Many people like to say things like, "I am loving this new thing," instead of saying, "I love this new thing."
Or "I am wanting a new thing" instead of "I want a new thing."
I don't get it.
In the 2000s there was a cultural appreciation of poorly translated sentences found in video games from Japan. "All your base are belong to us" from Zero Wing, and the like. A particular feature of these Engrish utterances are a tense shift from present to imperfect ("am wanting"), which I surmise reflects differences of Japanese sentence structure. Many people found it funny, and started using these forms as an attempt at humor; others copied it, without knowing why it was humorous. This is how many language trends develop.
Japanese is very flexible when structuring sentences. There can be difficulty when translating from Japanese to English because English grammar and structure is an amalgam of languages over the centuries. Additionally, English is relatively limited in some ways, which means that for someone translating from Japanese to English there can be difficulty in reaching the exact structure that is necessary to make the sentence sound natural.
This is why it's easy to identify material translated from Russian, Chinese, Japanese, etc. that was not done by someone intuitively familiar with English.
The above expressions, "I am wanting a new thing" instead of "I want a new thing.", are a perfect place to start.
A few notes:
1. Grammar is not the same across all languages. The rules in one may not transfer exactly to the rules of another. Consider that C and Python, while they have similarities, can’t be translated exactly without significant interventional engineering.
2. Japanese writing uses English letters, Katakana (consider them to be phonetic or UPPER CASE, although that isn’t an exact way to describe it), Hiragana (consider them to be phonetic or lower case, along with completion of Kanji words or as simplified substitution of Kanji characters), and Kanji (carried over from China around 1000 years ago. They generally have several readings, such that there is a “Chinese” set of one-syllable readings, and an equivalent reading for the traditional Japanese word of the same meaning that may be multi-syllable and that will have additional Hiragana attached to it to continue the exact usage. Compare to how Greek is used in English.)
3. In general spaces aren’t necessary between words in Japanese. The delineation between words is understood in the transition between various word endings, particles, context, etc. In the Hiragana-only part I will use spaces to distinguish between the various words.
4. This post includes Japanese characters, and may not render properly if Unicode isn’t supported completely.
I will structure the examples in the form of:
Romaji = Hiragana = Kanji = Direct complete translation to English (with implied words) along with [commentary, explanation, or a long English translation in parenthesis because it's difficult to go in that direction.]
Let’s start with a verb that means, “to want”:
hoshii = ほしい = 欲しい = (I) want (that). [I want..., I want it, I am wanting it. The item that is wanted is understood by both parties. The subject is the speaker, the object is whatever is known, the verb is “to want”. It is a complete sentence from the English point of view.]
kore hoshii = これ ほしい = これ欲しい = (I) want this (thing that is closer to me). [The item “near me” is specified. Using a pronoun.]
sore hoshii = それ ほしい = それ欲しい = (I) want that (thing that is closer to you). [Now the item “near you” is specified. Using a pronoun.]
are hoshii = あれ ほしい = あれ欲しい = (I) want that (thing that is far away from us). [Now the item “far away” is specified. Using a pronoun.]
Now let’s cover another word and construction:
morau = もらう = 貰う = (I) will get/receive (it). [I will receive (from you) the thing.]
moraitai = もらいたい = 貰いたい = (I) want to get/receive (it). [The “tai” ending indicates “want to”.]
So we can also make this in the same pattern:
*hoshitai = ほしたい = 欲したい = (I) want to want (it). [While grammatically this is correct, it isn’t proper usage. It would either sound “cute” or obnoxious. Imagine a child wanting a toy, or a teenage girl wanting a fan with a picture of the latest Korean group.]
So now let’s start with a reasonable translation for "I want a new thing", however, let’s make it definite. In this case, how about a digital multimeter, or DMM, for “I want a new DMM”.
Using “hoshii”, “want”:
atarashii DMM hoshii = あたらしい DMM ほしい = 新しいDMM欲しい = (I) want (a) new DMM. [“I want a new DMM”. However, in Japanese it sounds a little immature. See the ‘hoshitai” example.]
Using “morau”, “get/receive”:
atarashii DMM wo moraitai = あたらしい DMM を もらいたい = 新しいDMMを貰いたい = (I) would like to get a new DMM. [“I want a new DMM”. For instance, the old one doesn’t have enough digits, so I want to get an HP 3458A.]
Finally, let’s cover how "I am wanting a new thing", or “I am wanting a new DMM” might translate:
Using “hoshii”, “want”:
atarashii DMM wo hosite imasu = あたらしい DMM を ほして います = 新しいDMMを欲しています = (I) am wanting a new DMM.
Using “morau”, “get/receive”:
atarashii DMM wo moraitakute imasu = あたらしい DMM を もらいたくています = 新しいDMMを貰いたくています = (I) am wanting to get a new DMM.