What exactly mean??

hari · Post by **hari** » Fri Apr 17, 2009 2:56 am

today morning, i found a famous-saying in newspaper.it really make me to
feel good but icant understand its 100% meanings about it.
could you explain it meanings???

You cant sit around and wait the storm to be over.You have got to learn how to dance in the rain.

thank you

Post by **Ironman** » Fri Apr 17, 2009 3:43 am

All your base are belong to us!!!!!!!!!!

What it means is that you can't just wait and look ahead to the future. You have to make the best of what you have now. You don't want to have your life on hold waiting for something. Just work around whatever is going on in the present.

hari · Post by **hari** » Sat Apr 18, 2009 6:13 am

Thank you for translate!!

yeah,it is very important to keep walking in my life,instead of waiting for something.

Anyway could you tell me what does it means...All your base are belong to us

teach me,please

Post by **Ironman** » Sat Apr 18, 2009 12:49 pm

The line "All your base are belong to us!!" was a line from an old video game in the 1980's. It was originally a Japanese game, but it was then translated into English and released in the US. There is a part at the beginning where the aliens are taking over all the human bases in space. I think the object of the game is to take them back and defeat the aliens. However when they meant to say something like "We have taken over all your bases!", the actual phrase used was "All your base are belong to us!". This was very funny and so it became quoted a lot. It is a famous example of a bad translation.

So my use of it was just a little joke in regard to the way you phrased things. It's all in fun though, just a joke.

for example, "today morning", should be "this morning". In english you always use the pronoun when speaking about the time of for today. So while you may say yesterday morning, or tomorrow morning, when talking about today, you say this morning.

"feel good but I can't understand its 100% meanings about it." Should probably be "I like it, but I don't understand it's meaning 100%." or "I don't understand it 100%, but the part I do understand sounds right."

"could you explain it meanings" should probably be "Could you explain it's meaning?" You want to add the s to the pronoun to show ownership, so to speak, rather than put it on meaning. Because the phrase, which you replace with the pronoun "it" is the meaning you are asking about. It is the meaning of that phrase. So "it's meaning". It is confusing though, because other pronouns don't require the S. Usually only names get the S, like "Hari's question". You don't use it with "his question" or "my response".

The phrasing is so radically different between English and Japanese, that these translations happen all the time. There is a whole site about it called engrish.com.

If we read it carefully we can tell what you were trying to say. Sometimes it comes out in a humorous way though.

Post by **stuward** » Sat Apr 18, 2009 2:38 pm

Ironman, you should be an Engrish teacher.

hari · Post by **hari** » Sun Apr 19, 2009 6:42 am

I really appriciate for teaching me completely!!

you know,i never imagine that someone would correct my english mistakes in this site, i think i may have meet with wondelful place!!
"all your base are belong to us", i learn new phrase

when i want to develop writing skill, what kind of training should i do??? Reading a lot of things?? or learn vocabolary??
I know that in this forum there is an aweful lot of incredible phrase which i can devolop writing skill form it,but i definitely dont know how to utilize.
Any idea??

pdellorto · Post by **pdellorto** » Sun Apr 19, 2009 7:18 am

What works for me in Japanese writing is:

- I keep a blog in Japanese

- I read as much Japanese as I can find, from children's books to websites.

- I copy things I see natives write. Not cut-and-paste what they write, but I use their phrases. If it's wrong, people will correct me or misunderstand me but I learn the phrase when I use it.

That's helped me a lot. You can reverse that for English. And finding a good English/eikaiwa teacher in Osaka won't be hard.

Peter

Post by **Ironman** » Sun Apr 19, 2009 1:20 pm

American or UK media is always good. By reading the way things are phrased, you can use that as an example. Listening to how people phrase stuff is another good way. Youtube is any easy way to find stuff. I know people that learned English from scratch by watching Sesame street (An American TV show).

You can find anime with English subtitles. There is a whole community that rips the DVDs and adds subtitles. So you can hear the Japanese and then see the phrase in English.

"I really appriciate for teaching me completely" = "I really appreciate you teaching me so thoroughly."

Next lesson is past tense. When speaking of the past, the verb changes. Usually "ed" is added to the end. Imagine becomes imagined and learn becomes learned.

In the phrase "i think i may have meet with wondelful place", 'have" and meet" are both present tense. The conditional past tense using "may" leaves "have" as it is, but changes "meet" to the past tense of "met". This is a verb that changes rather than just adding "ed".

Using the phrase "have met with", would be in regards to a person. You meet people, where as places or things you visit or see. For example. "I may have met with a celebrity, and not known about it because he was in disguise.

In your case you could maybe phrase it "I think I may have found a wonderful place." But I think implies the uncertainty and makes the conditional "may have" redundant. So even better would be "I think I found a wonderful place." Or probably the best would be "I may have discovered a wonderful place."

That's being literal though. The phrase "I think I just found a really good web site", is probably a better translation of what you were saying based on the context. The word "just" is used to imply very recent past.

As for using the forum, you can try dictionary.com for definitions. You are at the point now, where you understand English well enough that you can use an English dictionary to learn vocabulary rather than a Japanese/English dictionary. The meaning of things frequently don't translate literally between Japanese and English. So you may find an English dictionary better, because it can relate new words, to ones you already know. It can teach you connotation too. Connotation is a very confusing thing in English where the implied meaning in a certain situation may be radically different from the usual literal meaning. A thesaurus is another good tool. You can find an online thesaurus. It can show you words the have a similar meaning, or an opposite meaning. You can then use these to help you with the meaning of unfamiliar words on the forum.

Here is an example of a fairly complex sentence you got completely right. "when i want to develop writing skill, what kind of training should i do?" That is pretty good. It would be a good one to refer back too.

hari · Post by **hari** » Mon Apr 20, 2009 3:19 am

Thanks for suggestions,peter and Iroman.

i have started to make my blog,3 days ago.To tell you the truth,i feel irritate because the level of writing skill is like elementary school level.
but i need to learn with intesity.

Youtube is any easy way to find stuff. I know people that learned English from scratch by watching Sesame street (An American TV show).

I like the ER.Do you think is it possible to learn phrase from it??
Yeah,i forget...recently i start to watch the CNN news and BBC newes in order to develop my english,and this morning i buyed Cnn ENGLISH EXPRESSION,,but the phrase which they use in between Drama and in the
news so differently,i mean in the news there are more bussiness conversetion.What exectly iwant to say,do you think reading articles and listening form CNN or BBC is the waste of times???

The meaning of things frequently don't translate literally between Japanese and English. So you may find an English dictionary better, because it can relate new words, to ones you already know. It can teach you connotation too. Connotation is a very confusing thing in English where the implied meaning in a certain situation may be radically different from the usual literal meaning. A thesaurus is another good tool. You can find an online thesaurus.

Thanks for site!it`s amazing!!

pdellorto · Post by **pdellorto** » Mon Apr 20, 2009 8:34 am

I find copying friends is better than copying TV. If you copy TV and it's a strange expression or a "catch phrase" you sound odd. If you copy your friends, you sound like your friends!

I recommend this site highly:

http://www.bbc.co.uk/worldservice/learningenglish/

It is current news in easy English. It has a lot of good expressions, phrases, and vocabulary.　It's British English, not American English, but the difference is very slight. I'm looking for something like that in Japanese, so please tell me if you know.

Otherwise, keep trying.

一生懸命頑張って下さい。もし頑張ったら、かなり上手になるよ！

hari · Post by **hari** » Tue Apr 21, 2009 4:29 pm

Thanks for website! I havent known there is a BBC LEARNING ENGLISH
into the bbc site

It`s amazing,so incredible.
this morning i woke up so early in order to study englsih utilizing this one
listening a lot and i learned new vocabolary.

I'm looking for something like that in Japanese, so please tell me if you know.

im going to ask to proffesor [teacher of university who teach japanese launguage] if there is the site like bbc

Iam going to find out quickly!

一生懸命頑張って下さい。もし頑張ったら、かなり上手になるよ！

もちろん頑張るで！！どんなことでも続けることが大事だと思わない？小さな努力の積み重ねがいつか絶対に表に表れてくる。

yeah,do you like this phrase??

To thine own self be true. from william shakespears.

hari · Post by **hari** » Sat Apr 25, 2009 7:23 am

What kind of difference they have between Premonition and Foreboding?
Do you use this vocabolary when you talk with others people??

"i have a premonition that he will pass the exam" or"foreboding??

pdellorto · Post by **pdellorto** » Sat Apr 25, 2009 8:37 am

hari wrote:What kind of difference they have between Premonition and Foreboding?

"What's the difference between a premonition and foreboding?"

The difference is: A premonition is when you have a warning or insight about a future event. Usually with no evidence or cause - you just feel it.

Foreboding is similar, it's an warning or feeling, but it's almost always of something bad. You don't say "I had a foreboding that dinner would be steak." You might say "I had a foreboding that something bad would happen on this trip."

hari wrote:Do you use this vocabolary when you talk with others people??

"i have a premonition that he will pass the exam" or"foreboding??

It's not so common. We'd usually say "I have a feeling that he will pass the exam." Premonitions usually imply something supernatural or that you can't explain.

Is that explanation clear enough?

Post by **Ironman** » Sat Apr 25, 2009 12:29 pm

Those 2 words are usually used in a poetic way of speaking. You run into that more in books and movies.

What I would work on, if I were you, is past tense. Other than past tense you seem to get things right more often than not.

A list of verbs that change in the past tense would be a big help.

Like for example talk just becomes talked like most verbs. However speak becomes spoke. A lot of times those verbs may have another form for past conditional. Like spoken in this case. As in "I would have spoken with him."

There is also the situation where you are talking about a continuous action. Like the present is "I am running around the track." You might say "I ran around the track." in a situation where you are telling someone one of the things you did that day. However when speaking about what you did a certain time, you keep "run" in the "ing" form "running" and just ad the word "was". So you say "I was running around the track this morning."

How to pluralize words might be something good to go to next. But you would be better off focusing on past tense for a while.

Post by **Jungledoc** » Sat Apr 25, 2009 2:38 pm

Hari--

Would you mind telling us a little more about yourself? What work do you do? Where do you live? (I assume you are in Japan, but where exactly?)

Are you able to get Australia Network on TV? I know that they are carried on cable systems throughout Asia. On Saturdays (maybe repeated on Sundays) they have several programs on English. One is a news feature show in simplified English. Another is specific teaching. They have a brief story, acted out by actors. After they show the story, a commentator goes through the dialog, discussing meanings of words and phrases, including idioms. There are maybe three different shows that they show in quick succession. I hope that helps.

ExRx.net

What exactly mean??

What exactly mean??

Grazie tanto