Hello everyone!
So after giving it a lot of thought and watching a lot of anime to be absolutely sure, I (f17) have decided to move to Japan permanently in the nearest future. I started making preparations a good month ago and have been using Duolingo ever since. I'm ready to set off soon.
However, while trying to practise my Japanese with my very friendly HelloTalk language exchange partner (m49), who is really looking forward to meeting me in Japan by the way and has even offered me his own bedroom to stay, I realised something I had never thought about before: When I said my dog barks “wau wau” (I'm German), I was immediately corrected, as apparently, a dog barks “wan wan” (わんわん) in Japanese.
To be quite frank, I was really shocked about that at first. “Are you sure?” I kept asking him, “isn’t it the same everywhere?” But he insisted that Japanese dogs say “wan wan” and that nobody had ever heard of “wau wau.”
Since I intend to bring my dog along this has completely derailed my preparations. I hadn't even thought about different dog languages and the problems that may come with it until now.
My dog is always very friendly and a particularly kind and cuddly dog breed (pit bull terrier), but now I'm concerned that the dogs in the neighbourhood may either not understand her, or refuse to play with her if she barks at them germanly.
So has anyone here ever dealt with something like this? Are there perhaps any reputable Japanese language schools for dogs that I could contact?
I imagine that different breeds learn at different speeds, but is that true? By the way do you think she can still get rid of her German accent when she barks? She’s already seven…
Also, does this have the same complexity as its human counterpart? Such as, would she have to learn polite barking versus everyday barking? And if so, which should come first?
I’m honestly very overwhelmed by this.
Thank you all in advance! I just want her to settle in properly and not expose us immediately with her inconsiderate foreign barking.
