Hi All,

Am new here, This is an amazing community and I'm glad to be a part of it.
I'm currently trying to pick up Japanese through self-study like most of you here.

I've just finished around 100 words of Kanji from RTK1 and I hope to expand my vocab/readings by starting on KO2001.

However, so far I have run into a little question on one of the sentences that is in KO2001.

円は今１ドル１０５円。昨日より１円円高だ。
$1 is now 105 yen. It is 1 yen higher than yesterday.

It says here Yen has gone 104 = $1 to 105 = $1.
Doesn't this meant that Yen has depreciated against USD.
In such case, why do they still use 円高?

Cheers

It actually says Yen has gone from 106 = $1 to 105 = $1.

What Tobbs said. I recommend against letting the full sentence translation guide your sense of the words/structure, it should be the other way around, at most just use the translation to get the gist of the sentence afterwards to compare.

Yep ! I did both books and by the end of the book II I was barely taking a glance at the translation ..... It is meant to be a crutch . The quicker you get rid of it , the better.
Khatzu would even advocate against any kind of translation once you got after 500 sentences....

I have a quick question about a sentence and didn't want to start a new thread. What does the "遅えぞ" do in this sentence?

あとで やっぱ付き合っときゃ よかったって泣いても遅えぞ

danieldesu Wrote:I have a quick question about a sentence and didn't want to start a new thread. What does the "遅えぞ" do in this sentence?

あとで やっぱ付き合っときゃ よかったって泣いても遅えぞ

It's slang, extremely similar to 遅いよ. It's pronunced "osee zo".

Tobberoth Wrote:

danieldesu Wrote:I have a quick question about a sentence and didn't want to start a new thread. What does the "遅えぞ" do in this sentence?

あとで やっぱ付き合っときゃ よかったって泣いても遅えぞ

It's slang, extremely similar to 遅いよ. It's pronunced "osee zo".

And I would add that, used in this manner, it gives a sense of "there's no use X." In this specific example, "there's no use crying" (lit., crying now is late/after the fact).

Or if you live where I live, it becomes おせちゃ

Thanks guys, I figured there was something more to it than just its "slow" meaning

nest0r Wrote:What Tobbs said. I recommend against letting the full sentence translation guide your sense of the words/structure, it should be the other way around, at most just use the translation to get the gist of the sentence afterwards to compare.

So the problem is with the very 'literal' translation of the Japanese statement to English?
Nonetheless, thanks a lot to everyone for the clarification .

Cheers

istel Wrote:

nest0r Wrote:What Tobbs said. I recommend against letting the full sentence translation guide your sense of the words/structure, it should be the other way around, at most just use the translation to get the gist of the sentence afterwards to compare.

So the problem is with the very 'literal' translation of the Japanese statement to English?
Nonetheless, thanks a lot to everyone for the clarification .

Cheers

I actually usually prefer very 'literal' translations, because the 'natural' ones deviate from the structure of the Japanese sentence.

You just misinterpreted the English word 'higher' in the translation--you appear to have isolated it from the idea of 円高 ('exchange in favour of the yen'), and then compared the Japanese to your idea of what the English meant, when you need to keep in mind that the Japanese is the original and the rest is an imperfect interpretation, so you should be focusing on the words/structure of the original sentence, and then check the translation if necessary. I mean, no need to isolate Japanese/English unless you want to, just make sure Japanese gets the priority in every way when it comes down to giving priority to one or the other.

Actually, my problem was like you have said that I compared the Japanese and English sentences separately.

Looking at just the English statement alone.

$1 is now 105 yen. It is 1 yen higher than yesterday.

Will anyone understand that Yen was 106 yesterday?

Like you've said the keyword is 円高, this tells us that the Yen has appreciated.
This direction of appreciation is not conveyed in the English statement. Which was why I said it's 'literal' translation (I actually meant 'direct' translation I guess). It only tells us that it's 1 yen higher than yesterday.

I think I roughly get the drift on how I should use the English translation in KO2001 for Japanese study.

Thanks a lot for all the prompt response, everyone has been heaps helpful.

Cheers

[Sorry for editing this post so much, I'll use the preview button next time]

If a translation is wrong it might not classify as literal.

The yen rate now is $1 to 105 yen. The yen is 1 yen stronger than yesterday.

My impression of the KO sentences is that they aim for natural-sounding English interpretations rather than literal 1:1 translations or something close to that, though often there's a bit of awkwardness due, I presume, to non-native English proficiency. I also do not like their English translations of vocabulary words.