*Japanese Word of the Day*
教（おし）えてくれてありがとう！
/oshiete kurete arigatou/
Thank you for letting me know!
The other day, my friend asked me that what
くれて in this sentence means.
I think it's a very good question, so I'd like to share my answer with you guys. ;)
You know
ありがとう/arigatou/ means "thank you", and
教(おし)える/oshieru/ means "to teach" or "to tell". This phrase can be translated as "thank you for teaching me" or "I appreciate your advice".
教えてくれて is consist of two verbs,
教える and
くれる.
Let me show you some example sentences to see what the verb
くれる/kureru/ means when it is used alone.
おじいちゃんはいつもお菓子(かし)をくれる。
/ojiichan wa itsumo okashi wo kureru/
Grandpa always
gives me some snacks.
彼氏(かれし)がプレゼント(ぷれぜんと)をくれた。
/kareshi ga purezento wo kureta/
My boyfriend
gave me a present.
*Here,
くれた is the past tense of
くれる.
母がおこづかいをくれた。
/haha ga okozukai wo kureta/
My mother
gave me some allowance.
早(はや)く水(みず)をくれ！！
/hayaku mizu wo kure/
Give me water quickly!!
*
くれ is the imperative (command) form of
くれる. It sounds very rude. If you want something, you'd better to use the polite form of it,
ください.
レシートをください。
/reshiito wo kudasai/
Please
give me a receipt.
Now, did you notice that
the object of くれる is always "me"?
Grandpa gives
me blablabla, my boyfriend gave
me blablabla, please give
me blablabla... You don't have to add
私に/watasi ni/ "to me" when you use
くれる because I know
くれる always indicates that the speaker is the one who's given something.
But, in the other words,
くれる basically cannot be used when the object is not yourself. It sounds a bit strange if you say
母が妹におこづかいをくれた. Sometimes we'd say like this but it implies another meaning.
Well, then how should I say "to give something to someone else"?
In this case, you should use あげる/ageru/ instead.
母(はは)が妹(いもうと)におこづかいをあげた。
/haha ga imouto ni okozukai wo ageta/
My mother gave my sister some allowance.
Both くれる and あげる mean "to give", but the point of view is totally different. Let's look at some example sentences of あげる.
後(あと)であげるね。
/ato de ageru ne/
I'll
give it to you later.
犬(いぬ)に玉(たま)ねぎをあげてはいけない。
/inu ni tamanegi wo agete wa ikenai/
You must not
give a dog onions.
窓(まど)からパン(ぱん)くずをあげた。
/mado kara pankuzu wo ageta/
I
gave (fed) crumbs through the window.
You know, Japanese language often omit the subject of the sentence. So it might be "
I gave crumbs through the window" or "An old lady gave crumbs through the window" or somebody else did. It depends on the context. Also, this sentence doesn't mention that to whom I (or somebody else) gave crumbs.
Please have a look at the sentence below.
窓(まど)からパン(ぱん)くずをくれた。
/mado kara pankuzu wo kureta/
Now I changed the verb of the sentence (
あげた →
くれた). You still don't know the subject of the sentence, but you can guess who got crumbs. It's
me (the speaker of the sentence)! As I said,
くれる suggests that the speaker is the one who gets something.
We won't say あげる when the speaker is the one who gets something. So
彼氏が私にプレゼントをあげる sounds unnatural.
And one more important property of this verb―
gratitude! :)
When I say
パンくずをくれた, it implies that I appreciate the one who gave me crumbs. Maybe I was too hungry? Or I love crumbs? Who cares! XD Anyway,
this verb くれる shows that you feel thankful, or you are happy to get something.
What to say when you're not happy to get something? Or you don't want to use the words which contain gratitude? For example, your dad gave you a thick math book for your birthday. If you love math (do you?!), then you can say:
父(ちち)が誕生日(たんじょうび)に数学(すうがく)の本(ほん)をくれた。
/chichi ga tanjoubi ni suugaku no hon wo kureta/
My father gave me a thick math book. (and I'm happy to get it)
But if you don't like math and you're not happy at all to get such a present, you should say like this:
父(ちち)から誕生日(たんじょうび)に数学(すうがく)の本(ほん)をもらった。
/chichi kara tanjoubi ni suugaku no hon wo moratta/
もらう/morau/ is a verb which means "to get" or "to receive". So the subject of this sentence is "I", but I just omitted it. The full sentence is:
私（わたし）は父(ちち)から誕生日(たんじょうび)に数学(すうがく)の本(ほん)をもらった。 You can say
父にもらう or
父からもらう. Here I used
から to avoid repetition of
に (父
に誕生日
に...).
→
See more explanation of から!
By the way, I guess you've learnt
ください as "please". Yes, it means "please" when it's used with other verbs. You can also use
くれ to ask someone to do something, but it sounds arrogant.
窓(まど)を閉(し)めてください。
/mado wo shimete kudasai/
Please close the window.
一緒(いっしょ)に来(き)てください。
/issho ni kite kudasai/
Please come with me.
ほっといてくれ。
/hottoite kure/
Leave me alone, please.
OK, now let's look at the first sentence
教えてくれてありがとう. What
くれる of
教えてくれる means? The role of
くれる isn't same as
ください in above sentences, I think.
Let's compare two sentences.
(1) 友達(ともだち)が私(わたし)におもしろいゲーム(げーむ)を教(おし)えた。
/tomodachi ga watashi ni omoshiroi geemu wo oshiete kureta/
(2) 友達(ともだち)がおもしろいゲーム(げーむ)を教(おし)えてくれた。
/tomodachi ga omoshiroi geemu wo oshiete kureta/
Both can be translated as "My friend told me about an interesting game." What are the differences between them? I want you to remember that
くれる implies the speaker feel thankful about it. You can see that the speaker of (2) probably feels happy to know about the game. Or, he thinks what his
友達 did was good for him.
Do you get the picture? :)
姉(あね)が一緒(いっしょ)に来(き)てくれた。
/ane ga issho ni kite kureta/
My sister came with me. (And I appreciate about it)
彼（かれ）はいつも私（わたし）に話（はな）しかけてくれる。
/kare wa itsumo watashi ni hanashi kakete kureru/
He always speaks to me. (And I think he's very kind)
来（き）てくれて嬉（うれ）しいよ。
/kite kurete ureshii yo/
I'm glad you came.
We often use it with other verbs when we ask something casually.
ちょっと窓(まど)を開(あ)けてくれる？
/chotto mado wo akete kureru/
Can you open the window? (And I'd be appreciate if you'd do that)
この文章(ぶんしょう)を直(なお)してくれる？
/kono bunshou wo naoshite kureru/
Can you correct these sentences for me? (And it'd be very helpful if you could)
Sometimes it sounds a biiiiit arrogant. So we tend to use
くれない, which is the negative form of
くれる. If you want to make it more polite, you can say
くれますか instead of
くれる. And also,
くれませんか sounds more soft.
Agh, I know it's confusing though...
くれる？ ＜
くれない？ ＜
くれますか ＜
くれませんか？
Casual -----------------------------> Polite
Which should I use? Well, it depends on how close you guys are. :P
今度(らいしゅう)の日曜(にちよう)、僕(ぼく)とデート(でーと)してくれませんか？
/raishuu no nichiyou, boku to deeto shite kuremasen ka/
Will you please go on a date with me?
忙(いそが)しいから、また今度(こんど)にしてくれない？
/isogashii kara, mata kondo ni shite kurenai/
I'm busy, can't it be at some other time?
By the way, when Japanese people say
また今度 "maybe next time", most of the time it implies that she doesn't want to go. :(
Ohh, I wrote a lot! I did it! haha
I hope it would be of your help. :) Please let me know if you have any questions or if you want more examples. Thank you for reading,
読(よ)んでくれてありがとう！；）
See ya!
