230 CHAPTER 5. COUNTERS AND COUNTING
Aside from the numbers one through ten, there is also the ’number’
zero, which is typically wriĴen in katakana as when used on its own,
or using the noun
when meaning ”naught” or ”null”. An example of
using is in things such as ”0.0001”, which can be wriĴen
,
with meaning ”dot”.
The native Japanese way of counting is a bit more complex:number pronunciation
1
2
3
4
5 ( )
6
7
8
9
10While this is the basic series, this series is also one you will likely
never use as they aren’t used for actual counting. It may be used when
someone’s trying to enumerate something from memory using their fin-
gers, muĴering ” , , , , ...” while touching fingers in succession,
but that’s about it. Instead, slightly different pronunciations are used when
paired with counters for actual counting statements. The native Japanese
readings are used with only a handful of counters, but these are quite im-
portant counters: those used for general counting of items, and for count-
ing days.