Japanese

Just got back from the Japanese class. It was suppose to be a 2 hour class but the lecturer let us back earlier because the class today is mainly about the introduction and the origin of the Japanese words.

Our lecturer is a Japanese, he came to Malaysia for 8 years already, working as a Japanese lecturer since 2001 in USM. His name is Soeda Masatoshi. Just like the Chinese culture, the surname of the Japanese comes first, in this case - Soeda and the first name comes second - Masatoshi. however, Japanese greet each other by using their surnames instead of their first name, which is very different from Malaysia's culture.

We were told that Japanese words are originate from China's 汉字, in Japan they pronounce it as Kanji at 4 B.C. The characters are similar to the Chinese but different pronunciation. For example in Chinese, 加 is pronounce as jia but in Japanese, 加 is pronounce as ka. During that time, only men are permitted to read and write Kanji. Until 7th century, women are allowed to read and write Kanji. There, they created their own Japanese words, Hiragana and Katagana.

One more thing, our lecturer taught us about Japanese culture as well. Japanese always bow whenever they greet or they meet their friends, teachers etc. Does anyone know the original meaning behind the bows they did? According to Mr.Soeda, the reason Japanese did those bows are to show that there is no weapons on our back. I think he read or watched too much of samurais thingy Haha. That's all for now Ciaoz ^^