海 is ‘umi’, or sea/ocean. You are correct that the second half of the kanji (母) is the same as the standalone character for mother, but it’s base radical is ⽏, which also just means mother. The first radical, ⺡, means water/ liquid, so you can sort of infer that “water mother” = ocean. Not all kanji work out this nicely with their radical structure, though.
Last part is spot on, ikou (行こう) is the shortened (conjugation?) of iku or ‘to go’ that expresses a suggestion to do, i.e. “let’s (go)”.
Thanks for the feedback, seems my efforts weren’t entirely wasted :D
Interesting, that the Kanji for water itself does not contain that rqficale (unless you squint heavily)
What’s the difference to Ikkimashou? Isn’t that the suggestive form? As in ‘we should go’
By the way, is there a rule to how these short forms are formed?
Yep! Most Japanese verbs (with a few exceptions like ‘shimasu’ becoming suru) use one of the ‘i’ variants (‘i’, ‘ki’, ‘ni’, ‘mi’, or ‘ri’) after the kanji, that indicates they are verbs.
Ki will become ku in the shortened version, ri will become ru, ni -> nu, etc:
yaku, shiru, aruku, aru, shinu, yomu
I believe the verbs that don’t end in one of those like tabemasu (to eat) will default to ‘ru’ (taberu), but I don’t know if that’s a rule off the top of my head, or if I just can’t think of any others right now.
In the cases where rendaku applies, such as yogimasu (to swim), the end kana will also have rendaku applied, e.g. yogu. Ki -> ku, gi -> gu.
Yes, 君 is ‘kun’ when used as an honorific.
海 is ‘umi’, or sea/ocean. You are correct that the second half of the kanji (母) is the same as the standalone character for mother, but it’s base radical is ⽏, which also just means mother. The first radical, ⺡, means water/ liquid, so you can sort of infer that “water mother” = ocean. Not all kanji work out this nicely with their radical structure, though.
Last part is spot on, ikou (行こう) is the shortened (conjugation?) of iku or ‘to go’ that expresses a suggestion to do, i.e. “let’s (go)”.
Thanks for the feedback, seems my efforts weren’t entirely wasted :D Interesting, that the Kanji for water itself does not contain that rqficale (unless you squint heavily) What’s the difference to Ikkimashou? Isn’t that the suggestive form? As in ‘we should go’
The radical for water is actually derived from the standalone kanji. It’s basically an extremely short-stroke version of the kanji.
Ikimashou is just the ‘formal’, full-length version. No difference in meaning. Just as “iku” is the casual version of “ikimasu”.
Ikimasu -> iku
Ikimashou -> ikou
Fascinating. That explains the similarity. Since watching that episode of Witch Watch I definitely feel bad about my formal “Duolingo” Japanese :D
By the way, is there a rule to how these short forms are formed?
Yep! Most Japanese verbs (with a few exceptions like ‘shimasu’ becoming suru) use one of the ‘i’ variants (‘i’, ‘ki’, ‘ni’, ‘mi’, or ‘ri’) after the kanji, that indicates they are verbs.
Yakimasu (to burn/ cook), shirimasu (to know), arukimasu (to walk), arimasu (to be), shinimasu (to die), yogimasu (to read).
Ki will become ku in the shortened version, ri will become ru, ni -> nu, etc:
I believe the verbs that don’t end in one of those like tabemasu (to eat) will default to ‘ru’ (taberu), but I don’t know if that’s a rule off the top of my head, or if I just can’t think of any others right now.
In the cases where rendaku applies, such as yogimasu (to swim), the end kana will also have rendaku applied, e.g. yogu. Ki -> ku, gi -> gu.
Do you teach this usually? These explanations seem very practiced (in a good way).
Thanks a lot, maybe this will help me sound at least somewhat casual :D
Nope, just been learning and speaking it for a long time. :)
Good luck with your studies, and you can always dm me if you have any other questions!
Thank you