Sumimasen. Pronounce it: Soo-mee-mah-sen. It’s means “pardon me”, “excuse me”, “sorry” and is a generally useful verbal tick. It’s written in hiragana as すみません.
It’s one of the three most useful words in Japan. Say it when you’re going to ask someone something, “Sumimasen, eki ha doko desu ka?” call a waiter “sumimasen!”, apologize for bumping someone, getting on or off the train, generally, as a course of matter as you move around.
True story - as I walked through a crowd at an event in Tokyo this month, I said “sumimasen” as I had to cross someone’s path. I heard him turn to the person he was with and comment that my Japanese was good - I had said “sumimasen.” ^_^ I thought that was kind of funny and touching. My Japanese is, in all honesty, quite terrible. It’s just a useful word to know.
Read other answers by Erica Friedman on Quora:
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from Quora http://ift.tt/1OuW1bl
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