question: how to refer to a 3rd person

I have two scenarios:

1) Say I want to introduce my friend to another Japanese person. How do I refer to him before his name is mentioned?

I'm thinking 'kore' but that sounds impolite... referring him as an object.
Kore ha watashi no tomodachi, Sumisu san desu.

2) Say I'm at a Japanese restaurant, and I want to order for my friend. How do I refer to him? In english, it'd be fine to refer to him as 'he' to the waitress, but is it still okay to use 'kare' to refer to him?

Watashi ha osushi ni shimasu. Kare ha udon ni shimasu.

Does that sound right? I don't want to go through the motion of introducing him there... cuz we're just there to eat. What's the correct/polite way to refer to my friend without me looking rude?

Thanks. Sorry if this topic has been discussed before.

boltar wrote:I have two scenarios:

1) Say I want to introduce my friend to another Japanese person. How do I refer to him before his name is mentioned?

I'm thinking 'kore' but that sounds impolite... referring him as an object.
Kore ha watashi no tomodachi, Sumisu san desu.

2) Say I'm at a Japanese restaurant, and I want to order for my friend. How do I refer to him? In english, it'd be fine to refer to him as 'he' to the waitress, but is it still okay to use 'kare' to refer to him?

Watashi ha osushi ni shimasu. Kare ha udon ni shimasu.

Does that sound right? I don't want to go through the motion of introducing him there... cuz we're just there to eat. What's the correct/polite way to refer to my friend without me looking rude?

Thanks. Sorry if this topic has been discussed before.

Scenario 1..... Just say his name. If you don't want to say his name first, but would rather refer to him as your friend, you'd say, "Ore no tomodachi". (My friend) If he was there during the initial introduction, you could possibly say "Kare". (He)
You could always say "Koitsu ha ore no tomodachi, Sumisu san desu" *LOL* J/K. It's rude. :beaten:

Scenario 2...... You could say "Kare". As long as he's not a "billion years" older than you.

boltar wrote:Watashi ha osushi ni shimasu. Kare ha udon ni shimasu

Rather than "ni", use "wo"/"o".
Simply because you are "doing" the action, where as "ni" would be a grammatical error.

Cool. Thanks for the help ahochaude!

boltar wrote:I have two scenarios:

1) Say I want to introduce my friend to another Japanese person. How do I refer to him before his name is mentioned?

I'm thinking 'kore' but that sounds impolite... referring him as an object.
Kore ha watashi no tomodachi, Sumisu san desu.

If ya wanna be polite and proper about it, you could say:

Kochira wa watashi no tomodachi, Sumisu-san desu.

Your decision for the use of watashi, boku, or ore would depend on the situation and how "polite" you want to be. For pretty informal situations, I'd say "ore" is ok. Otherwise, I'd suggest "boku". It sounds better to me without being overly formal. It's mostly safe, in my opinion. I'm welcome to criticism on that because I'm not fluent, I'm a girl, and I snicker when guys say "watashi". :nut:

KouSeiya315 wrote:

If ya wanna be polite and proper about it, you could say:

Kochira wa watashi no tomodachi, Sumisu-san desu.

Your decision for the use of watashi, boku, or ore would depend on the situation and how "polite" you want to be. For pretty informal situations, I'd say "ore" is ok. Otherwise, I'd suggest "boku". It sounds better to me without being overly formal. It's mostly safe, in my opinion. I'm welcome to criticism on that because I'm not fluent, I'm a girl, and I snicker when guys say "watashi". :nut:

Hehe! Good one KouSeiya! I don't really use keigo, so I tend to usually forget those "proper" terms! :hehe:
I really should start using more keigo! Starting to "somewhat forget"!! :crazy: :nut:

KouSeiya315 wrote:If ya wanna be polite and proper about it, you could say:

Kochira wa watashi no tomodachi, Sumisu-san desu.

Your decision for the use of watashi, boku, or ore would depend on the situation and how "polite" you want to be. For pretty informal situations, I'd say "ore" is ok. Otherwise, I'd suggest "boku". It sounds better to me without being overly formal. It's mostly safe, in my opinion. I'm welcome to criticism on that because I'm not fluent, I'm a girl, and I snicker when guys say "watashi". :nut:

watashi is OK if it is fairly formal (job related, whatever...)you should snicker IF he says 'atashi'

niko2x wrote:watashi is OK if it is fairly formal (job related, whatever...)you should snicker IF he says 'atashi'

If a guy said "atashi", I wouldn't snicker. I would laugh so hard and do my best to retain good bladder control :hehe: :mrgreen:

ahochaude wrote:
Rather than "ni", use "wo"/"o".
Simply because you are "doing" the action, where as "ni" would be a grammatical error.

actually this is grammatically correct. i remember learning this kind of structure in japanese class from a book. :mrgreen:

amrayu wrote:

actually this is grammatically correct. i remember learning this kind of structure in japanese class from a book. :mrgreen:

Oh well, that just goes to show how much I really use particles in speech.

Damn! I gotta learn Keigo. (Honorifics)

Watakushi is a pretty polite way of saying I for a male. To me boku sounds..err well gay to be honest. It sounds so junior high hehe (gets a lot of snickers from Japanese people from my experience), plus girls are using it more and more. I'd rather use watashi. Most of the time I use ore anyway..

Yeah, I agree. I never could take a liking to 'Boku' at all. I felt weird using it. (Don't know why) But I use 'Ore' and when I have to sound "nice", I use 'Watakushi'. I've never heard a chick use 'Boku' before though.... But I have heard a chick use 'Ore'. :hehe: (My friend) I get a kick whenever I hear her talk. She doesn't speak keigo (honorifics) for jack. I don't even think she knows how to :hehe: Nah, I think that she just chooses not to though.

ahochaude wrote:Yeah, I agree. I never could take a liking to 'Boku' at all. I felt weird using it. (Don't know why) But I use 'Ore' and when I have to sound "nice", I use 'Watakushi'. I've never heard a chick use 'Boku' before though.... But I have heard a chick use 'Ore'. :hehe: (My friend) I get a kick whenever I hear her talk. She doesn't speak keigo (honorifics) for jack. I don't even think she knows how to :hehe: Nah, I think that she just chooses not to though.

Urluzers wrote:To me boku sounds..err well gay to be honest. It sounds so junior high hehe (gets a lot of snickers from Japanese people from my experience), plus girls are using it more and more. I'd rather use watashi. Most of the time I use ore anyway..

Don't flame me on this one hey:.. :sweat:

I only use –l.

If –l was so feminine, then explain to me why at least half the population of men in all different ages use it. Most celebrities use '–l' or '‰´' too..

To me, and to my Japanese friends, a gaijin guy using ‰´ basically looks like a try-hard (that is to say, if he is not fluent in Japanese yet). Yet I guess it would be strange to become fluent, then suddenly change your Japanese to '‰´' from '–l' or 'Ž„'... well, whatever works for you.

As for Ž„,... well that might sound pretty odd in a 'friends' atmosphere for some people, unless you were being polite. ‚킽‚­‚µ is used when speaking Keigo.. i have never heard it used in other situations.

I think it depends on the person I guess. I never get any problems using ‰´ (ore)@to anyone (well anyone being friends and such). Most of my Japanese friends think it's strange if I use –l@boku (they'll tell me it sounds like junior high). Even having had the experience of teaching English to junior high and high school students in Japan, I noticed the high school students didn't use boku so much. I say whatever works for you though.

Moccona wrote:


Don't flame me on this one hey:.. :sweat:

I only use –l.

If –l was so feminine, then explain to me why at least half the population of men in all different ages use it. Most celebrities use '–l' or '‰´' too..

I didn't say that it was fem. I just don't feel suit using it. That's all.

Moccona wrote:As for Ž„,... well that might sound pretty odd in a 'friends' atmosphere for some people, unless you were being polite. ‚킽‚­‚µ is used when speaking Keigo.. i have never heard it used in other situations.

In a less formal atmosphere, I tend to use "Ore".

Coming from a girl's standpoint I don't care if a guy uses –l or ‰´. I don't find it gay or feminine. When guys I didn't know talked to me, they would say "boku" first, 9 times out of 10. If it was someone I saw a lot later or had classes with, it gradually got to "ore". So either is cool by me. Although if a guy says "ore" around me I think it's good that they don't feel limited by formalities and can speak casually. A lot of Japanese guys I encountered at first in class or wherever (well, not like it's been a ton of them), would then find out I didn't only understand English and then spoke so formally and with a "boku". Not that "boku" is terribly formal, but if a guy can feel comfy enough to speak casual Japanese to me and say "ore", then go ahead, it's all good, IMO. :sweat:

It cracked me up if I overheard little boys (under 10 yrs. old) saying "ore" though. LOL, I just found it amusing for no good reason. :hehe:

But I'm not Japanese so....let's get a Japanese girl in here and ask her, huh? :mrgreen: Only sometimes do I feel offended by informalities in Japanese (w/ kids asking me stuff on trains and etcetera). Usually I don't. Being American I guess that comes from that.

Hehe, honestly we are probably over analyzing this a bit. You should say whatever feels comfortable. I happen to use ore. Not because it makes me feel all cool or gangster or something, it just seems right. Of course I use it at appropriate times.

Most friends of mine (Japanese ones, no offense to non Japanese, but I don't care about their opinions about my Japanese as much lol) are so used to me saying ore, they actually would comment if I started saying boku.

Hmmm....from my experiance I definately found using ‚¨‚ê to sound more natural in the end. But really I learned quickly that I was over using personal pronouns. For whatever reason they have many varities of "I" and "you". I guess if you lived a while back and were I samurai you could use ‚킪‚Í‚¢B :D

Urluzers wrote:Most friends of mine (Japanese ones, no offense to non Japanese, but I don't care about their opinions about my Japanese as much lol) are so used to me saying ore, they actually would comment if I started saying boku.

Just to annoy you a little more (j/k)..

No offence to the non-Japanese too, but I don't care about their opinions about my Japanese either- my Japanese friends are so used to me saying 'boku' that they would actually comment if I started saying 'ore'. Basically what you said, but slightly modified.

Ok, you get the idea- ore/boku are used preferrably be different people. I know you agree, and let's just leave it at that- there is no real better alternative.

sorry to interrupt you guys but i have one question.is it okay if we used ore or boku in any condition?i mean if we speak to parents or the older one is it ok if we just used ore/boku?

and one more question,what's the meaning of 'teme'?dont know the exact spelling but something like teme or temme if i not mistaken..

haydenz wrote:sorry to interrupt you guys but i have one question.is it okay if we used ore or boku in any condition?i mean if we speak to parents or the older one is it ok if we just used ore/boku?

I'll let the others answer that one hey.. :sleep:

haydenz wrote:and one more question,what's the meaning of 'teme'?dont know the exact spelling but something like teme or temme if i not mistaken..

'teme'/'temme' :crazy:

The two Japanese words coming to mind are 'te-ma' and 'tame'.. where did you read/hear/see this word? A little more information, or at least the sentence it is in would allow me or one of the others help you.