The Katakana Alphabet
Translated from the Vietnamese original. View the original.
The Katakana alphabet
Japanese has 3 official writing systems: Hiragana, Katakana and Kanji.
Hiragana: feminine. Curvy. Cute ( except for "ku" く, right )
Kanji : the Chinese characters the Japanese borrowed from China about a thousand years ago.
Katakana : rough and angular ( the man standing next to Hiragana-san)
Katakana is not easy to master. Katakana is the script the Japanese use to transcribe and write loanwords, or to add emphasis and write onomatopoeia. Many words have foreign origins, yet foreigners themselves often have no idea what a word means when they hear its katakana. Put simply, it has been "Japanified". Below are some katakana words considered "odd" and "brain-melting" because their meaning is very hard to guess (before you learn it) or easy to misunderstand — nothing as simple as インターネット or ペン. But once you have read through them you will find them quite interesting, and you may even grow fonder of this "lad".
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See also:
20 Mistakes People Make with Japanese Honorific Language
Katakana Words That Are Hard to Learn