We Need More Japanese

[Guest ___]

You know something that donned on me. It's something we had discussion about in the JRM for our own club.

 

Here we are a Japanese model railroad forum, but we have no (or at least no active) Japanese members.To me this seems odd. We tend to speculate, guess, and do a lot of rough translations, but if we had some English speaking Japanese (and there are a hell of a lot of them out there.)

 

At the moment, I'm working online on conversational English with about nine women right now, (sadly none have any interest in trains.) that one would think there would be some J-modelers out there we could snag. Hell, we have several in our own club, well not as members but as translators, so it's not like it should be all too tough to find a way to reach out and recruit some on here. It sure would help a lot with translations, and product availability and release help.

 

It just seems there is market potential out there especially seeing how we're a globalized community, much more so than many other forum based communities.

[Bernard]

I couldn't agree more, but how do we get the message out to the Japanese modelers that this forum exists?

I would be a great way to exchange ideas and learn about each others culture.

[scott]

Well, we have some members who live in Japan--they might have some ideas, or know some people.

 

Also, didn't JRM just sign a sister-club arrangement with a Japanese club? Why not try to drag some of them into it, and ask them to pass the word around?

 

(I'm full of good ideas when I don't have to do the work....)

[Guest ___]

You're right Scott about the JRM sister club agreement, but from what I gathered from Mathew, no one over there on our sister club can speak English. We have to rely on Matt for translation. It always saddens me how many JRM members are registered but how few are active.

 

Mike, if my Japanese were better, I'd directly try to recruit, and sadly there's no way I could get any of the J-chicks I know to do it without sounding totally Otaku on the subject; something I'm going out of my way to avoid.

[to2leo]

Is SubwayH Japanese?  I wish we have those flag icons in the forum.

[Tenorikuma]

I think you overestimate how many Japanese there are who know English. Fewer yet would be comfortable writing about a subject with lots of specialized terminology in another language.

[Guest ___]

I think you overestimate how many Japanese there are who know English. Fewer yet would be comfortable writing about a subject with lots of specialized terminology In another language.

 

From my time in Japan, I found I had no trouble at all finding English speaking native Japanese, not just including the host families I stayed with. While at Omiya, plenty of the Japanese rail fans and I managed to hold conversations in English, though not perfect, we were definitely able to communicate enough to understand each other.

 

I think part of the problem is that most of the Japanese search engines don't look for English sites by default in the same manner my Yahoo or Google would not look for a site in Japanese unless, I tell it to do so in the default settings.

 

EDIT: Stupid FF Spellchecker things thoguht is a word.

[lbriand_fr]

From my time in Japan, I found I had no trouble at all finding English speaking native Japanese, not just including the host families I stayed with. While at Omiya, plenty of the Japanese rail fans and I managed to hold conversations in English, though not perfect, we were definitely able to communicate enough to understand each other.

 

 

Known another language to communicate enough to undrstand each other is one thing.

I don't use english everyday, and write in this forum is more dificult for me than in a french forum. 

So, when you found something in your own language, you use it. And their is no french forums on Japenese rail fan 

[Guest ___]

Yes, but note that people will also use the English forums just to use the English forums. One of my other past times is anime, and we have have a 50/50 Japanese to European ratio on it. Similar arguments can be made for Facebook, MySpace or LiveJournal, where I have plenty of native Japanese.

[CaptOblivious]

From my time in Japan, I found I had no trouble at all finding English speaking native Japanese, not just including the host families I stayed with. While at Omiya, plenty of the Japanese rail fans and I managed to hold conversations in English, though not perfect, we were definitely able to communicate enough to understand each other.

 

Really? My experience was quite the opposite! Not a single person I asked could speak English. The only people I met who were comfortable speaking English to me were: A Korean immigrant, the Japanese wife of one of my (totally white) college buddies, and a Japanese student attending a university in Hawaii. (Good thing I knew enough Japanese to order curry!)

[Bernard]

I'll going to speak from my work experience. Whenever any of the producers have to interview a Japanese athlete even if they been playing/training in the USA for years, we have found that they would speak in English. They just didn't feel comfortable with the language. The feeling I got from the athletes is that there is a lot of pride and everything should be perfect.

 

In one case I could see the athlete could understand my questions but was very self-conscience to answer in English.

[Martijn Meerts]

It also depends on the people you're trying to talk to. I can imagine the model railroading community is largely older people, who might never have had any interest in learning English. Even the younger people might not be bothered about learning English, because they don't really need it, especially not for their hobby ;)

[Guest ___]

I'll going to speak from my work experience. Whenever any of the producers have to interview a Japanese athlete even if they been playing/training in the USA for years, we have found that they would speak in English. They just didn't feel comfortable with the language. The feeling I got from the athletes is that there is a lot of pride and everything should be perfect.

 

In one case I could see the athlete could understand my questions but was very self-conscience to answer in English.

 

That's my overall experience. It's hardwired in the Japanese I think, that if they can't do it perfectly, they don't do it at all around foreigners. Their concept of face is so strong that they just can't break it. My very first student for lack of a better word that I started doing conversational English with (Kenichirou) about seven years ago was obsessed with not only learning to speak English proficiently, but he warned to master the pronunciations and accent. Since then, I've hung out with Ken a few times in Japan, and he's back down a little bit about the accent, but in my experience with Skype, they want to nail the accent as well and if they can't get very bashful about speaking.

 

But with that said anytime I have ever had to communicate in English and could not encounter someone who could understand my English, all I had to do is write it down in English, and they seem to instantly understand what I'm saying. (Including the incident when I ran out of cash, and had no pin for my credit card for a cash advance in rural Kyushu)

[alpineaustralia]

Tell me you didnt teach him to have a regional US accent....

 

Years ago I met a german student who had been on a language exchange program in the US. The organisers had a sense of humour and sent her to Alabama to learn English.  Needless to say that she learnt to speak the Queen's English in the deepest southern drawl you could imagine, complete with "y'all" at the beginning of each sentence. Poor girl thougt this was the way English was spoken.

 

A complete catastophe.

[Guest ___]

Tell me you didnt teach him to have a regional US accent....

 

Years ago I met a german student who had been on a language exchange program in the US. The organisers had a sense of humour and sent her to Alabama to learn English.  Needless to say that she learnt to speak the Queen's English in the deepest southern drawl you could imagine, complete with "y'all" at the beginning of each sentence. Poor girl thougt this was the way English was spoken.

 

A complete catastrophe.

 

Pittsburgh accents sounds pretty much normal, not like a NY or Boston accent, or a southern accent. (dialect, technically) I haven't lived in Pittsburgh in twenty years, but am told I still have it. Then again people in Baltimore and DC can't pronounce their own towns. Baltimore is Ballmere, and DC is Wooshington. But, I don't work on accent, so much as just trying to get them to pronounce R, L and some of the more difficult sounds correctly.

 

Wow, I would not have guessed anyone on Alabama would know queen's English. Y'all is pretty common south of the Mason-Dixon, and I heard it in DC all the time. You'll often hear double contractions like "should'd've" I love using those in text because I'd write in shorthand all the time if I could, but would not dare think of speaking with it, my parents are both teachers so I would get a mouth full from them, especially from my mother. And, I can tell you right now, never antagonize a Jewish new your woman.

[scott]

never antagonize a Jewish new your woman.

 

Care to translate that for us West Virginia rednecks that don't understand this so-fistycated city talk? 

[CaptOblivious]

Tell me you didnt teach him to have a regional US accent....

 

Years ago I met a german student who had been on a language exchange program in the US. The organisers had a sense of humour and sent her to Alabama to learn English.  Needless to say that she learnt to speak the Queen's English in the deepest southern drawl you could imagine, complete with "y'all" at the beginning of each sentence. Poor girl thougt this was the way English was spoken.

 

A complete catastophe.

 

 

 

 

 

Now, wait. You mean that's not how it's spoken? If we do get a chance to meet in Oz, you may be a little surprised to find out I'm actually from Louisiana by way of Mississippi ;)

[cteno4]

Ill throw out the suggestion as to why would a japanese want to interact on an english forum when there are probably oodles of japanese ones that have a lot more experienced and knowledgeable folks on Japanese trains and modeling. they would have to either really be into exchange with foreigners or practice their written english a lot. we are a nice group and doing some fun stuff but we are really really dwarfed by the volume of japanese train modelers in japan.

 

i remember matthew also mentioning an article he saw when he first got over to japan about the success of the hobby shops like hw and hs overseas was finding an employee that could translate written english well and that was a hard thing to find for them and a limiting factor -- and one of the main reasons why there are not more japanese shops that sell overseas outside the warrantee/return issues.

 

aaron's point of japanese not wanting to do something like speak or write english unless they think they are at a certain level is also very true, especially in a public forum like this. i have communicated with a few japanese modelers over the years and most will usually try to respond with a brief message, but with little details and i suspect they had a friend who is good with english draft it for them to be polite to me in responding.

 

just a thought.

 

cheers,

 

jeff

[Bernard]

I think there are a couple of things that we do have to offer to Japanese modelers maybe not in the way of trains. When we were in Nagano in 1998, the Japanese were facinated with the Westerners. They were constantly asking if they could take our photos, I think it has a lot to do with exchanging cultures. They were always asking about where in the USA I came from and once they found out I was from NYC, the questions kept on coming.

 

I think it has to do with learning about each other, our similarities and our differences.

 

As for the language barrier, the baseball player Suzuki of the Seattle Mariners still can't speak fluent English and he's been playing in the USA for over 10 yrs.

[Guest ___]

I think there are a couple of things that we do have to offer to Japanese modelers maybe not in the way of trains. When we were in Nagano in 1998, the Japanese were facinated with the Westerners. They were constantly asking if they could take our photos, I think it has a lot to do with exchanging cultures. They were always asking about where in the USA I came from and once they found out I was from NYC, the questions kept on coming.

 

I think it has to do with learning about each other, our similarities and our differences.

 

As for the language barrier, the baseball player Suzuki of the Seattle Mariners still can't speak fluent English and he's been playing in the USA for over 10 yrs.

 

This is exactly why I have eight new Japanese students. Yes, they could learn better English from professional English teachers in Japan, but it's the experience in dealing with a Native American in the states that fascinates them. One of the women I'm working with is a web designer, so she is fascinated by the web work I did for the Coast Guard, another one is a fashion designer who is interested in my weekend ModelMayhem shoots I do twice a month. There was a gentlemen who was interested my time with Airbus and bp solar during the three years of working as a contractor as a tech writer.

 

A lot of the rail fans I met in Japan at Omiya were full of questions about the American trains, and just never really had the chance to ask anyone becasue everyone in their train circles were of course Japanese train buffs. There are plenty of Japanese fascinated by western culture, I really do not think rail fans are any different. We're proof of this fact by our very existence here as a Japanese model railroading forum.

 

Besides there a potential for them to be a popularity factor as an incnetive. It's one thing to be a small fish in a big pond, but another to be a big fish in a small pond. (^_^)