Please help me to read this English sentence:

[YuriTokoro]

Originally Posted by Koir

He means that statements made by his grandmother have three examples or forms of negative terms. Words that turn the meaning of other words to the opposite meaning. Using his grandmother's sentence as an example:

"I ain't never did none of that."

The main idea of the statement is she (the grandmother) has not performed some action that forms the context of the conversation taking place at that time. Except with three sets of negative (or meaning-reversing) terms, the meaning is completely opposite.

Hi, Koir.
A happy new year!

“I ain’t never did none of that.” means “I have never done that.” and the speaker has said in the way to underscore what her meant.

“They have not never occurred.” means “They have occurred.”

When the negative words are even number, I see the sentence doesn’t mean any negative, and when the negative words are uneven number, I can see the sentence has one negative word.
I see. However, if you speak to me with three negative words, I wouldn’t understand.
This is very confusing when conversations.
I, myself sometimes say double negatives, but never say triple even in Japanese.

Thanks as always, Koir.

[Koir]

Originally Posted by YuriTokoro

Hi, Koir.
A happy new year!

Happy New Year to you as well, Yuri.

“I ain’t never did none of that.” means “I have never done that.” and the speaker has said in the way to underscore what her meant.

“They have not never occurred.” means “They have occurred.”

When the negative words are even number, I see the sentence doesn’t mean any negative, and when the negative words are uneven number, I can see the sentence has one negative word.
I see. However, if you speak to me with three negative words, I wouldn’t understand.
This is very confusing when conversations.
I, myself sometimes say double negatives, but never say triple even in Japanese.

Thanks as always, Koir.

You understand perfectly, Yuri. Great work!

Please take good care of me in the new year as well!

[YuriTokoro]

A Happy New Year!

It was very nice in this morning.
We call “new year’s morning” “gantan”. In gantan, we eat food called “osechi”.
The picture down is osechi I made.
This is not for one person, but for one family.
Usually osechi has three boxes. We start with the food in the first box drinking “toso (a sort of sake). The second box mainly has vinegared food and grilled fishes. The third box has boiled food.
We don’t finish all the osechi at a time. Osechi includes a lot of food that can be kept for a long time, and we eat it until about the third day. However, eating osechi at each meal is tiring, so after gantan, we often eat something else with osechi.

Thank you.

Osechi - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
Toso - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

[Koir]

Originally Posted by YuriTokoro

A Happy New Year!

It was very nice this morning.
We call New Year’s morning “gantan”. During gantan, we eat food called “osechi”.
Pictured below is osechi that I made.
This is not for just one person, but for a family.
Usually osechi has three boxes. We start with the food in the first box drinking “toso" (a sort of sake). The second box mainly has vinegared food and grilled fish. The third box has boiled food.
We don’t finish all the osechi at one time. Osechi includes a lot of food that can be kept for a long time, and we eat it until about the third day. However, eating osechi at each meal is tiring, so after gantan we often eat something else with osechi.

Thank you.

Osechi - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
Toso - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

Looks delicious, Yuri. And quite a lot as well!

Not very much for revisions this time. Most were to clarify the concept that osechi isn't eaten "all at one time" (or completely eaten in one occurance or event), and the three boxes of food is not meant for "just one person".

The second comma was removed after "so after gantan" to keep reading smooth and uninterrupted as that clause leads naturally into the rest of the sentence as a time frame reference. Essentially, it's "occurance/event -- time frame reference -- second occurance/event that modifies first event".

Hope that helps!

[YuriTokoro]

Originally Posted by Koir

Looks delicious, Yuri. And quite a lot as well!

Not very much for revisions this time. Most were to clarify the concept that osechi isn't eaten "all at one time" (or completely eaten in one occurance or event), and the three boxes of food is not meant for "just one person".

The second comma was removed after "so after gantan" to keep reading smooth and uninterrupted as that clause leads naturally into the rest of the sentence as a time frame reference. Essentially, it's "occurance/event -- time frame reference -- second occurance/event that modifies first event".

Hope that helps!

Koir, thanks a lot as always.
あけまして　おめでとうございます。　今年もよろしく 。

[Sakamae]

HAPPY New Years to all of you.

[YuriTokoro]

Hi.
Could you correct my English?


An Evidence of Poverty?

Several days ago, one of Japanese TV news programs said that some American people were proposing hanging out laundry to dry in the sun. At first I didn’t understand what the point because most Japanese people hang out the clothes except people who don’t have a balcony or a yard to hang things.
The news reader continued that hanging laundry is an evidence of poverty in the US, so some people protest against hanging the washing out to dry; they don’t like their town to seem to be poor.
I was shocked to hear this. We’ve been hanging the laundry out. We believe that using a dryer is a waste of electricity. Nobody protest against what we do. We have a drying tumbler, and we use it when it’s not fine.
So then, when American people come to Japan, most of us seem to be poverty people to you? Do I seem to be very poor?

Thank you.

http://www.alachuacounty.us/document...98ee48fd2c.pdf

[Klint]

Originally Posted by YuriTokoro

Hi.
Could you correct my English?


An Evidence of Poverty?

Several days ago, one of the Japanese TV news programs said that some American people had proposed* hanging out laundry to dry in the sun. At first I didn’t understand what the point was, because most Japanese people hang out** their clothes except for those who don’t have a balcony or a yard to hang things.
The news reader continued that hanging laundry is an evidence of poverty in the US, so some people protested against hanging the washing out to dry; they don’t like their town to seem to be poor.
I was shocked to hear this. We’ve always*** been hanging the laundry out. We believe that using a dryer is a waste of electricity, and that nobody should protest against what we do. We have a drying tumbler, although we only use it when it’s not fine working.
So then, when American people come to Japan, do most of us seem to be in poverty people to you? Do I seem to be very poor?

Thank you.

http://www.alachuacounty.us/document...98ee48fd2c.pdf

Underline = Add (or) replace.

Red = Delete.

*"were proposing" is not neccessarily incorrect, although it may seem a little strange to have two words ending in "ing" in a row (to me at least). Not that there can't be any exceptions.

**"out" is fine where it is, but I figured I'd also point out that it can be placed after "clothes", or even deleted all together if you wish.

***Not really needed, but it gives the sentence a bit more depth I believe.

Your English is very impressive. Of what I corrected, very little of it was actual grammatic errors. Just some changes in a few places to give it a bit more of a natural feel. I wouldn't fully go by what I've said though. Especially since I havn't nearly contributed to or read through as much of this thread as a lot of the other members have. Not to mention it's nearly 3:30 in the morning here.

Anyways, I'm not sure if the question is directed at us or not, but... No, I don't see hanging laundry outside to dry as any sort of sign of poverty. My family and most other people where I live also hang our laundry out to dry, whether they're rich, poor, or somewhere in the middle.

I'm sorry if I missed something, made a bad correction, or even got redundant with my corrections.

...Okay, 4:00 AM... I must be an insomniac...

[ColinHowell]

Originally Posted by Klint

I'm sorry if I missed something, made a bad correction, or even got redundant with my corrections.

I'm afraid you may have changed her intended meaning in a couple of places. When she wrote:

Originally Posted by YuriTokoro

We believe that using a dryer is a waste of electricity. Nobody protest against what we do. We have a drying tumbler, and we use it when it’s not fine.

I interpreted it as follows (changed part in italics):

We believe that using a dryer is a waste of electricity. Nobody here protests against what we do. We have tumble dryers, and we use them when the weather is not fine.

[ColinHowell]

On a different topic (one I've been thinking about for a while)...

Originally Posted by Klint

Anyways, I'm not sure if the question is directed at us or not, but...

Well, I think YuriTokoro intended this passage for a post for her weblog, as with all her other postings, but it seems kind of a shame that we don't discuss them more on this forum, rather than just talking about her English. Many of her posts are interesting, but an English help thread seems to be the wrong place to discuss their subjects in depth. They deserve their own threads.