Beginning Japanese for Professionals: Book 2

10 5-3-2 Mou and Motto ‘More’ Both mou and motto mean ‘more’ in English, but they are followed by different elements. The word motto was introduced in Lesson 3. It combines with a verb, adjective, noun+ desu to indicate a greater degree than what has been mentioned. Motto douzo. Please have more. Motto yasui apaato cheaper apartments Motto kirei desu. It’s prettier. The word mou combines with a quantity expression to indicate added amount. Unlike English, where ‘more’ follows the quantity, in Japanese it precedes the quantity. mou chotto a little more mou hito-tsu one more When you offer something, motto is more polite, but when you accept an offer, mou sukoshi is more polite. Motto nomimasen ka. Won’t you drink more? -Ja, mou sukoshi itadakimasu. Well then, I’ll take a little more. 5-3-3 More classifiers: 〜 kai 、 〜 do / 〜 kai The classifier for floors of a building is –kai/-gai and the classifiers for counting the number of times are - do and -kai (recall Mou ichi-do onegai-shimasu. ‘One more time, please.’ from Lesson 1.) Note the difference between these two questions: Nan-kai arimasu ka. ’How many floors are there?’ Nan-kai ni arimasu ka. ‘On which floor is it?’