My Last Name – Japanese Surname
Monday October 19, 2009
My last name, "Abe", is quite common in Japan. It is ranked as 23rd among a hundred thousand Japanese surnames . In North America, I am often called "Abe" like Abraham, but in Japanese it is pronounced as "a-be." There was the Prime Minister Abe a few years ago, though the kanji characters for his name were different from mine. I didn't like my last name much when I was young because it is too ordinary. However, I liked the fact that I was usually the first on the name list at school. (The Japanese alphabet order goes as "a, i, u, e, o, ka, ki, ku, ke, ko..., therefore unless there are names like "Aoki" or "Aihara," "Abe" would be the first. )
Japanese translation
Comments
umm. you are a japanese teacher ? i hope you can teach me online. if there is more than one kun-reading or more than one on-reading then which one do i use ?? i really want to know
Yes, she’s a Japanese teacher. If you want to learn about On and Kun reading, you can click on the Kanji links and there are articles on on and kun. If you need to know specific on and kun readings of a kanji you’re looking for, click on “Kanji Land”.
Hi! I wanted to e-mail you to make a suggestion. Unfortunately the link in your page to “e-mail me” doesn’t seems to work, you land in “http://japanese.about.com/?once=true&”.
Anyway, what I want to suggest is to include kanji (with furigana) to the Japanese Word of the Day newsletter. I signed up a week ago, and since I’ve been learning Japanese for a couple of years (or at least trying to!), I find words written only in romaji very odd.
Thank you!
Manuel
However, I liked the fact that I was usually the first on the name list at school.
There will probably be some situations where being first on a list is a little less than ideal….