Sometimes travelling to a foreign country can be quite daunting, especially if you don’t know how to speak the language. You could be really thorough and take up language classes before you travel or you could wing your way through your journey, with a little help from a book like this Instant Japanese phrase book. Best of all, this is not just a boring phrase book filled with words, the book contains fun manga illustrations!
This is the revised second edition of Boye Lafayette De Mente’s classic, bestselling phrase book and Japanese dictionary. This pocket-size book measures just 15 x 10 x 1 cm which makes it incredibly convenient to travel with but without losing the essential content for communication.
The author, De Mente has picked up the 100 most common words to learn. These words are repeated in different combinations, building familiarity without effort. This brief guide to pronunciation allows the user to say the phrases correctly and at the back of the books, there is the Japanese dictionary for quick reference. This book also has fun manga-style illustrations, Japanese etiquette tips and additional information on which destinations, personalities and trends are hot in Japan right now! It is an interesting read.
This book is a good start for tourists, especially if you just want to learn the basic keywords to communicate. It should get you by with the phrases listed on the book. Not many of the local Japanese people speak English. If you are not able to pronounce the phrase, you can just show them the phrases from this book to get you by. Some of the phrases are useful if you are trying to make conversation in Japanese. This book is available to buy from Tuttle Publishing, good bookstores and Amazon.
Disclosure: I received this book from the publisher for free. However, they have not paid me for this review, and they do not exercise any editorial control over my review or anything else on this site. Contains Amazon affiliate link.
