はい、みなさんこんにちは。Welcome to Sakura Neko’s Japanese Study Room, where you can learn Japanese from anime quotes! Today’s topic is 耳をすませば (Mimi o sumase ba: Whisper of the Heart).
If you read this article, you will learn:
Useful vocabulary
A grammar point – You may not do / it is not ok to do
Today’s quote
The protagonist, 月山雫(Tsukiyama Shizuku) decides to become an author and she goes to see her grandpa, expressing her concern that she doesn’t know if she can write well. Her grandpa responds with:
はじめから完璧なんか期待しちゃいけない
Hajime kara kanpeki nanka kitai shicha ikenai
Vocabulary
はじめ (hajime)：At first
[X] から (kara)：From [X]
完璧 (かんぺき / kanpeki)：Pefection
(X) なんか (nanka)：Things such as (X)
期待 (きたい / kitai) する・期待します：To expect
Grammar point – You may not do / it is not ok to do
The grandpa teaches us not only the important life lesson that we shouldn’t always aim for perfection, but also a very useful grammar point for learners of Japanese! That is, of course, いけない (ikenai)・いけません(ikemasen).
You can use this expression when you prohibit something – when you would say ‘You may not do this’ or ‘It’s not okay to do that’.
「いけない・いけません」normally follows a te-form verb plus 「は」. For example:
教室で、ねてはいけません。
kyoushitsu de nete wa ikemasen
You may not sleep in the classroom.
大きい声で話しては行けません。
ookii koe de hanashite wa ikemasen
It’s not ok to speak in loud voices.
Whether you should use ‘you may not do’ or ‘it is not ok to do’ can be contextual. Depending on who the subject of the sentence is, you can translate the sentence in a way you think appropriate.
While combining a [te-form verb plus は] and [いけない・いけません] is a rather formal expression, there is a casual version of this expression.
With the casual version, you first get a te-form verb, and replace the 「て te」part of the verb with 「ちゃ cha」and 「で de」part with 「じゃ ja」. Then add 「いけない・いけません」or「だめ dame」.
For example,
見ちゃだめ！
Micha dame
Don’t look!
The casual version of 見てはいけません。(You may not look.)
あの川で泳いじゃいけない。
Ano kawa de oyoi ja ikenai
You may not swim in that river.
The casual version of あの川で泳いではいけません。
Today’s quote
はじめから完璧なんか期待しちゃいけない
is a casual version of はじめから完璧なんて期待してはいけません.
Summary – まとめ
In summary, we discussed vocabulary and grammar point in the phrase from 耳をすませば (Mimi o sumase ba: Whisper of the Heart). Today’s grammar point will be very useful in conversations, and you can find this a lot from any anime!
I hope you found this helpful! If you liked this post, make sure you check out other articles as well! You can also find more phrases from my twitter account.
じゃあ、みなさんさようなら！
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