jarvissamuel wrote on Jul 1
st, 2010 at 5:42pm:
Welcome Matt,
In the time spent in Japan have you picked up any of the Japanese speech or writing?
I have always been fascinated by Japanese writing as I understand there are three different styles?
If you have any questions feel free to ask.
Sam
Hi Sam, thanks for the welcome. I've been here for a long time...

I graduated from one of the US Military high schools here in the 80's, went to college in the US (while returning to Japan for every spring, winter, and summer break), and promptly returned, married my HS sweetheart, and have been here ever since. I get back to the US about every year and a half.
I speak Japanese fluently, but my reading and writing is only passable... My wife does all the books and paperwork, so it was never a priority.
There are three different "styles"; kanji, hiragana, and katakana. While you
can write all of the Japanese in Hiragana, it would take forever as it's all one-syllable phonetics, where Kanji is "whole words or phrases. Formally, a mix of kanji and hiragana is used (where the Chinese use only kanji). Katakana is all single-syllable phonetics and is used for "Japanized" words. For instance, the Japanese call the hood of a car a bonnet (like in the UK). That would be bo-ne-to. A seat would be called shi-to.
Japan is a great place to see the world from if you like to travel!