Lesson 5 · Hiragana

The H-row — Mt Fuji, chopsticks, and the last trick sound

Five characters. One of them, ふ, is the fourth and final irregular sound in all of hiragana — after this, no more surprises.

Mission check: はし (chopsticks), ひと (person), ひこうき (airplane). Eating, crowds, and the flight in — core trip vocabulary.

1 · The row

ふ = "fu" — the last irregular

You'd expect "hu", but ふ is a soft fu — not a hard English "f", more like blowing out a candle. That completes the famous four: し shi, ち chi, つ tsu, ふ fu. Every other kana says exactly what its row predicts.

Two special jobs (just so you're not surprised)

When は and へ act as grammar particles, their sound shifts: は → "wa", へ → "e". You'll see は after the thing a sentence is "about". Don't drill this yet — just know the shift exists so a sign doesn't trip you.

2 · Memory hooks

3 · New words

Slow read of the big one: ひこうき = hi · ko · u · ki. The う just stretches the "ko" into "kō" — a long vowel. (More on long vowels soon; you already read it correctly by sounding it out.)

4 · Recall — interleaved

5 · Go deeper

• Primary source: Tofugu — Learn Hiragana (H-row mnemonics + quiz).
• The map: the H-row in the full hiragana chart — only the short tail rows left.
• Previous: Lesson 4 — N-row.