Wednesday, June 9, 2010

Let's enjoy Japanese: Nothing else you can do

Here's a quick little grammar tidbit for you:

When you want to express the idea that all you can do is X, just make X into dictionary form and add しかない. As しかない can be used in conjunction with nouns to indicate a scarcity of something, so too with verbs can it be used to show a lack of options.

例えば:

日本語分からなかったら、勉強するしかないですね。
(If you don't understand Japanese, there's nothing else you can do but study, huh?)

テストのために勉強しなかったの?じゃあ、祈るしかないな。
(You didn't study for the test? Well, I guess all you can do now is pray)

1 comment:

  1. Hey, that's great! I didn't know you could do that. I say keep the nifty grammar suggestions coming.

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