Japanese characters, which consist of hiragana, katakana, and kanji, is said to be the most complex in the world. In addition to these, there is also romaji as an alphabet auxiliary language. Romaji are phonetic characters like hiragana and katakana, and are used mainly for place names and people names for foreigners.

However, Japanese sounds are made up of combinations of consonants and vowels as well as vowels alone. There are several combinations of the same sound. For example, “Shinjuku” can be written as “Sinjyuku. There are no rules, so everyone is free to write as they wish. Therefore, there are some different ways to write “Shinjuku. When typing Japanese sentences on a computer, many Japanese type in romaji and convert them to Japanese characters.

Glomaji (Global romaji) was created to avoid spelling confusion. The combination alphabet follows the English alphabet practice and can still be converted into correct Japanese. English speakers do not need to learn to type. If you do not input the correct pronunciation, it will not be converted into correct Japanese. Japanese characters can be learned with Glomaji.

To correctly pronounce Japanese sounds, it is recommended to look at the Glomaji Pronunciation Chart. You will find that it is easier to understand the relationship between vowels and consonants in alphabetical notation than in hiragana or katakana. You can learn the letters after you have learned reasonable amount of the vocabulary. The English words incorporated into Japanese in this blog are written in Glomaji.

Lesson Experience by the Author