Chotto matte kudasai (ちょっと待って下さい / ちょっとまってください)is the most common term for "just a minute please." It's also the name of a traditional Japanese children's song.
The keigo version is sho sho omachi kudasai (少々お待ち下さい、しょしょおまちください).
Below is a link to a website that has on it a bunch of versions of the children's song.
http://www.songlust.com/s/16/sandpipers_chotto_matte_kudasai.html
(I love the name of the site, "songlust." I can't imagining coming up with a word like that myself, but I think it's awesome.)
And, of course, there are tons of versions on YouTube. I like this 'ukulele version, some nice playing:
and here's a version by a an "idol girl group" called Smileage. Not really my kind of music, but again, what a great word to create; and this is seriously a part of modern Japanese culture.
For beginner to perhaps intermediate-level students, Japanese words, phrases, and expressions, as learned by an American living in Tokyo. . Some of it I absorbed from my surroundings--slang, abbreviated terms, or new katakana-ized words that have recently entered the Japanese language. Some words are straight-up conventional vocabulary that I've found helpful to know, either in the classroom (where I taught English) or in everyday life, and some words just make me smile.
Monday, May 13, 2013
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