芒種

芒種, around the sixth of June. 芒 is the bristle on an ear of grain, and this is when it's sown. It is also, almost exactly, when the rainy season arrives, and the two facts are not unrelated — rice wants water and it is about to get a month of it.

つtsuゆyu梅雨the rainy season

About six weeks of rain from early June, humid and grey and relentless, and it is declared and un-declared by the weather agency like a season in its own right — 梅雨入り, entering the rains; 梅雨明け, the rains ending.

The characters are worth a look: 梅 is the plum from chapter fourteen, 雨 is rain. Plum rain — it arrives when the plums ripen. The reading つゆ doesn't follow from either character, which happens sometimes and is simply learned.

It is nobody's favourite season. But this is the water the rice grows on, and a light 梅雨 is a genuine worry, so the complaining has a hollow ring to it.

How it fits together

〜ます

Japanese verbs go at the **end**, always, and the polite present form ends in ます. たべます, eat. のみます, drink. いきます, go. みます, see. します, do.

There is no *I* or *you* in any of those. Japanese leaves out whatever is obvious, which is usually the person. たべます on its own is a complete sentence meaning 'I'm eating' or 'I'll eat' — or 'she eats', if that's who you were talking about.

It also covers the future. Japanese doesn't have a separate future tense; context does that work too.

AをBます

Put an object in front with を and you have most of the sentences you need. ごはんをたべます — eat rice. みずをのみます — drink water.

Notice the order: object, then verb. English puts the verb in the middle and Japanese puts it at the end, which is why translating word by word produces nonsense in both directions.

〜ませんか · 〜ましょう

You have already used both. ましょう is *let's* — いきましょう, let's go. ませんか is an invitation, literally 'won't you' — たべませんか, shall we eat?

ませんか is softer, because it leaves them room to decline. That preference for leaving room is most of Japanese politeness in one grammatical habit.

Words

たtaべbeまmaすsu食べますto eat
のnoみmiまmaすsu飲みますto drink
いiきkiまmaすsu行きますto go
みmiまmaすsu見ますto see, to watch
しshiまmaすsuto do
attaches to nouns to make verbs — べんきょうします, study; でんわします, phone

Things you can say today

なnaにniをoたtaべbeまmaすsuかkawhat will you eat?
みmiずzuをoのnoみmiまmaすsuI'll drink some water
えeいiがgaをoみmiまmaせseんnかkashall we watch a film?the soft invitation, with room to say no

Nothing to review right now.

This chapter teaches no new characters — you have them all. Anything still fading will come back round here after a day or two away.