@Shadow

Yup. And Marie is right about the Spanish surnames. xP

now, i'm learning korean and english still,,,

annyonghaseyo,,,(in korean;similiar with hai for greeting)
je ireumeun ris_mun imnida,,(my name is ris_mun)
mannaso bangapsemnida,,(nice to meet u)

@ris: you well known of them, huh?
May i ask for the korean of "who cares" or "no brainers"?
Give me some of the curse, lol, hehe

I've started learning Japanese

@slimmm: well, it's great. Do you learn it by yourself or what?
I'm trying to learn by myself by watching animes and matching what they're saying, both with the dictionary i have, and the subtitles. Even now, i still barely know of japanese, though. They just speak too fast

No, I study at the University.

you're so lucky!!
well, out university offers other languages classes too, but.. i dunno.. too lazy of me. but i do want to learn another language.. haha

@slimmm: whoa-- are you gonna be a translator?
Or fansuber?
@marie: too bad.. But you wish to have a big tour through the world? :p

I have no idea what I'd like to be, I just knew what I wanted to study.

good for you
i remembered the time when i self studied Japanese

yeah, end of story..

Well, now that I've graduated in my ennglish course, I've started learning spanish and german :B

@watershine: so it's just differently-shaped alphabets but basically normal language? Or an entirely different language? XD I used to write in symbols too, even though my diary is locked. It's harder to read than to write, LOL.
-----------------------------------
Japanese IS mostly based off Chinese, especially obvious in the kanji. The katakana "alphabet" is also inspired by Chinese characters.

I find the Scandinavian language very interesting because it's so hard to speak them. The more tongue-twisting the language is, the more I love them. It took me DAYS to get the pronounciation for the Caramelldansen correct and I still haven't managed to properly pronounce the entire Ievan Polkka song. You know, that Loituma Leek Spin song? And I mean the original full version, not the one playing in those Leek Spin vids. That's the "nonsense chorus" section, and it's completely and utterly nonsense. Akin to the "Rah rah rah ah ah rama ramama ga ga ooh lala" part in Bad Romance.

@agas: The japanese written language is similar though not enough for a chinese to be able to read it. My mom (knows madarin, cantonese, another chinese dialect, vietnamese,english) tried reading some japanese text and she was only able to get the chinese words though not enough to really get an understanding of what's going on in the text. And the language sounds totally different from mandarin/cantonese.

@KTC: I know that. I'm just saying that the Japanese kanji is based off the Chinese characters. The traditional/old form of the characters, to be precise. The Japanese use the hiragana a lot and hardly ever use full kanji for their writings, so it's still hard for people fluent in Chinese to read Japanese text. And hiragana is not at all inspired/similar to Chinese writing in any way.

@KTC & agas
I know how to read Chinese and Japanese and what I can say that not all Japanese kanji are what they seemed (through the eyes of one who tries to read it as if reading Chinese characters/kanji).

My "favorite" example is as below:
(Not sure if you can see the text though)

e.g. 勉強

a)Japanese
Pronunciation - Benkyou
Meaning - Study (adj.)

b)Chinese
Pronunciation - Mian Qiang
Meaning - Force (adj.)

See the meanings of this word in these two languages, I come up with this thought....This is probably the "hidden meaning" behind how Asians see studying as xD

We worked so hard in our studies because we "study with force" xD

OR maybe because we are FORCED to study. xP

@Ivana
*nods in agreement* Forced to study by an external force.(Why'd you think our parents had stocked up on rattan canes for? xD)

Ha, wow. I want to learn Japanese, but no where to learn it. I guess I'll have to stick with French for now. Since English is my first language, French, Spannish, and Italian are easier because they're based off of Latin, just like English.

@Yuffie

English is a Germanic language, not a Latin one.

@shadowshed:
ya i'm still learning korea language, in my town there is a korean grup, i've joined since 1 year ago, and i learn there,,=)
so many korea freaks in my town, so the members of this grup more adding,

because i learn formal language first, i'm still not much know about informal language,
i think 'who cares' = nuga bonya
'no brainers' = ani saengakhal / nwe obneun

kamsahamnida,,,(thank u)