nihongo wo benkyou shitai

日本語：	[verb (volitional)] と思う
English:	I think I will...

Way back in my first year of studying I came across と思う as a means of expressing my thoughts. So I was a little confused when I started looking into today's grammar point, as it seemed to overlap with this simpler と思う form, however there is a difference.

Whilst the previous use of と思う came after verbs in the plain form (as well as adjectives and nouns), today's usage is after the volitional form of verbs. In this context, it takes on a meaning similar to 'I think I will...' which added to my confusion as I now had two ways to express the same idea. For example: to say "I think I'll eat the sushi" could now be translated as either of the following:

寿司を食べると思う。
寿司と食べようと思う。

Luckily, this ambiguity is a(nother) case of my lack of understanding: the simpler と思う conjugation is used to express one's thoughts and views, but to express one's intentions we have to use the volitional form if the verb followed by と思う. As such, the first example sentence above is not grammatically correct.

Things do get a little cloudy, however, as there seem to be two common uses of the volitional form; と思う and と思っている. Usually this would be a simple (if time consuming) job for Google, but I have been getting conflicting answers on the differences. One source (my 元気 textbook) suggests that if the intention to do something has just been reached, then use と思う, otherwise use と思っている however, a source on the web suggests the opposite. However, given that ーている expresses a state, I am inclined to think that と思っている expresses an intention already reached と思う expresses an intention that has just been made.

例文を見ましょう！

English:	I think I'll order the pizza at the restaurant tonight.
Jenglish:	[tonight][restaurant][at][pizza][order + I think I will]
日本語：	今晩レストランでピザを注文しようと思ってる。

English:	Actually, I think I will buy two batteries after all.
Jenglish:	[battery][2][buy + I think I will]
日本語：	電池を２本買おうと思う。

次は、インターネットでし調べよう！

例文１

最初の例文はこのサイトを見つかった。

日本語：	携帯を買い替えようとおもってます。
Jenglish:	[mobile phone] [replace + I think I will]

OK. An easy example to start off and the opening question on a web site asking about what people could recommend and why. As there seem little of real difficulty here, I'll go straight for the translation: I'm thinking of replacing my mobile.


例文２
このサイトから、この例文はもっと難しいと思う。

日本語：	株の勉強をしようとおもっているのですが、初心者でもよくわかるサイトありませんか？
Jenglish:	[shares] [study + I think I will] [NO] [is] [but], [beginner] [DEMO] [often] [to understand] [site] [there is] [KA]?

Well, where to start? I've left a couple of particles in as they require special discussion. The first part seems relatively straightforward. Then we have the particle NO, used here to normalise the preceding statement into a noun. After that we have です which most will recognise as the verb to be. Here though, there is no English equivalent and so it will get dropped from the translation. Next we have the conjunction but, thereby creating a natural break in the sentence. So , at the halfway point we have I'm thinking of studying shares but... which, although not natural sounding , is understandable.

The next part of the sentence slightly more complex. We have a verb in there (わかる) followed by a noun, so it's my favourite subordinate clause again. Since everything before the noun is describing it, I shall ignore that for a moment and look at the remainder of the sentence, which is straightforward. This should give us: Is there a site that....

The final part looks at the subordinate clause. The first difficulty I had here was the translation of でも. I covered this a while ago here and here and as both can follow a noun, it's difficult to choose. I have decided to translate でも in this case as or something... on the grounds that it seems a slightly better option. The last part (よくわかる) seems a little odd to me. The literal translation is often understand which really feels awkward in this context. I have therefore decided to change the translation to a more natural-sounding easily understand because if something can be understood frequently, it must be easy to understand. Right?

Anyway, my final translation is: I'm thinking of following stocks and shares but is there a site that is easily understandable for beginners and such?

またね・・・

日本語：	[verb (base 3, 7)] ところだ
日本語：	[verb (base 6)] いる + ところだ
日本語：	[verb (base 6)] いた + ところだ
English:	To be about to..., to have just..., to be in the middle of..., to have been in the middle of...

I covered this grammar point back in May 2006, but have come back to visit it for two reasons: first I didn't cover what has to be a very useful meaning of it and second, I like the new blog format. According to JapanesePod101, ところ can also be used after adjectives and nouns, but this does not seem to be a requirement for the 日本語能力試験三級 so I'm not going to look into such usage here.

As covered in the original blog entry, ところ can follow verbs in base 3 and 7. Here the meaning is that some action is just about to be performed (base 3) or has just been performed (base 7). What I did not cover then is the usage of ところ after the present & past progressive verbal forms. After such forms, ところ can be used to indicate that the subject of the sentence is in the middle of, or was in the middle of performing some action.

じゃぁ、例文を作ろう！

English:	He is just about to leave the office.
Jenglish:	[he][office][leave + just about to]
日本語：	彼はオフィスを出るところだ。

English:	I have just bought the HiS Crossfire PCIe X1950 graphics card.
Jenglish:	[HiS Crossfire PCIe X1950] [called] [graphics card] [bought + just]
日本語：	ヒースコロスフィアピシアイX１９５０というグラフィクスカードを買ったところだ。

English:	I am in the middle of preparing dinner so can I call you later?
Jenglish:	[dinner] [prepare + in the middle of] [because] [later] [call + can]
日本語：	食事を料理しているつもりからあとで電話できますか。

今、インタネットから例文を調べよう！

例文１

この例文はこのウェブサイトが見つかりました。サイトのアイデアはとても面白いと思います。

日本語：	「カメラマンが写真を撮っているところ」を撮った写真いろいろ
Jenglish:	"[cameramen] [pictures] [taking + middle of]" [took] [pictures] [various]

What a great idea for a web site and probably as interesting as the pictures they were taking! Anyway, perhaps nothing too complex here. The adjective is stuck right at the end of the sentence, which is a little odd I think (but my failing memory seems to remember this is possible). Also, another sentence with a subordinate clause. So my translation is: A variety of pictures taken of cameramen in the middle of taking pictures.


例文２

同じサイトに他の例文を見つかりました。

日本語：	女性が自分の体型で気にしているところは？
Jenglish:	[women] [GA] [myself] [NO] [figure] [DE] [worry about + middle of] [WA]

Now this is much more tricky. In the Jenglish, I've included the particles as well since they're going to play a big part in this translation. First, I'm going to translate で as becuase in this case as it comes directly after a noun. A quick check on Jim Breen's online dictionary suggests that 気にする can be translated as to worry about. However, it didn't feel right when I tried to fit the words 'in the middle of' into this sentence and so I haven't. Instead I have decided that, because the verb is in the て form, we are looking at an ongoing state and adding adding ところ simply reinforces that fact. So, my initial translation would be Women worrying about their figures, however because of the 自分 and the question mark at the end I'm going for Are you a woman worrying about your figure?.

Interesting result from the study too!

またね・・・

じゃあ、久しぶりだなぁ・・・

この写真はニューブリの運河だ。今日はちょっとつまらなくて写真と撮ることにした。そして、正直と言えば他の理由だ。今月末、旅行に行く！！！！！２７日にエジプトに行く予定だ。今は用意がたくさんあるから、超忙しいだよ！

でも、ニューブリの写真はなぜ？じゃぁ、カメラを使うのを連絡しなければなれない。