Merry Christmas in the Land of the Rising Sun In Japan, Christmas is known as more of a time to spread happiness rather than a religious celebration. Christmas became popular through American influence and many of the phrases associated with Christmas are words and phrases from English. Japanese uses a special script, Katakana, to write words it has borrowed from other languages. Here are some rules about Katakana: Each symbol is a syllable instead of just one letter; A syllable starts with a consonant followed by a vowel; Only the has its own symbol / letter; “n” Japanese does not have certain sounds that we have in English, for example there is no so this sound is not written in Japanese; “w” – There are no special characters for capital letters there’s no difference between – capitals and lower case letters in Katakana; As the Japanese sound for sounds a bit between our and sounds, Japanese “r” “r” “l” speakers translate every sound in English with their “l” “r” is a special symbol that is a little pause before the next syllable is said. It is used when the English word has two consonants for example, in Japanese would “Hello” be , which is literally: ro”. “he – etc. can be turned into very easily by adding a little “ta”, “te”, “to” “da”, “de” “do” accent-like symbol that looks like a double apostrophe: ta = da = Question 1: Can you fill in the blanks with the English translation? (there are some hints on the next page to help you if you get stuck) Japanese word /phrase: English word / phrase: (a) Present (literally in Japanese: “puresento”) (b) Christmas wreath (literally in Japanese: ri-su”) “kurisumasu Santa (c) marsh mellow (literally in Japanese (d) for “marushuju” “marsh”) (e) Christmas light (literally in Japanese “raito” for “light”)
Merry Christmas in the Land of the Rising Sun In Japan, Christmas is known as more of a time to spread happiness rather than a religious celebration. Christmas became popular through American influence and many of the phrases associated with Christmas are words and phrases from English. Japanese uses a special script, Katakana, to write words it has borrowed from other languages. Here are some rules about Katakana: Each symbol is a syllable instead of just one letter; A syllable starts with a consonant followed by a vowel; Only the “n” has its own symbol / letter; Japanese does not have certain sounds that we have in English, for example there is no “w” – so this sound is not written in Japanese; There are no special characters for capital letters – there’s no difference between capitals and lower case letters in Katakana; As the Japanese sound for “r” sounds a bit between our “r” and “l” sounds, Japanese speakers translate every “l” sound in English with their “r” is a special symbol that is a little pause before the next syllable is said. It is used when the English word has two consonants for example, “Hello” in Japanese would be which is literally: “he – ro”. “ta”, “te”, “to” etc. can be turned into “da”, “de” , “do” very easily by adding a little accent-like symbol that looks like a double apostrophe: ta = da = Question 1: Can you fill in the blanks with the English translation? (there are some hints on the next page to help you if you get stuck) Japanese word /phrase: English word / phrase: (a) Present (literally in Japanese: “puresento”) (b) Christmas wreath (literally in Japanese: “kurisumasu ri-su”) (c) Santa (d) marsh mellow (literally in Japanese “marushuju” for “marsh”) (e) Christmas light (literally in Japanese “raito” for “light”)
Merry-Christmas-in-the-Land-of-the-Rising-Sun.docx