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What do you know about Hiragana? Well, you know it as Japanese words. But do you know more about it? Now I'm here to give you more information about it.

Hiragana

Hiragana consists of a basic set of characters: five singular vowels, 39 distinct consonant-vowel unions and one singular consonant. Additionally, を wo is included (although pronounced the same as vowel お o, [o]), bringing up the total count of common-use characters to 46.

These basic characters can be modified in various ways. By adding a dakuten marker ( ゛), a voiceless consonant is turned into a voiced consonant: k→g, s→z, t→d, and h→b. Hiragana beginning with an h can also add a handakuten marker ( ゜) changing the h to a p.

A small version of the hiragana for ya, yu or yo (ゃ, ゅ or ょ respectively) may be added to hiragana ending in i. This changes the i vowel sound to a glide (palatalization) to a, u or o. Addition of the small y kana is called yoōn.

A small tsu っ, called a sokuon, indicates that the following consonant is geminated (doubled). For example, compare さか saka "hill" with さっか sakka "author". It also sometimes appears at the end of utterances, where it denotes a glottal stop. However, it cannot be used to double the na, ni, nu, ne, no syllables' consonants – to double them, the singular n (ん) is added in front of the syllable. For example さんにん sannin "three people".

Hiragana usually spells long vowels with the addition of a second vowel kana. The choōn (long vowel mark) (ー) used in katakana is rarely used with hiragana, for example in the word らーめん, rāmen, but this usage is considered non-standard. In informal writing, small versions of the five vowel kana are sometimes used to represent trailing off sounds (はぁ hā, ねぇ nē).

Here's a hiragana chart for you:

The Hiragana Syllabary

Here is the first Japanese syllabary. Japanese has no alphabet, but instead two syllabaries and Kanji, a modified subset of Chinese characters. The Hiragana Syllabary.

Do you like manga or anime? Well, I found an interesting way to people who like manga to learn about hiragana. Take a look at this poster, and feel free to download it! (I got this poster from na-insoo on deviantArt ☺Feel free to check the profile too!)

Want to know more about Hiragana? Click here!

That's all about today's Japanese lesson. Hope you like it! Cheers!

-Jean

Do you have problems with your English? Always nervous when you speak English, don't know what to say, or maybe have problems in listening? Well, I have some tips for you. I found it and I've tried it by myself. And now, I realized that my English is improved by doing these. So, what should you do to improve your English?

1. Join any forums or social network.
Join social network, such as Facebook, Friendster, Twitter, Myspace, and so on. Add friends from other countries. Talk to them, chat with them. Chatting every day will show you many ways to speak (to talk), and later you'll get accustomed to talk with someone. You can also join forums. For example, you like manga or anime. Join manga forums such as: I Eat Soul, 1/2 Prince, and so on. Don't forget to be active on those forums, posts a lot, and reply the others' posts.

Here are the links to some manga forums (Click on the pic to go to the forums):



2. Listening to music.
You like to sing or listening to music? Then it'll be easier for you to do this tips. Find some musics. Try to find a "clear" one (so you can hear the lyrics correctly), and write down what you've heard. At first, just listen to slow songs. As the time goes, try to listen faster songs. That'll improve your listening. After you done your listening, see the right lyrics and check your progress.
By doing this, you'll get at least 3 benefits:
- You will improve your listening skill.
- You can learn new vocabs and know how to say it.
- You can increase your typing speed (if you listen it on computer and type the lyrics).

3. Read comics or novel, and play games!
Why do these activities can improve your English? Because by doing these, you can learn new vocabularies. Having a lot of vocabularies will somehow help you to talk and to listen. And by reading comics or novel, you'll see a lot of sentences. Later on, you can make good sentences because you're accustomed to see good sentences (learn how to write by reading people's writing!).

4. Create a blog.
Create a blog, fill your blog just like you write on your diary. You can posts your daily life or everything (but use English!). This will somehow give you senses to write (like using good dictions) and that'll improve your writing (remember, if you want to study abroad, writing essay is included as a test!).

So, that's all. I hope this post can help you improve your English.

Note:
This will works not only for English. You can do the same way to learn other languages! Cheers!