About that takoyaki party...

Hi again. Niko here.

This week’s prompt

Your friend texted you to ask if you’re still coming to the *たこ焼き party at their house tomorrow night. You are, but you have a question for them about it.

*One of these “parties” involves getting a takoyaki grill, then having friends over to cook them with you:

＊ You can submit a response in Japanese here. ＊

Please try to submit your response within 48 hours of receiving this email. Please only write one response per form submission.

Corrections will arrive in your inbox next week.

Last week’s corrections

Your Japanese friend tells you that next month they’re leaving for New Zealand on a 1-year Working Holiday Visa.

Everyone had such nice things to say to their friends. Makes me want to be friends with all of you (笑)

I always dreamed of getting a working holiday visa somewhere, maybe South Korea, Germany, Japan… so many options. While US citizens typically can’t get them, I am a dual citizen of New Zealand… but you can only apply from your home country, so I would have had to go to NZ first to make it happen, and I never did. Before I knew it, I was past the age limit.

Oh well.

I submitted three answers of my own for this prompt:

*We’ve removed literal breakdowns, as it was taking me far too long to write them by myself for every response. We’re trying to come up with some solutions for this internally. It just might be a bit of a wait.

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Niko Submission #1

え？ワーホリ？じゃ仕事辞めんの？

Correction

え？ワーホリ？じゃあ仕事辞めんの？
え？　ワーホリ？　じゃあ　しごと　やめん　の？
A working holiday? So you're gonna quit your job?

Comments

When Rei saw this, she asked, “Why do you always write じゃ instead of じゃあ?” Uh… why…? Why indeed. I don’t know!

Maybe because in casual language it kind of sounds like じゃ and not じゃあ sometimes. Anyway, based on her feedback, I’m gonna properly write じゃあ (most of the time) from now on.

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Niko Submission #2

英語喋れないお前がどういうワーキングできんだよ。
えいご　しゃべれない　おまえ　が　どういう　ワーキング　できん　だ　よ。
What kind of "working" can you do when you don't even speak English?

Correction

〇

英語も喋れないくせにどんなワーキングするつもりなの？
えいご　も　しゃべれない　くせ　に　どんな　ワーキング　する　つもり　なの？
What kind of "working" are you planning to do when you can't even speak English?

Comments

I got 〇 and also a correction. So I wasn’t wrong, but perhaps this other phrasing would have been more likely for some native speakers.

I had assumed that everyone would write nice things, so I wanted to submit an answer where the speaker is giving their friend a hard time. ^_^

Note how I used ワーキング to refer to the “working” in ワーキングホリデー (working holiday). I was sure that Rei was gonna correct me, saying it should be 仕事[しごと] or something… but my play on words got a pass! やった！

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Here is my attempt at a short, simple answer: