JAPANESE WRITING PROJECT 1

The department store I visited is called “SOGO”. In hiragana, it is “そごう”. From this photos, we can see that the both word“そごう”and“SOGO” are on the wall of the building, so both Japanese people, local and foreigners can recognise the department store. In fact, The romaji“そごう”should be “SOGOU”. I think the reason why they use “SOGO”instead of“SOGOU”is that “SOGO”is easier for foreigners to pronounce. Just like the example of the kanji“日本”can be pronounced as“にっぽん”or“にほん”. It is easier for foreigner to pronounce it as“にほん”instead of“にっぽん”.

 This pack of frozen food was found in SOGO

The word written in Katakana“サクサク”is the onomatopoeia. “サクサク” is the sound made by people who eat the crispy food. I think it can also emphasize the food will become crispy and tastes good after frying, so the consumers may be interested in this food product.
 “フライ” is the loan word. “フライ” is fry(fried) in English.

In general, we use Katakana to write“エビ”(prawn/shrimp) because animals’ and plants’ name should be written in Katakana. Therefore, “fried prawn” should be written in katakana “エビフライ”. From this package, we can see that the designer uses hiragana to write “えび”(prawn/shrimp) instead of “エビ”. I think the designer wants to emphasize the word“えび”to tell people what kind of food they are selling.

Packed lunch box should be written as“お弁当” which should consists of hiragana and kanji. Here we see they use hiragana to write the word“おべんとう”. I think this is their idea that unify the design by using hiragana and katakana only. If they use kanji“お弁当”, the design may look strange.

These are the apple juice and mandarin orange juice that are found in SOGO. We usually use Hiragana to write“りんご”(apple), and “みかん”(mandarin orange). Kanji of these two words,“林檎”and“蜜柑”, are not commonly used because these two words are old kanji. In this case, the designer of this brand used kanji“林檎”and“蜜柑”for the packing of the drinks. I think the designer wants to make their drinks different from other brands’ packing design, so they use old kanji for the names of the drinks so as to draw customers’ attention. I also think that the designer tries to create a traditional style or image for this brand by using old kanji. They can especially draw Chinese people's attention because the kanji are similar to the Chinese characters.

自己紹介

初めましで
私は静です
今、HKU SPACEで日本語の勉強をしています
甘い物の中でイチゴのショートケーキが一番好きです
暇のときにいろいろなケーキを作ります
今は手作りパンに挑戦しますw
とても楽しいです

私は女性グループパフュームのファンです
彼女たちのダンスも歌も上手と思います
絢香さんのことも好きです
辛いとき、わたしは絢香さんの「みんな空の下」を聴いて、勇気をもらいました

日本語の勉強を頑張ります！
これからもどうぞよろしくお願いします