nihongo wo benkyou shitai

日本語：	[verb (base 6)] しまう
English:	To finish doing, to do something completely
English:	To regret some action taking place

Tonight, we'll have a look at a verb conjugation I've seeing cropping up a few times and it's definitely in the JLPT. However, it can have two uses and so we'll discuss these separately.

The first and, I believe, most frequently used is to express regret at some action. It allows you to add an emotional context to the occurrance of an event. However, it can only be used to show regret at some action taking place, not that some action did not take place.

The second use is a little more complex. しまう is used to indicate the fact that event has come to a termination point. It's ended. The plate broke. I finished the exam. She quit her job. This is different to the conjugation
[verb (base 2)] 終わる that we looked at the other day in that しまう implies a certain amount of emotion on behalf of the speaker. So a sentence like "I have finished all my exams" using しまう implies an amount of relief at finishing whereas 終わる is simply stating a fact. This actually ties in with the first use above as the use of しまう could imply a sense of regret at finishing something, as in "I fininshed spending the last of my bonus".

例文

English:	Because I am poor, I can't go to Japan this year.
Jenglish:	[I][poor][am][because][this year][Japan][go + can't + regret]
日本語：	貧乏ですから、今年日本に行くことができてしまいます。

English:	I am sorry but I have forgotten your name.
Jenglish:	[sorry][but][your name][forgotten + regret]
日本語：	本当にごめんなさい。あなたの名前を忘れてしまいました。

またね。。。

日本語：	[verb (base 2)] すぎる
日本語：	[adjective] すぎる
English:	Too...

This is a simple, yet useful conjugation to have to hand; how to say that there is too much of something or some action is performed too much? Use すぎる of course. With verb, you use the base 2 form. With adjectives you have to drop the final い or な.

例文

English:	The rainy season's level of humidity is too high.
Jenglish:	[rainy season][level of humidity][high + too]
日本語：	梅雨の湿度は高すぎます。

English:	Because the food looked so tasty, I ate too much.
Jenglish:	[food][tasty + looked][because][ate + too much]
日本語：	料理は美味しそうだったから、食べすぎました。

またな。。。

日本語：	[verb (short)] のに
日本語：	[い adjective] のに
日本語：	[noun/ な adjective] なのに
English:	Despite, in spite of, even though...

Well, I actually covered this one a while ago, but it was mixed up with other, non-JLPT3/4 grammar points. Also, given that that article only really looked at verbs, I thought I'd cover it again. More chance of it sticking in the old noggin then :-)

There is no single English equivalent of のに. It carries a meaning similar to 'despite', 'inspite of', and 'even though'. It can be used to create sentences in which two clauses are at odds with each other. For example, the sentence

"Even though the restaurant was expensive, the food was excellent."

doesn't really make sense. You would expect the food to be good if the restaurant were expensive. However, the sentence

"Even though the restaurant was expensive, the food was awful."

feels more natural. In essence, clause B (food was awful) is not what was expected given the statement in clause A (restaurant was expensive).

例文

English:	Despite yesterday's rain, he cut the grass
Jenglish:	[Yesterday's][rain][despite][he][grass][cut]
日本語：	昨日は雨なのに彼は草を刈りました。

English:	Today is hot even although the weather girl said it would be cloudy.
Jenglish:	[today][host][even although][weather girl][cloudy][said]
日本語：	今日は暑いのにお天気お姉さんは曇りと言っていました。

English:	Even though she ate the whole cake, she was still hungry.
Jenglish:	[whole][cake][ate][even though][she][still][hungry]
日本語：	丸ごとのケーキを食べたのに彼女はまだお腹がすいていました。

There are a couple of points to remember. This shouldn't be confused with the use of のに to mean 'in order to'. They look very similar in sentences so, you'll need to look at the context. Also, with な adjectives, keep the な.

またね。。。

日本語：	[verb (base 2)] なさい。
English:	Simple command

Again, another short but sweet one here. But not one you should bandy about in general conversation as it is not particularly polite. Likely uses include a teacher to a student, parent to a child or between friends. Just don't go using it when asking your boss for a pay rise.

The construct is dead easy; simply follow a verb in base 2 form with なさい.

例文

English:	Eat the basashi!
Jenglish:	[basashi][eat + command]
日本語：	馬刺しを食べなさい。

English:	My dad told me to do my homework.
Jenglish:	[my dad][homework][do + command][told]
日本語：	父は宿題をしなさいと言っていました。

English:	Stop playing stupid computer games and get a job.
Jenglish:	[stupid][computer games][play][stop][job][find + command]
日本語：	下らないコンピュータゲームをするのをやめて、仕事を見つけなさい！

またね。。。

日本語：	[verb (base 3)] ことがある。
English:	There are times when...

日本語：	[verb (base 7)] ことがある。
English:	Have experienced...

Today we'll have a look at another simple, but useful, construct. I'm actually surprised that this isn't JLPT4, but then again there doesn't seem to be much in level 4 :-)

The ことがある conjugation can be used after the verb in either base 3 or base 7. There is a subtle change in meaning, but nothing too complex. If placed after a base 3 verb, it can be used to indicate an action that you perform with some kind of regularity, and in essence means 'there are times when such-and-such'. If placed after a base 7 verb, the meaning shifts to the past tense and presents the notion of having experienced something.

例文

English:	Despite being busy, there are times when I read the newspaper.
Jenglish:	[busy][depite][newspaper][read + there are times when]
日本語：	忙しいのに、新聞を読むことがあります。

English:	There are times when I go to work by bike.
Jenglish:	[to work][by bike][go + there are times when]
日本語：	会社に自転車で行くことがあります。

Actually, I think you could use the verb 'to ride' in the sentence.

English:	I have been to London.
Jenglish:	[London][went + have experienced]
日本語：	ロンドンに行ったことがあります。

English:	I have eaten Italian food.
Jenglish:	[Italian food][eaten + have experienced]
日本語：	イタリアン料理を食べたことがあります。

またね。。。

日本語：	[verb (base 6)] もいい
English:	It is alright to...

Another quick one tonight and this time we'll look at a conjugation that allows us to say that some action is permissable. All you have to do is stick もいい on the end of a verb in base 6. Usually, you'll find です in there to make it nice and polite. Something else worth noting is that you can turn this into a question simply by adding か to the end.

例文

English:	It is alright to finish drinking your coffee before we depart.
Jenglish:	[depart][before][coffee][drinking + finish + alright]
日本語：	出発する前にコーヒーを飲み終わってもいいです。

English:	Is it alright to phone my sister?
Jenglish:	[sister][phone + alright][?]
日本語：	姉を電話してもいいですか。

またね。。。

日本語：	[verb (base 2)] 続ける。
日本語：	[verb (base 2)] 続く。
English:	To continue doing...

We've now looked at how to say 'start something', 'suddenly start something' and 'stop something'. To complete this section, let's see how to say 'continue doing something'.

The verb 'to continue' is 続く or 続ける for intransitive and transitive sentences respectively and just like start and stop, we simple add this to base 2 of the action verb.

例文

English:	Despite the weather forcast, the rain continued to fall.
Jenglish:	[weather forecast][despite][rain][fall + continue]
日本語：	天気予報にもかかわらず、雨が降り続きました。

English:	I continued to study after the exam.
Jenglish:	[exam][after][study + continue]
日本語：	試験の後で、勉強し続けました。

またね。。。

日本語：	[verb (base 2)] だす
English:	To suddenly start...

A recent blog entry looked at how we can add 始める to a verb to say 'start an action'. Here we will look at a slight twist on this and see how to say suddenly start an action. It's a subtle difference, but well worth knowing on your path to becoming native. Good examples of this are 'It suddenly started raining' or 'she suddenly remembered'

例文

English:	The girl suddenly started screaming.
Jenglish:	[girl][scream + suddenly started]
日本語：	女の人が悲鳴を上げだしました。

English:	The temperature suddenly dropped.
Jenglish:	[temperature][drop + suddenly]
日本語：	気温は低くなり出しました。

Is this the right verb for temperature dropping?

またね。。。

日本語：	[verb (base 2)] 終わる。
English:	To finish something...

Hot on the heels of the previous blog which looked at how to say something has started, here we will look the the opposite. Again this is a pretty straightforward conjugation as we simply add the verb 'to finish' (終わる) to the base 2 form of the action verb.

例文

English:	I will finish painting the walls in my kitchen this weekend.
Jenglish:	[this weekend][in my kitchen][walls][painting + finish]
日本語：	今週末台所に壁を塗り終わります。

English:	The file has finished copying onto the file server.
Jenglish:	[file server][onto][file][copy + finished]
日本語：	ファイルサーバーにファイを写し終わりました。

Actually, I'm not sure if the verb 写す can be used to mean 'copy a file'. Anyone know different?

またね。。。

日本語：	[verb (base 2)] 始める。
English:	To begin/start something.

After a week away on a business trip, it's time for some serious blog action. After all, the JLPT exams are not that far away.

Today, we'll have at a very quick one. It's a base 2 conjugation that allows you to say that something has started or begun. All you do is take the action verb and add the verb 'to start' to it's base 2 form.

例文

English:	I began reading this book last week.
Jenglish	[last week][this book][read + begun]
日本語：	先週この本を読み始めました。

English:	He will start studying for the JLPT tomorrow.
Jenglish	[tomorrow][he][JLPT][for][study + start]
日本語：	明日彼は日本語能力試験に備えて勉強し始めます。

English:	At the end of August, Japan's weather will start to become cooler.
Jenglish	[at the end of August][Japan's weather][cooler][become + start]
日本語：	８月の終わりに、日本の天気は涼しくなり始めます。

See? I said it was easy!

またね。。。

日本語：	[verb (base 3)/noun] ことができる。
English:	Can do...

OK. A quick grammar point from JLPT3 tonight, but nonetheless, it's an essential one to know. I covered potential verbs back in April, and thought that we had pretty much wrapped the subject up, but it seems that we have another way in which we can express the ability, or inability, to do something.

Back in April, we ended up conjugating the verb and found that despite being an easy conjugation to remember, the resulting verb could become a bit of a mouthful to pronounce. You may be happy to know that tonight's alternative is simple to remember and simple to pronounce. All you do is leave the verb in base 3 and add ことができる.

Now, it is interesting to note that できる is the potential form of する and this can lead to a odd looking situation when using ことができる on する verbs. For example 'I can drive' translates into 私は運転することができます。 Perfectly correct, but pretty long winded. Well, given that できる is just another form of する, we can shorten this to 私は運転ができます. The する has been dropped along with the こと.

Simply put, する verbs are just nouns with the する slapped on the end to make them verbs. 運転する (to drive), 電話する (to phone) etc. The こと is used to turn a verb into a noun. Ergo, if we drop the する, the verb reverts back to being a noun and so こと is not needed. You could even shorten this to 私は運転できます, dropping the particle altogether, but that way too informal. OK, I'm off on a tangent here, but to finalise, the sentence 私は運転することができます could culled down to 運転できる at the extreme end. That's a serious amount of information compression.

The final question that came to mind was given that we now have two ways to express potentials - verb conjugation and ことができる, when do we use each? Here, it again simply comes down to politeness. ことができる is seen as more formal than the verb conjugation method.

例文

English:	I can eat spicy curries.
Jenglish:	[I][spicy][curries][eat][can]
日本語：	私は辛いカレーを食べることができます。

またね。。。

日本語：	[verb (base 1/3)] ように言う。
English:	Tell someone (not) to do something.

Today's grammar point allows us to construct a sentence in which entity A is telling person B to do, or not to do, something. Entity A need not be a person; it could be a sign or other instruction. Person B can either be a third person, or yourself. For example:

"My teacher told me to do the homework".
"Mr. Smith told his colleagues not to gossip"

In essence, what we are really doing is reporting a form of indirect speech, which is something I covered here. However, ように言う is specific to reporting an order or instruction being given.

例文

English:	My teacher told me to do the homework.
Jenglish:	[teacher][me][homework][do]
日本語：	先生は私に宿題をするように言った。

English:	Mr. Smith told his colleagues not to gossip.
Jenglish:	[Mr Smith][colleagues][gossip][not].
日本語：	スミスさんは同僚に陰口しないように言った。

またね。。。

日本語：	[verb (base 1/3)] といいですね。
日本語：	[verb (base 1/3)] といいんですが。
English:	I hope...

Today we'll have a look at such a handy phrase, I don't really know why I haven't covered it before. How do you express that you hope something good happens? The conjugation is pretty easy, but as you can see there are essentially two ways and each has a particular use.

If you want to say that you hope something good happens to someone else, use といいですね. If you are hoping that the good thing will happen to you, use といいんですが. In the latter case you are speaking in a more humble fashion and as such saying 'I hope something good happens, but...'.

Interestingly, I have seen this used by native speakers as といいんだけど when saying they want a positive outcome for themselves, and I guess this is simply a more colloquial form.

One final point: only use the above conjugation form if you have no control over the situation being discussed. So, you couldn't use it in sentences like 'I hope to clean the house today'. For sentences where you do have control, first convert the verb to it's potential form.

例文

English:	I hope the weather will be nice tomorrow for your BBQ.
Jenglish:	[tomorrow][your][BBQ][for][weather][nice][hope]
日本語：	明日、あなたのバーベキューのために天気は良いといいですね。

English:	I hope I pass the exam.
Jenglish:	[exam][pass][hope]
日本語：	試験を合格するといいんですが。

English:	I hope to clean the house today.
Jenglish:	[today][house][(can) clean][hope]
日本語：	今日、家を掃除できるといいんですが。

English:	I hope his flight isn't delayed.
Jenglish:	[his][flight][delayed][hope]
日本語：	彼のフライトを遅れないといいんですが。

またね。。。

日本語：	[verb (base 1/7)] 方がいい。
English:	Would be better (not) to...

Here's another handy little one to have up your sleeve. It allows you to structure a statement as a bit of advice, where the overall feel of the statement can be positive (base 7) or negative (base 1).

Not much else to say about 方がいい so let's give it a go!

例文

English:	It would be better to drive more slowly.
Jenglish:	[more][slowly][drive][better]
日本語:	もっと早く運転した方がいいですよ。

English:	It would be better not to eat the cake before dinner.
Jenglish:	[dinner][before][cake][eat][better not]
日本語:	食事の前にケーキを食べない方がいい。

The grammar books usually stick です on the end, but when speaking, the Japanese seem to omit this more often than not.

またね。。。

Since I keep referring to verb bases when talking about conjugation, I thought it may be handy to actually provide a list of what they are. It's worth noting that the conjugation group indicates the predominant use of the base, not necessarily the sole use...

Base	Conjugation Group	Common Name(s)
1	Negative Base
2	Noun Forming Base
3	Dictionary	Plain Non-Past
4	Conditional
5	Conjectural
6	て-form
7	た-form	Plain Past

You'll also see the term 'short form'. This refers to a verb in bases 1,3 or 7.

日本語：	[verb (base 1)] なくてもいい。
English:	Do not need to...

This is a very simple conjugation: simply convert the verb to base 1 (plain negative) and add なくてもいい. To make it more polite add です。Yeah, it's that easy!

例文：

English:	John does not have to study Japanese on Saturday.
Jenglish:	[On Saturday][John][Japanese][study + don't have to]
日本語：	土曜日にジョンさんは日本語を勉強しなくてもいいです。
English:	Akiko does not have to go to work tomorrow.
Jenglish:	[Tomorrow][Akiko][work][go + don't have to]
日本語:	明日あきこさんは会社に行かなくてもいいです。
English:	I don't have to write the report this weekend.
Jenglish:	[This weekend][report][write + don't have to]
日本語：	今週末にはレポートを書かなくてもいいです。

It's also worth mentioning how to ask someone if they have to do something, although we have already covered this a while back. Usually with the question form you simply slap か on the end, but not here. If you did you would end up saying "Do you not have to..." which sounds odd. Instead you would say "Do you have to..." which uses the なければなりません and なければいけません conjugations. If you want to be a bit more casual, you can use なくちゃいけません. All three of these follow the verb conjugated to base 1.

例文：

English:	Peter, do you have to be so positve about everything?
Jenglish:	[Peter][everything][about][positive][be + have to]
日本語：	ペータさんは何でものために前向きにならなければなりませんか。

I think this sentence is correct.

日本語：	[verb (base 1/3)] ことにする。
English:	Decide to do...

Yes, I'm going for the 日本語能力試験３ in December. So I guess it's time to start cramming up on the grammar I'll need to know. This one is a bit confusing as it also appears to be on the level 2 list of grammar, but hey, it's a handy one so we'll cover it anyway.

ことにする is used when you want to say that someone decided to do something and, as such, it's usually found in past tense conjugation. The emphasis here is that the person you are talking about did the deciding - it was decision they came to themselves. If you want to say that the decision was made for them, I think you would use ことになる which is JLPT2 stuff.

One final point, if saying 'decided not to', then the base 1 ない ending becomes なさ.

例文：

English:	I have decided to study for the JPLT3 in December.
Jenglish:	[December][in][JLPT3][study][decided]
日本語：	１２月に日本語能力試験３を勉強することにしました。

English:	The teacher decided to quit because the job became too stressful.
Jenglish:	[job][stressful+too][became][because][teacher][quit][decided]
日本語：	仕事がストレスになったから、先生は辞めることにしました。

Actually, how do you say 'stressful' in Japanese.

またね。。。