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I wonder if you’re applying the のに too broadly? To me, the sentence reads “Even though I’m not the company president, I make those kinds of important decisions – {new concept:} and I don’t expect things will end well.” Paraphrased that last clause a little, though. =)
That is to say, the のに reflects on the 私が決める, while いいはずがない is a conclusion that results from that.
That definitely makes more sense. I think it was the placement of the comma that threw me, and the function of て in 決めて. Thanks :D
If の is a feminine ender, why is the show I’m watching have a male use it? He’s not feminine, in fact, he’s a panda. :/
I have to admit I’m not clear on why him being a panda explains that he’s not effeminate. =P In any case, it’s also used by children, apparently. Also, のです is a more formal version of んです.
What show?
It can be used to convey an explanatory tone in your sentence for both males and females.
It will sound very female if you just add の, while most males will say のだ（んだ）
However, だ can’t be added in a question since it declares a state of being, so in questions the use of の is not gender specific.
みなさん、こんいちわ。 I’ve made my first journal on Lang-8. Could you please clarify these corrections I received? I think I can understand it a little bit but since I haven’t come across these grammar points, I may need a little more guidance.
1. 今、日本語を勉強します。
I intended it as “Now, I will study Japanese” because from what I understood, verbます is present/future tense. The suggestion was 今、日本語を勉強しています。
Apparently,
日本語を勉強します。 = I study Japanese.
日本語を勉強しています。 = I am studying Japanese.
日本語を勉強しようとしています。＝ I will study Japanese.So ～ます is simple present but not future tense?
Have I been ～ますusing incorrectly? Or is this a special case, etc?
2. あした、もっと勉強しに行きます。
“Tomorrow, I’m going to study more” based on Season 4 Chapter 8
It was rephrased into あした、もっと勉強するつもりです。 With
する meaning “to do something”
つもり meaning “will/going to/intend to”
What is the difference of する and します?
Also, the corrector said that in the phrase “go study,” ”go” doesn’t mean いく. And this is confusing me because that’s what I learned from Season 4. Am I missing something?
3. 日本語を習いたいです。
Supposed to be “I want to learn Japanese.”
The corrector said 勉強したい = want to learn. 習う is usually used when you learn from someone or some places, like language schools or teachers. What is the difference?
So, yeah. Sorry I have too many questions. ^^;
1. Well, “今、日本語を勉強します” is kind of an odd thing to say. “Now, I study Japanese”?
To be fair, “now I will study Japanese” is a slightly odd thing to say in English too. You’re not really saying “now” meaning “at this current point in time” – the meaning in this sentence is more of an interjection, like “alrighty, I’ll study some Japanese”. What you meant to say was something like “I intend to study Japanese”, while the suggested correction is “Now, I am studying Japanese”
Possibly the sentence you’re after is 日本語を勉強しようと思います – I think I’ll study Japanese.
2. 行く means “go [to some place]” – it’s not the same as “going to study” in English. もっと勉強しに行きます means you’re going to some place with the purpose of doing study. Another weird thing about English – again, you don’t mean you’re going somewhere to study, it means you intend or plan to study.That’s basically what the suggested correction is – もっと勉強するつもりです = “I intend to do more study”.
する = plain form of します. Also called the dictionary form.
3. 習う basically means you’re learning from someone else – they teach you, you learn at the same time. Again, the meaning you’re after here is closer to “I want to study Japanese” – hence the correction.
Basically, it seems to me that all three of these confusions arise because you’ve thought of a sentence in English, are are trying to translate it word-for-word into Japanese. You need to pay close attention to the meaning of the sentence rather than the words of the sentence – English and Japanese just don’t work the same in many respects. For that matter, English is a bit of a crazy one as far as most languages go…
Ahh. I see. So the “go to do something” in Season 4 is actually “going someplace to do something“. Is that right?
I’m not sure what I meant by the first sentence either. I think I was narrating what I was about to do (while or after writing). You know how in a cooking show, the host would say “Now I will add the sliced onions…” or something. I might have derived the sentence from that.
Thank you so much for clearing those out!
「こんいちわ」*shudder* >.<
Not sure if you’re not used to using an IME or if you just didn’t know how to spell it, but that should be「こんにちは」, where the “wa” part is the particle は. Don’t worry, lots of people get it wrong at the start, it’s just that I cringe every time I see it :P
Definitely a typo!
Nah, I didn’t know how to spell it. XD Thanks for pointing that out! You’ve saved me from further embarrassment. xP
Hah, whoops – I didn’t even see that. I must have started reading at the first numbered point. =P
But yeah, you’ve gotta be careful when typing an ん followed by a な-line or あ-line character when using an IME – if you type “konnichi” you’re going to get こんいち, because the double-n produces just the ん. You either need to type “kon’nichi” or “konnnichi” (yep, that’s a triple n). I usually go for the latter – it’s easier than going for the apostrophe key, especially on the iPad.
There’s similar things to keep in mind when trying to type something like んあ (though the only example of something like that I can think of off the top of my head is Tian’anmen Square, but that’s Chinese…). Typing “na” will get you な – you need to type “n’a” or “nna”.
A sentence I wrote on the 8 was “５月で終わりたい”, intending to be “I want to finish it by May”.
I got some corrections on the verb, that’s cool.
I also got corrections changing で to には.
Can anyone enlighten me on this please? Is my understanding of で to mark a point in time erroneous?
Well, で means you want to finish in May. If you want to finish by May, までに would probably be best.
Yeah, I would have thought までに too – pretty sure I covered it the other day, though can’t remember for the life of me whether it was Tae Kim or an Anki sentence or what…
締め切りまでに願書を提出する – “submit the application form before the deadline”
The example sentence was along those lines, but there was a different word used for deadline… Ugh, I’m really not good at remembering anything, am I?Ah, ok, I haven’t seen までに before.
Thanks.
Michael – that remembering thing, that’s crazy.
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