Frequency

• あまり　　　　not much
• ぜんぜん  　　  not at all

When you use these two words, you need to make it negative at the end of a sentence. For example: 

私（わたし）はあまり朝（あさ）ごはんを食（た）べません。

I don't eat much breakfast./I don't usually eat breakfast.  (I'm trying to drink some water in the morning at least)

私（わたし）はぜんぜんテレビを見（み）ません。

I don't watch TV at all.   (well, I watch everything online with my PC)

• たいてい          usually
• ちょっと          a little
• ときどき          sometimes
• よく                  often; much

You DON'T need to make the sentence negative when you use these words to describe frequency. And frequency words are adverb, so you can put anywhere before the verb. Here I'm going to use 'ちょっと' to express inconvenience of request or invitation.

A:    明日（あした）に映画（えいが）を見（み）ませんか。

B:　 明日（あした）はちょっと......

(A: Do you want to watch movie tomorrow?)

(B: Tomorrow is a little bit (inconvenience)./ Maybe not tomorrow./ Tomorrow is not good)

I want to mention that, 'ませんか' has the meaning of 'would you like to..?'

Study Japanese in Japan

I'm not only want to learn Japanese, but also want to experience their culture. So I searched and asked people, how can I stay in Japan and learn Japanese efficiently? I got two answers. 

The first one is Japanese language school, that you study in the morning at school for three hours and do whatever you want to do in the afternoon. And most programs in Japanese language school is trying to send you to a good university. This is the way they get reputation. So other than Japanese, they also focus on the test that you need to do in order to go to university. Usually, it's a two-year study, and there is also half year and one-year study.

The second one is Japanese language program in private university. Generally, you study from 9am to 6pm, from Monday to Saturday. And the purpose of this kind of program is mostly for 'training' their perspective student to know more about Japanese and Japan, and prepare for under-graduate or graduate program study in their university. Other than learning Japanese, you can also choose some culture or business courses. And if your Japanese is really good, you could even go to classes like regular students there. Also, you are free to use facility in the university, attend activities, and join in clubs. All of the school I searched, providing this program as a one-year non-degree program.

The second chose is what I want. And I found three schools that I want to go:

1)    Intensive Japanese Language Program (IJLP) in Waseda University

        http://www.waseda.jp/cjl/html/e_study.index.html
        Application Guidebook (PDF file)
        http://www.waseda.jp/cjl/html/dat/download_E/00_guide_in_English.pdf

2)    The Japanese Language Program (JLP) in Keio Univeristy

        http://www.ic.keio.ac.jp/nncenter/en/index.html?url=110.html
        Application Guidebook (PDF file)
        http://www.ic.keio.ac.jp/nncenter/pdf/jlp/10f&11s_guidebook.pdf 

3)    Intensive Japanese Language Program "Bekka" in Doshisha University

        http://www.doshisha.ac.jp/english/education/inbound/bekka.php

Check the website out, if you are interested in them. The deadline to apply April semester is from September to October. And the deadline to apply for September semester is from March to May depends on the school you are applying. I'm preparing to apply the September semester now. And I will share more of my experience later.

Numbers

      As I mention before in the 'University self introduction', I will summary numbers in a table. From the table, we can see, one number has more than one way to say (for example, number 4, 7 and 9), and they be used differently in different situation. This is what we have to remember. Hope this table would help you easier to remember the differences. (For me, those differences are still confusing me when I use it, I need to work more on them.)

	Numbers	Hours	Minutes	~Years old	Months	Days
		‘じ’	‘ぷん/ふん’	‘さい’	‘がつ’	か/にち
0	ぜろ/れい
1	いち	いちじ	いっぷん	いっさい	いちがつ	ついたち
2	に	にじ	にふん	にさい	にがつ	ふつか
3	さん	さんじ	さんぷん	さんさい	さんがつ	みっか
4	よん/し/よ	よじ	よんぷん	よんさい	しがつ	よっか
5	ご	ごじ	ごふん	ごさい	ごがつ	いつか
6	ろく	ろくじ	ろっぷん	ろくさい	ろくがつ	むいか
7	なな/しち	しちじ	ななふん	ななさい	しちがつ	なのか
8	はち	はちじ	はっぷん	はっさい	はちがつ	ようか
9	きゅう/く	くじ	きゅうふん	きゅうさい	くがつ	ここのか
10	じゅう	じゅうじ	じゅぷうん	じゅっさい	じゅうがつ	とおか
11	じゅういち	じゅういちじ	じゅういっぷん	じゅういっさい	じゅういちがつ	じゅいちにち
12	じゅうに	じゅうにじ	じゅうにふん		じゅうにがつ	じゅうににち

I only put numbers that from 0 to 12 in the table, here are some notes for further numbers:

• Numbers – 20 is にじゅう, 100 isひゃく, 1000 is せん, and 10,000 is いちまん。
• Hours – 1:30 is いちじはん (half)
• Minutes – 30 is さんじゅっぷん。
•  ~Years old – 20 is はたち (special, it’s an age that indicate you are an adult now).
• Days – the first ten days are special spelling, and 20^th day is はつか。The rest are pretty much the same as in Hours, and plus にち, except 14^th and 24^th are using よっas 4.

There is something.

～があります/います。

We use 'あります' for something cannot move such as plants, tests, and buildings. And we use 'います' for things that can move such as people, buses, and animals. 

For example, "there is a book." We can say, "ほんがあります."

If we want to say "there is something at X time or X place."We add 'に’after the time or place and put it in the beginning of the sentence. For example, "there is a bank near the park." We can say, "こうえんのそばに ぎんこうがあります." 'こうえん' means 'park', and 'そば' means 'near'. We use 'の' to connect 'park' and 'near', then we add ’に’after them, and put them all in the beginning of the sentence.

Do you remember we mentioned that we put particle 'で' after location words? However, we put 'に' here after location words. Why? The difference is, when you use 'で', it means there is an event taking place. For example, "I took pictures in the park." We use 'で', "わたしは こうえんで しゃしんをとりました。" You were doing something at that place, the event was 'took pictures.'

Past Tense, Verb, and Particle

 New knowledge from 'Sherry's one day'.

Now I can write what I did in a day. I introduced present tense of writing a sentence before, and in this little diary，there are past, present and future tense. In Japanese, the present and future tense are the same. Details see the table below:

	None		Verb
Tense	Regular	Negative	Regular-action	Negative-action
Past	～でした	～じゃありませんですた	～ました	～ませんでした
Present	～です	～じゃあリません	～ます	～ません
Future	～です	～じゃあリません	～ます	～ません

 The second new knowledge here is using verbs. When you want to describe an action, you can use noun+を+verb format. For example, 'eat breakfast' would be 'breakfast を eat'. And when you add the phrase into a sentence, the end of the verb changes depends on what kind of the verb it is.

	Ru-verb	u-verb	Irregular verbs
Dictionary forms	ねる	のむ	する	くる
Present	ねます	のみます	します	きます

• ru-verb: take る out and add ます。
• u-verb: change from ~u to ~i and add ます。
• irregular verbs: It's all about memory.
• The way to change is the same to present, negative, past and past-negative.
• ねる-to sleep; のむ-to drink; する-to do; くる-to come.

The last thing I want to mention is particle such as で、を　and に。They usually appear after a word to indicate the function of the word and helping to easier understanding a sentence.

•  で: indicate the place, so if you see で comes after a word, then the word is a place.
• を：as we said above, it's a particle connect a noun and a verb.
• に: it has several usage here. The most common usage is for time such as １時に. And it also use for indicate the goal of movement. For example, 'go to school', に will be placed after 'school' to show this is the goal of 'go': 'schoolにgo' which is 'がっこうにいきます'. 

*I will stop using hiragana and katakana to show the pronunciation from now. And start to use Kanji.

Sherry's one day.

Hiragana and katakana
きょうは　じゅういちがつ　ここのかです。 わたしは　あさのろくじはんに　おきました。それから　がっこうに　いきました。あさごはんを　たべませんでした。じゅうにじに　わしょくのレストランで 　ランチをたべました。わたしのおいしいランチは　さかなとにくと　やさいでした。いちじに　としょかんで　にほんごと　えいごを　べんきょうしました。 いま　ごごさんじです。わたしは　にほんごのがっこうに　いきます。それから　ごじに　えいごのがっこうに　いきます。このえいごのべんきょうは　にじか ん　ぐらいです。よるはちじに　バスで　うちに　かえります。たいてい　くじはんに　ばんごはんをたべます。それから　べんきょうしてと　テレビをみま す。ときどき　みずをのみます。あまり　おさけを　のみません。でも　わたしのともたちは　よる　よく　おさけを　のみます。いちじはんに　わたしは　ね ます。

Hiragana, katakana and Kanji (This is the writing that most time you will see)
今日は十一月九日です。私は朝の６時半におきました。それから学校に行きました。朝ごはんを食べませんでした。１２時に和食のレストランでランチを食べました。私のおいしいランチは魚と肉と野菜でした。１時に図書館で日本語と英語を勉強しました。今午後3時です。私は日本語の学校に行きます。それから５時に英語の学校に行きます。この英語の勉強は二時間ぐらいです。夜８時にバスでうちに帰ります。たいてい９時半に晩御飯を食べます。それから勉強してとテレビを見ます。時々水を飲みます。あまりお酒を飲みません。でも私の友たちは夜よくお酒を飲みます。１時半に私は寝ます。

English (I try to make it consistent as the Japanese, and you can easily track it by matching numbers.)

Today is November 9th. I woke up at 6:30 this morning. Then I went to school. (I) didn't have breakfast. At 12:00, (I) had lunch at Japanese food restaurant. My delicious lunch includes fish, meat and vegetable. At 1:00, (I) was studying Japanese and English in a library. Now is 3:00 in the afternoon. I'm going to Japanese school. Then at 5:00, I will go to English school. This English study last for around 2 hours. At 8 at night, (I) will take bus to go home. Usually (I) have dinner at 9:30. Then I do studying and watching TV. Sometimes, (I) drink water. I don't usually drink alcohol. But my friend does it at night time. (I) go to sleep at 1.