Here's a slightly different request...

Does anyone have any sound clips of the shortened greetings or other such words?

For example, instead of おはようございます or ありがとうございます there is something else that is quite often said instead.

The first becomes something like っざいます　and the second something like either あっざす or あっざいます. I want to shadow these sound clips and get it perfect.

Thanks!

When my Japanese friends greet each other they say something that sounds like うっす！　which I suppose is just like "hi!". When they greet someone older they say something like こんちわっす！

I was quite surprised because I have never heard these before and it feels weird that after years of studying Japanese I didn't even know how Japanese people greet each other.

I don't have any video or sound clips though...

Sequa Wrote:When my Japanese friends greet each other they say something that sounds like うっす！　which I suppose is just like "hi!". When they greet someone older they say something like こんちわっす！

I hear おっす！ in anime a lot.

Sequa Wrote:When my Japanese friends greet each other they say something that sounds like うっす！　which I suppose is just like "hi!". When they greet someone older they say something like こんちわっす！

I was quite surprised because I have never heard these before and it feels weird that after years of studying Japanese I didn't even know how Japanese people greet each other.

I don't have any video or sound clips though...

おっす is used constantly. If you watch anime, you'll hear it a lot.

The っす in こんちわっす however is probably a short form of です, also used very often by some people. それはそうっす. It's sorta slangy but still 丁寧語.

yukamina Wrote:I hear おっす！ in anime a lot.

I'd say it's pretty common outside of anime, too. All my male Japanese friends greet each other with おっす.

according to naomi at jpod its a karate term that a lot of japanese males use. in the newbie series the australian girl asked exactly that question. whether it was short for おはようございます or if it meant something else.

Gingerninja Wrote:according to naomi at jpod its a karate term that a lot of japanese males use. in the newbie series the australian girl asked exactly that question. whether it was short for おはようございます or if it meant something else.

It's not a karate term anymore than ichi ni san are karate terms.

Ryuujin27 Wrote:Here's a slightly different request...

Does anyone have any sound clips of the shortened greetings or other such words?

For example, instead of おはようございます or ありがとうございます there is something else that is quite often said instead.

The first becomes something like っざいます　and the second something like either あっざす or あっざいます. I want to shadow these sound clips and get it perfect.

Thanks!

You're pretty on in your guessing, I hear the same things every day but I don't know exactly how to spell them.

yeh i got 1

Ahh, good find Hashiriya. I just wish he threw in the short ありがとうございます... One of my Japanese buddies taught me あっざす but this other Japanese girl I know told me it was like badass slang and not to use it too much. However, everyone else here (even shop clerks) always say this shortened version that isn't as short as あっざす but still short... maybe like あざいます or something, but I want to get the intonation down.

Ryuujin27 Wrote:Ahh, good find Hashiriya. I just wish he threw in the short ありがとうございます... One of my Japanese buddies taught me あっざす but this other Japanese girl I know told me it was like badass slang and not to use it too much. However, everyone else here (even shop clerks) always say this shortened version that isn't as short as あっざす but still short... maybe like あざいます or something, but I want to get the intonation down.

I've never heard a shop clerk say anything other than full properly enunciated speech. Even for normal encounters with people they normally properly enunciate their speech instead of saying something like あっざす. The only person I hear it from regularly is my girlfriend, but Japanese people always tell her that her speech is weird (and it is, she sounds like an anime character sometimes with all the にゃー and キュン and シュン.)

Thats not to say that normal speech doesn't have abbreviations, but with expressions of thanks it's better to be more clear. My speech is littered with shortenings (some of which are exclusive to Kansai-ben and other western dialects. It seems that I speak more Osaka-ben as time goes by, despite not living there anymore.

When greeting my Japanese friends I normally just use おう, even shorter than おっす.

When I used to hand out flyers at the train station in Japan for one of my バイト I usually went less polite with おねがいしゃっす & ありがとござっす since I had to say it every couple seconds when someone took a flyer.

Some major ones (much much more common than あっざす) missed in the above video are:
〜ている→〜てる (or 〜とる if you go more inaka)
は becoming a glide, such as in：
それは→そっりゃ
これは→こっりゃ
俺は→おっりゃ
は losing the h sound such as in
今日は→きょうあ (actually this usually loses the う too, so more like きょあ)
〜るの turning into んの (何をするの？→なにすんの?, the に's n becomes very weak here too, so more like なーいすんの)
phrases like:俺の家→俺んち
もの becoming もん "お前は俺のもんやからな"
では becoming じゃ (most common one evar)

Anyways, casual speech is best learned over time naturally, not from study. You need to get a feel for the kind of company and TPO (time/place/occasion) that you can use them in. There is no way to perfectly transcribe the pronunciation anyways. If you can learn to use them naturally it really makes your Japanese more impressive to native speakers though.

Just say "おはようございます" really really really fast! zooom

Wow, Jarvik, fantastic post! Thank you.

I agree it should be learned over time, but I think I generally have a good idea of TPO and think I can use it correctly. Also, the shop keepers here never say the fully pronounced thing, unless they are older. All the コンビニ workers around me (大学) are college age or a little older and always shorten it... but reading your post it might be more something like ありがとござっす. I really need to listen in, but I always am doing something while paying or thinking of something else. Oh well.

But yeah, thanks for the great post! Very informative!