600 most common words: Japanese. Expressions of politeness - Part 1
Below you’ll find the first part of the 600 most frequently used words of any given language for Japanese.
This series will be started off with Expressions of Politeness Part 1. This part will include yes and no, question words and apologies. I adjusted the original list a little since I felt like some of the expressions are not used one to one in Japanese as they are in English. I also included several translations for some words... In those cases, the first one should be the politer way to say it, with the following expressions being more colloquial.
‘Yes’ and ‘No’:
はい; うん - yes
いいえ; ううん - no
絶対（ぜったい）- absolutely
とんでもない; 無理です（むりです) - no way
まさしく; そうですよ - exactly
Question words:
いつ - When?
どちら; どこ - Where?
どう; どうやって - How?
いくら - How much?
どの位 (どのぐらい) - How many?
なぜ; 何で (なんで) - Why?
何 (なに) - What?
誰 (だれ) - Who?
どちら; どれ - Which?
誰の (だれ) - Whose?
いかがですか - How is it?
Apologizing:
ごめん; すみません - Excuse me
失礼します (しつれい); ちょっとうかがいますか - sorry to interrupt
さあ; ちょっと - Well now
残念ながらそのようですね。(ざんねん) - I’m afraid so.
そうではないと思います。(おもいます) - I’m afraid not
If you find any mistakes, please let me know so I can correct them. I study Japanese in my free time, and although I tried to cross-reference most expressions with at least two dictionaries, there are likely still some mistakes.
