Japanese people know the English word, and what it means. In my experience that is not true. Even if I try to pronounce it like a Japanese person they tend to politely blink at me. I know there are some cultural differences between what an American thinks the word means, and a Japanese person, (heck, there are tons of different opinions within the US), but if there is a more native word or phrase to express this it would make my life a lot easier. For reference I eat eggs, and dairy, but not sea food.
2) “I do not eat meat or seafood” – This is really a part 2. If I can’t say “I’m a vegetarian”, or the idea is lost on the person, then maybe saying what I don’t do will help. I’m guessing the phrase I’m looking for is something like 私はにくや（XXXX?)たべません。 I’d like to express the idea of more than just fish when I say seafood, but I don’t want to exclude seaweed.
3) “Can you please say that again slower?” – I know various forms of chotto, and mou ichido, but those don’t exactly say “You’re speaking too fast for me to have a chance of understanding.” Also, I’m incredibly intimidated when speaking Japanese to a native person, so don’t be afraid to dial up the politeness. :)
4) “I am learning Japanese, but I’m bad at it.” – Honesty, and perspective for the poor person who is stuck talking to me. This is my best guess on how to say it, but I’m way above my experience level trying to cobble this sentence together “私は日本語勉強、でも悪い。” If I botched up the kanji I was trying to say “watashi ha nihongo benkyou, demo warui.” I feel like that’s missing a particle or two, and that’s if I’m even half way correct. ;)
5) “Sorry I don’t understand” – I’m guessing this “わかりません。” is all I need to say that?
Finally if you can think of any other things I may want to know how to say please feel free to share. At this point odds are in favor I don’t know it. ;)
1. My dictionary suggests ベジタリアン or 菜食主義者 (さいしょくしゅぎしゃ) – though the danger of relying on a dictionary is that I’m not entirely certain what is most commonly used in the vernacular. My ancient phrasebook has the latter, and also suggests 菜食主義者用の料理はありますか – do you have any vegetarian dishes? And お肉の代わりにXXXいただけますか – could I have XXX instead of meat?
2. My dictionary suggests シーフード. Or 魚介 (ぎょかい). Also, if you want to make your desire not to eat it more emphatic, you could try 食べられません – cannot eat.
3. あのう、XXXさんは話すのはちょっと早すぐますから、私は分かりません。 That might be a shade impolite, though.
4. Rather than “bad at it” you’d be better off with “unskilled” or “still have a lot to learn”. For example, 私は日本語を勉強していますけど、まだ上手になりません。
5. 分かりません works, yes. For added politeness, you can tack a すみませんが、 on the front, or even an あのう on the front of that.
AnonymousMy Japanese isn’t good at all, but I’ll try~
1)Well, according to jisho.org, I have found three that seem like ‘vegetarian’:
ベジタリアン – vegetarian
菜食主義者（さいしょくしゅぎしゃ） – vegetarian
精進料理（しょうじんりょうり） – vegetarian cuisine originally derived from the dietry restrictions of Buddhist monks
The third one doesn’t really seem like the correct word to me, and the second one is katakana, in which a pretty much every word has a another word in katakana. But the second one looks like it’s the right one to me, so I would go with that one if I had to choose. Also, my ‘My Japanese Coach’ DS game has a dictionary, and it says that that word, 菜食主義者, means vegetarian.
Just for your information, if you’re really a vegetarian, I heard it won’t be super easy finding vegetarian meals in Japan. Most of the food that is sold there usually has meat, and a large amount of food has seafood, like sushi. And I wouldn’t advise asking for something that defers intensely from the given menu at a restaurant, because I think that can be considered rude. So I’d just be careful – I’m sure you can find vegetables in restaurant menus and given options.2) Again my Japanese isn’t good, but here I go! This is what I think it is:
私は肉や魚介を食べません。
Or maybe 私は肉と魚介類を食べられません。
Or perhaps 私は肉とか魚介類とかを食べたくありません。3) Here goes my poor Japanese again!
もう一度ゆっくり言ってもらえますか？
Or maybe もうちょっとゆっくり話してくださいませんか？(This one would be quite polite, I think)
As for the second sentence: Nameさんの話しているのは少し早すぎだから、分かることができません。4) I think it is: 私は日本語を勉強しているんだけど、まだ上手じゃありません。
5) Perhaps it is: すみません。分かりません。
That’s all I can do for you now, I think. If you need help reading the kanji, you can search it in jisho.org, or you can get Rikaichan (or Rikaikun for Chrome) and hover your mouse over the kanji. Have a good time in Japan!
2) （あの・・・）、私はベジタリアンなので、肉もシーフードも食べません。
あのお わたし は ベジタリアンなので、にく も シーフード も たべません。3)
（えっ？）もう一回、（あの・・・）ゆっくり・・
（えっ？）もういっかい、（あの・・・）ゆっくり・・4)
（すいませんあのお）日本語（を）勉強してますが、あんまり上手じゃないんで・・・・（日本人：あああ、そうですか・・・/ あああ、わかったわかった） はい・・すいません・・・・
（すいません）にほんご（を）べんきょうしてますが、あんまりじょうずじゃないんで・・・・（nihonjin:あああ、そうですか・・・/あああ、わかったわかった） はい・・・すいません・・・5) すいません・・・わかりません
Also if you are 白人, then I would imagine that people will give you lots of leeway with the language. Unfortunately for me, I’m アジア人 so at first glance people will expect me to speak Japanese fluently.
食べたくありません。
食べたくないです。=P
Awesome! Thanks for the help with this so far! I’m in the middle of processing the responses. This is very helpful.
5) I see すみません as a good thing to add for politeness. When speaking with actual Japanese people, or hearing them talk in real life I’ve noticed that ごめん pops up a lot, but I never heard すみません. Should I avoid ごめん even though I hear it used more?
The three catch-all words that will get you through practically every conversation:
1. すみません is “excuse me” but can also mean “pardon me”, “sorry”, “sorry to bother you, but…” and the ol’ “Hi, I’d like to ask a question”, along with “I’m about to say something a little blunt or possibly confrontational, so this is here to soften the blow”
2. どうぞ is “please” but can also be “go ahead”, “have a seat”, “take this item”, “after you”
3. どうも is “thank you”, and can also be a fairly polite non-time-specific greeting, or an appropriate response to a greeting.ごめん is more of an outright apology than a general conversation device like すみません.
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