Can someone please help me clarify what this person is saying?
 

I'm sorry I realize this is not a translating site and I should try to translate this myself, but I am completely confused.

"わかりました。
じゃあひらがなでかきますね。よろしく。"

My best guess is this: "Understood. So, hiragana police (I am going and coming back) politely end. Nice to meet you."

I looked up each individual part on several different question and answer sites and that is what I came up with.

Wakarimashita= Understood.
Jyaa= So
hiragana= hiragana
deka= police officer
kimasu= going and coming back
ne= polite/friendly way to end a sentence
yoroshiku= Said when meeting someone for the first time, unsure of exact English equivalent but I was told "Yoroshiku onegaishimasu" meant 'Please treat me favorably and I will treat you favorably.'

A fairly admirable try, but I sense you don't have much experience with japanese. I would translate it as 'Understood. Well then, I'll write in hiragana. Pleased to meet you'.

So, I'm gonna go out on a limb and guess you're talking to a Japanese pen-pal of some sort and you told them you either can't read Kanji or don't need romaaji. Yoroshiku onegai shimasu is what you'd say when you request a favor of someone usually (there's lots of other ways to say this, but it's not important right now). It's also said the first time you meet someone, so I tend to translate it (in this context) as 'Pleased to meet you'.

Kimasu 来ます（きます） is actually not 'go and come back'. It's just 'come'. 行ってきます is something you would say when you leave your house that literally is like 'I'll go and come back' but can be very loosely translated in english as just a goodbye when you leave the house.

Finally, デカ is probably not police officer specifically. I've got some very minor experience with police terms (thanks to 逆転検事), I'd translate it as 'detective'. Granted, I've never asked for a native's opinion on this, but my dictionary also gives me 'detective' instead of 'police officer'.

Sorry my post is so long, just wanted to explain some stuff. :)

Just to back up Duo's translation, I'm going to add a not that you split the words in the wrong place, it's
wakaremashita, jyaa, hiragana, de, kakimasu, ne, yoroshiku.
Hiragana+de= 'in hiragana'
kakimasu= to write.

Excuse the romaji, I'm at work and it takes me longer if I have to swap inputs all the time.

Yes, you are very right. They asked me (in English) if I understood Romaji, Hiragana, Katakana, and Kanji. I told them I could 'understand' all except for Kanji.

So can jyaa be translated as a sort of concluding word or phrase? ex. So, well then, in that case, given the information ect.

どもありがとうございます～！

Oh I was afraid I would do that. =/ Okay, that makes a lot of sense now.

どもありがとうございます～！

The word is どうも、not ども. Romaji influence?

If it is, will it be taken as an opportunity to decry the uselessness of romaji and your corresponding superiority in other Japanese written forms?

This undercurrent of fragile elitism I'm seeing is really beginning to grate on me.

No doubt, I say death to romaji (err, I am mean the Roman alphabet being used in Japanese)

Well, considering he is a native speaker... I am not so sure what he is being so elite about.

And being against romaji has nothing to do with showing off one's Japanese ability. People who are against are mostly likely against it because they know that in the end it is nothing more than a hindrance to learning the Japanese language effectively and properly.

Uhh sorry. Does it looks less unintellegent if I just write "Domo arigato gozaimasu" and pretend I've learned nothing?

lol I'm amazed at how long you have kept that prejudice about romaji. What do you mean by "other Japanese written forms" anyway? You speak as if romaji was one of them. If you want to argue, base things on facts.

Why does this have anything to do with elitism? I'm only writing Japanese, my native language, the way it's supposed to be and the way it's written in Japan. How's that so different from you writing English the way you are?

You're so clearly (and mistakenly) 100% pro-romaji. What if YuriTokoro insists on writing English using katakana because she's more comfortable writing English with the letters she grew up using? Would you encourage her to continue doing that or would you try to disuade her from it? What would one achieve if one refused to write English using the alphabet? What confuses me is that you seem to take it for granted that I write English using the writing system that I'm supoposed to use, yet you're being unable to think thngs in relative forms when it comes to Japanese writing.

You keep using the term 'elitism', but if you really see an elitism in the things I state, you've got a serious complex problem. If I ever suggested that all posts be written in Classical Japanese, then call me anything you want. But if you keep calling me names just because I promote the real Japanese writing systems, you will only be supported by other sad anime fans.

No, if I was your teacher, I would much rather see you write completely wrong using Kana, than reverting to romaji. I think what Sashimister was pointing out was how romaji dependence can easily confuse new learners.

You are not stupid for making mistakes, everybody makes mistakes in language learning.

Educate me. Start with why romaji remains to exist in modern times, despite this universal dislike for it.

I have no problem with your writing Japanese in the way you are most comfortable. What I was taking issue with was the perception that your question to the OP seemed to be a lead-in to another voicing of this romaji dislike. This may have had little to do with how the OP was expressing himself/herself. That's all.

Lots here. I'll examine it point by point:

1) I'm not pro-anything. You're inferring a little too much.
2) Do not bring YuriTokoro into this argument. This is an issue between you and I, not you and I and her.
3) Similiarly, finding argument traction in my complete lack of knowledge of the Japanese language is not a part of this disagreement. If it makes you feel any better, however, I will admit I know very very little (practically nothing) about the Japanese language. This is not a big secret I keep hidden.

Point by point:

1) Classical Japanese - another strawman argument, which has no bearing on this discussion.
2) Labeling me as a "sad anime fan" is yet another baseless comparison. I have never expressed myself as such, nor will I ever do so. Watching anime is my current entertainment choice, simply put.

I certainly hope I have cleared up any misunderstanding surrounding my purpose for posting in this thread, and I do apologize for using such polarizing terms.

Whoa, before this turns into something more hostile...

Sashimister - I think you have to step back for a moment to see part of what Koir is talking about. And it isn`t just you, and I don`t really think it is entirely about romaji vs. kana.

I am against using romaji, but I can still see part of this and can understand some of the exasperation.

It seems that recently more and more outright hostility is directed toward romaji users... And a lot of it isn`t necessary in my eyes. Instead of informing new users that they`ll progress much better, etc, by using kana - there is an attitude of "if you use romaji you aren`t good enough to learn Japanese" projected. Mistakes are blamed on the fact that they have used romaji, and a lot of the time - even if it`s the first post - they`re treated with incredible impatience.

I think that this is the "attitude of elitism" mentioned. For a lot of learners, their first exposure is in romaji, and there are some schools that even teach without using kana for quite some time.

I will never suggest that anyone should be using romaji, but is it necessary to be so dismissive of people who use it on their first few posts?

And a voice of reason is heard....

Thanks Nyororin! :)

At the beginning what Sashimister intended to say is the usage of romaji could have probably confused people with どうも and ども. These two words have totally different meanings.

Generally, どうも should be written as doumo or dōmo; but since it's inconvenient, some people may just write domo (it may be considered wrong? however I do see some textbook omit the u or ō)

As a result, when this phrase どうも is converted from romaji to hiragana it may be incorrectly written as ども. I believe that's what Sashimister was trying to say (at the very beginning)

For begininers, romanji is surely a lot easier to use when learning Japanese. Since I am not a native speaker nor an advanved Japanese learner, I will leave Wiki to explain the history and use of romaji for me. :) Romanization of Japanese - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

When I tried to search the infomartion about romaji, at first I search the Japanese Wiki by the phrase ロマン字 (romanji), which I found out it was incorrect. The correct word is ローマ字. :o This is another examples of "romanji influence" that Sashimister was saying.

Koir, you have your points. However, Sashimister was pretty neutral in the first post of this thread. :)

lol Sounds as if I had said something unreasonable.

If the majority of JF members agree with you on the romaji issue, I'll be more than happy to get the heck outa here as I have much more than a single member's influence on the language section as of now. Endorsing the use of romaji, which has nothing to do with Japanese, is the last thing I want to do. I'm not a vendor of fake fur.

To me, it is always less intelligent looking if you write something simple in romaji. Also, "domo" and "arigato" are both wrongly romanized there in pretty much all the major romanization systems.

There are a number of reasons (to facilitate linguists who study Japanese grammar but don't need to actually be able to write or speak the language, to make survival Japanese possible for visitors, to make it possible to learn Japanese for the first couple weeks until kana is mastered, etc.), but "to be able to communicate in Japanese effectively" is definitely not one of them.

That may or may not be a fair criticism. Honestly, I'm too lazy to go back and look to see whether people jumped to conclusions. But can you blame us for getting frustrated with those who repeatedly try to convince us that romaji is a valid and useful way of writing Japanese?

This is a logical failing. YuriTokoro was not brought into this argument in the way "don't bring X into the argument" is used to mean. She was used as an example. There is a difference here. What you said does not a logical argument make.
If the argument is about whether the use of romaji is a remotely good idea outside of, say, the first two weeks of your endeavor to learn Japanese. You are suggesting otherwise. Therefore, your lack of Japanese ability harms your authority to make any such assertion.


It's OK. We all use polarizing terms sometimes. I often find myself editing posts (quickly) 3–4 times just to remove profanity and insults. ;)

That's a pretty interesting turn of phrase. Did you just make it up, or is it a saying in Japanese or English I'm unfamiliar with?

Just made it up, man.

I think you'd be hard pressed to find someone who would say it is correct to write it as "domo." The big romanization systems all require it to be written another way.

Hepburn and Revised Hepburn: dōmo
Modified Hepburn and JSL: doomo
Nihon-shiki and Kunrei-shiki: dômo
waapuro style: doumo
Ministry of Foreign Affairs style: dohmo, doumo, and doomo are all acceptable

As usual, Nyororin comes and settles down the angry people. You are valuable on so many levels to JF, Nyororin. (Everytime I want to say your name, my head wants to bob around and make the sound effect にょろにょろ.)

I'm partly to blame for the hostility, I think. I'm going to try and be more positive. I think I generally succeed, but sometimes I do fail and behave angrily. This keyboard and Internet bring out the worst in me. :/

You said nothing unreasonable, and I don`t recall ever saying that romaji should be an ok way to write in Japanese.
I don`t think that anyone is endorsing the use of romaji, and we certainly don`t want you to leave. And this most certainly isn`t just you.

My opinion on what might need a little more thought are threads that have this sort of pattern - obviously not in these words, but in feeling;

OP; Hey, anyone know what "nanika nanika arigato" means?

A: Not another romaji user! Ugh. Why don`t you try writing it in REAL Japanese?

OP; I don`t know any Japanese, my friend just wrote it at the end of a letter to me. But I do want to learn!

A, B; Well nobody is going to help you as long as you don`t write it in kana, because romaji isn`t real Japanese. Why don`t you even bother to try to learn yourself?

OP; Fine... Is this right? なにか なにか ありがと

A, B; Look! You wrote it wrong. That`s because you were using romaji - it screwed you up. That`s why we always say not to use it!! :rolleyes: You`ll never learn right as long as you use it!

-------------------

I understand impatience with romaji. I understand not liking it. It is great to get people off of romaji ASAP. I`m all for that... But there are a lot of users who come with a question, and instead of getting a kind answer - the first response they get is something telling them that they aren`t worth anyone`s time unless they write in kana. This sounds very cold. And there are quite a few who leave almost immediately after getting that sort of response.
It`s easy to become short tempered when it is something you`re telling people everyday, but these are all different people. They may be taking high school Japanese classes which don`t really study kana (for some idiotic reason). They may have be in some other course that uses romaji - I know of some university level textbooks entirely in romaji (Why, I couldn`t tell you...)
Or maybe a self study with a crappy book that doesn`t stress the need to learn kana first and foremost.

All of these are flaws with books and methods - not necessarily a flaw with the person wanting to learn. But unfortunately when these people are mixed in with "memorized 3 phrases from anime!" people, it`s far far too easy to place the blame on the individual.

I personally think it would be a great idea for someone like Sashimister to make a nice thread explaining why we should all use kana - and we can link to that post when a new user asks something using romaji so that impatience doesn`t leak through. And also so that no one feels they are being personally attacked. (Because I know that no one is, but impatience and exasperation can feel that way if you`re a new user and it`s the first response you get.)

Romaji should be avoided at all costs... Too many people do not know this so need to be taught, not scolded. The scolding should be reserved for repeat offenders. :D

ETA; Wow, there were a number of new posts while I was typing that up. But I think I covered everything and nothing needs to be added. :)

ﾆｮﾛﾘﾝﾎﾟﾝ

I must have just recently joined this debate. My purpose for arguing on the side of everyone else here who is against using romaji is on the basis of it not being good for Japanese learners, or being used to write and communicate with.

And so far what I have read, nobody is making fun of anybody or trying to make themselves feel superior to those who use romaji. So I would like to know specifically were these posts are. I agree with you that people should not have "have an attitude of elitism", but I would like to know where people are sounding like this, so I can see that this "elitism" is not being mistaken for simple arguing against romaji's usage for practical reasons.

Well, you see the problem I always run into with writing a very well-known and used phrase in Hiragana is that everyone uses the Romaji. Words like(and forgive me if I'm writing them in Romaji wrong, also): Konnichiwa, Arigatou, and such are rarely found(in my experience) actually written in hiragana. My first 'instict' was to write "Domou" because I thought that you held the 'o' sound, but then I second-guessed myself and thought the o was not held.

Romaji definitely has its faults, which are plainly seen from what I wrote, however, if you take an English speaker who has absolutely no knowledge of the Japanese language and only give them hiragana, they would probably be more likely to quit learning Japanese then try to learn hiragana. A lot of native English speakers I know hear or see Japanese and think it's the hardest thing in the world and they would never even dare learn it. This is where Romaji comes in handy. They are able to relate a new foreign language into their own writing system, which makes it easier for them to comprehend.

It's sort of funny because native English speakers find it so confusing and hard to understand in Japanese each 'letter' or character reprensents an entire word or syllable, however, the alphabet is very similar if you think about it. A B C. They have 'names', but when you use them in a word they have 'sounds'. True, we do not have letters that make up entire words like Kanji, but it's pretty similar besides that.