On Thu, Feb 05, 2004 at 04:12:52PM -0500, Rob Haden wrote:

> How are complex clauses handled in consistently head-last languages, such
> as Japanese? For example, what is the equivalent of English sentences
> like "I am happy to see you" and (from another thread) "I know who I want
> to take me home"?

I imagine the first would be "Anata ni au koto ga suki desu", or "you with
meet [nom] [subj] pleasurable is" ("to see you" would be meant literally;
where we would say "see you" they'd say "meet with you").

As for the second, you'd need a native speaker, preferably one fully
bilingual and fluent in English. I know how to say "I know the person
whom I want to take me home" (i.e. not *which* person, but rather that
I have met them and know them), but I do not know how to say "I know who
I want to take me home", or whether Japanese is a language in which
that particular subtle meaning can be expressed. (For the record, I
believe the first meaning would be something like "hoomu ni toritai
hito wo shirimasu", but due to pro-drop vagueness this is even more
ambiguous than the English version: not only do we not know whose
hoomu we're going to, but I'm not at all sure we can tell who is taking
whom *or* who it is that desires it! Plus I'm probably using the
wrong word for "know".)

Amanda