More complex sentence order.

[magevampjoe]

Hi.
OK, i'm trying to make the sentence '[I] ate meat for dinner.'
This was my attempt:
「私は」肉が晩御飯を食べました。
I know where 'ate' goes, so that is right.
But I don't know if 肉　should go before or after 晩御飯.

I may have it completely wrong, so please correct me. I remembered to put [] around 'watashi ha' to show it is ommited.

Thanks for your help. Once I have this I should be able to say/write a lot more complex sentences.

Thanks.

[Damicci]

try
晩ご飯には肉を食べました。
As for dinner I ate meat.

か

私は晩ご飯に肉を食べました。
I ate meat for dinner. (Not too sure about this one)

By the way, this should be in Grammar instead.

It may also be more practical to state what kind of meat.

[epigene]

try
晩ご飯には肉を食べました。
As for dinner I ate meat.
か
私は晩ご飯に肉を食べました。
I ate meat for dinner. (Not too sure about this one)
By the way, this should be in Grammar instead.
It may also be more practical to state what kind of meat.
Damicci's second translation is perfect.

In the first one, this is OK, but I personally use には more often in ways when you want to refer to something that accompanies or is related to dinner.
ご飯には味噌汁がほしい。
晩ご飯には肉料理が並んだ。

HTH! :relief:

PS I will move the thread to Grammar & Sentences as Damicci recommends.

[Mike Cash]

Hi.
OK, i'm trying to make the sentence '[I] ate meat for dinner.'
This was my attempt:
「私は」肉が晩御飯を食べました。


There you're saying that meat ate dinner.

[magevampjoe]

Ah, thanks everyone. My order is often wrong and so I often then use incorrect particles and even sometimes incorrect words.:bluush:
Anyway, thankyou thankyou.:bow::thankyou::love:

[Damicci]

Thanks Epigene, I realized after searchign for 「晩ご飯に」、it was alot more common than I thought.

Also I found
『晩ご飯で』 common too. What could be the difference?

[Elizabeth]

Thanks Epigene, I realized after searchign for 「晩ご飯に」、it was alot more common than I thought.

Also I found
『晩ご飯で』 common too. What could be the difference?
If you're talking about で as a particle it refers to what you would be doing at dinner apart from what is intrinsically part of the meal.


We drank a bottle of wine at dinner (晩ご飯・夕食で、ウインを一瓶飲んだ。)

[Damicci]

LMAO
I completely forgot about that. I was too busy sticking to saying what was done for dinner.

lol :slap: thanks Elizabeth.

[kamaru]

What does the use of でも　mean in this sentence structure:

コメントはドイツ語でもイタリア語でも英語です。

ありがとう　for ur help!

[EvilCowSlayer]

Not entirely sure about this, but you can probably think about it as ドイツ語で、　イタリア語で、　and 英語で. The も could just connect them all together.

My translation (in case you needed one): Comments can be in German, Italian, or English.

[NattyBumppo]

Not entirely sure about this, but you can probably think about it as ドイツ語で、　イタリア語で、　and 英語で. The も could just connect them all together.

My translation (in case you needed one): Comments can be in German, Italian, or English.
The も doesn't serve to connect them together, exactly. Its usage is similar to 「コメントは英語でもかまいません。」　"Comments can be in English, too, and that's just fine." The translation you gave is still just fine. But the repeated でも's give an air of freedom of options: "Comments can be German, Italian, or English: take your pick!" This is the "even if" 「でも」, and there's just an implied 「かまいません」, basically.

However, it would be far more natural to say 「コメントはドイツ語でもイタリア語でも英語でもかまいません」 or 「コメントはドイツ語でもイタリア語でも英語でもかどちらでもOKAYです」 or something like that. kamaru, are you sure that you're quoting the Japanese correctly?

[kamaru]

Actually the sentence ended with 「OKです」.
Sorry for the ambiguity :relief:
So, in the case it's 「コメントはドイツ語でもイタリア語でも英語ＯＫです 」　it would mean comments can be in either one of the languages? :-) coz I thought at first it should be in all of them :p
ありがとう！

[NattyBumppo]

Right, it means they can be in any of the languages, not all of them.

[Elizabeth]

Actually the sentence ended with 「OKです」.
Sorry for the ambiguity :relief:
So, in the case it's 「コメントはドイツ語でもイタリア語でも英語ＯＫです」　it would mean comments can be in either one of the languages? :-) coz I thought at first it should be in all of them :p
ありがとう！
"Demo" can mean "all" but not in combination with "OK" or "is alright/doesn't matter if you...." Just think, would you normally say "all of them are OK in English" ?

If you want to translate Please leave a comment in English, Japanese, and German it would need to be something closer to "Komento wo eigo demo nihongo demo doitsugo demo dashite kudasai."

[NattyBumppo]

Elizabeth,

Maybe I'm misunderstanding your intent in the last post, but if you're trying to say that comments should be left in all of those languages, your construction using でも would not work. (You've basically just written "Please leave a comment in English, Japanese, or German.) You'd need to say something like 「コメントを英語、日本語、ドイツ語の３か国語すべてで記入して下さい。」 to indicate that the user should write in all three... not that you'd want to do that anyway though, heh.

[Damicci]

Elizabeth,

Maybe I'm misunderstanding your intent in the last post, but if you're trying to say that comments should be left in all of those languages, your construction using でも would not work. (You've basically just written "Please leave a comment in English, Japanese, or German.) You'd need to say something like 「コメントを英語、日本語、ドイツ語の３か国語すべて で記入して下さい。」 to indicate that the user should write in all three... not that you'd want to do that anyway though, heh.

I think she meant one of the 3.