Peter: Here we can leave the subject out because it’s inferred. Peter: But, ヨシさん, does this sound natural? If we did, the sentence would sound like this… Peter: Now, here the subject is inferred, we don’t have to put in “you”. Okay, now that we’ve taken a look at this vocabulary, let’s move on to the dialogue. Right in between those two there’s a slight short pause. Peter: It was right in between the 絶 and 好. In Japanese, some words have a slight pause in between certain syllables. And in between the first two syllables there’s a pause. Peter: Now, this word has two long vowels. Now, we interpret it as “couldn’t be better, on cloud nine, feeling like a million bucks”.Ĭhigusa: (slow)ぜっこうちょう　(natural speed)絶好調 Peter: “In great condition” is the literal meaning. Peter: ヨシさん, what does the second character mean? Peter: Now, I want to take a look at the Kanji, the Chinese characters for 元気. This is a widely-used expression to enquire and respond to questions asking how one is doing. Now, while the word 元気 has these meanings and others, in the dialogue, 元気 is acting as an expression, meaning the subject is doing well, fine, good. Peter: Okay, first let’s take a look at some of the vocabulary words in there. Peter: This time チグサさん and ヨシさん will give you the Japanese and I’ll give you the English. Then we’re going to take a look at vocabulary and then break the conversation down. Finally, what we’ll do is give you the translation. Then we’re going to give you a slow version. So what we’re going to do, as always, is we’re going to give you the conversation at normal native speaking speed. Peter: I mean, talk about frequency of phrases. Peter: This expression that we’re going to introduce today is heard every day, many times each day all over Japan, right, チグサさん? Now, today we’re working on the all-important phrase… Today we’re back with another beginner lesson.

Up on cloud nine meaning