Lesson 22 of 24
And Also, And While
about 14 minutes
After this lesson you can
- Give two reasons in one sentence, and say what you did while doing something else.
- Say how few of something there are, how surprisingly many, and how often.
Words this lesson teaches
- あいだ
- the stretch of time between
- ミルク
- milk
- ちかい
- near, close by
- やすい
- cheap
- レジ
- the till, the register
- まちます
- waits
- ほん
- the counter for long thin things
- ちゅうもん
- an order for goods
What it explains
し: reasons, piled up
Plain form plus し, usually twice, listing grounds that all point the same way: 「ちかいし、やすいし」. Unlike から it does not claim to give the reason — it offers several and lets the listener add them up, which is why it sounds softer and why the conclusion is often left off entirely.
ながら and あいだに: two kinds of while
ながら takes the ます stem — 見ながら, たべながら — and needs one subject doing both things. あいだに takes a noun plus の or a ている clause, and puts your action inside a period that may belong to somebody else. Drop the に and あいだ means the whole stretch rather than a point in it: 「あいだ まちました」 is I waited the whole time.
Counting with feeling
Three ways a number stops being neutral. しか plus a negative means only that many and not enough: 「一本しか ありません」. Number plus も means that many, and it surprises me: 「十一人も」. And a period plus に gives frequency — 「月に いちど」, once a month; 「一日に 三回」, three times a day. Note that しか replaces は and が rather than sitting next to them.
The scene itself is in the app.
Lesson one of this track is free to read in full. From lesson two on, the story, the audio and the review are part of a free account.
