One of the first words you're likely to learn as you begin delving into Japanese is ごめんなさい, which means "I'm sorry."

The first time we saw the word ごめんなさい in an NDL was way back in this lesson: [NDL #62] - You have ketchup on your face.

We saw that if you spill coffee on someone, you can say:

ごめんなさい！大丈夫ですか？
ごめんなさい！　だいじょうぶ　です　か？
I'm so sorry! Are you all right?
Literally: “Sorry! + OK + is + か?”

In casual speech, ごめんなさい is shortened to ごめん.

So if you say ごめん to a stranger after spilling coffee on them, you'll sound pretty rude. If you're a few minutes late meeting your friend at the station, though, then feel free to say something like:

遅くなってごめんね。
おそく　なって　ごめん　ね。
Sorry I'm late.
Literally: “late + become (and) + sorry + ね.”

↑ That sentence is from [NDL #44] - Absolutely not at all...

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Long story short, ごめんなさい and ごめん are so common that you'll probably learn them very early in your studies.

As a result, though, you might be a little confused when you eventually come across a phrase like this:

彼と一緒に働くのはもうごめんだ。
かれ　と　いっしょ　に　はたらく　の　は　もう　ごめん　だ。
I've had enough of working with him. // That's it, I can't work with him anymore.
Literally: “he + と + together (with) + work + のは + already + sorry + だ.”

"Working with him is already sorry"...?

Seems strange, yeah? But for some reason, the phrase もうごめんだ means something along the lines of "I've had it," "enough is enough," "I can't take this anymore."

You are unlikely to find もうごめんだ in a Japanese-English dictionary, but if you look at one of the multiple definitions of ごめん in a Japanese-only dictionary, you'll find entries like this:

嫌で拒否する気持ちを表す語。もうたくさん。
A word used to show that something disagreeable is rejected. Enough is enough.

One dictionary also had this useful example sentence:

戦争は二度とご免だ。
せんそう　は　にど　と　ごめん　だ。
I can’t take another war. // We’ve had enough wars for a lifetime.
Literally: “war + は + never again (=two times + と) + sorry + だ.”

If you see 二度と (にどと) or もう before ごめんだ, chances are the meaning will be "Enough is enough" or "I've had it with..."

Actually, pretty much anytime ごめん is followed by だ, it will have this meaning.

Oh, and the kanji for ごめん is 御免, by the way. I'd recommend just writing it in hiragana, though.

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Enough is enough!

In that dictionary entry above, you may have noticed the phrase もうたくさん.

This pretty much has the same meaning.

沢山 (たくさん), which is usually just written in hiragana, means "a lot" or "a great deal."

We've seen this many, many times in past lessons. For example, we had the following sentence way back in [NDL #13] - I wanna take you out.

友達たくさん連れきて。
ともだち　たくさん　つれて　きて。
Bring lots of friends with you.
Literally: “friends + many + bring/take (someone) + come (and).”

If you watch enough anime, chances are you'll hear someone scream this at some point:

もうたくさんだ！
もう　たくさん　だ！
Enough is enough! // I can’t take it anymore!
Literally: “already + a lot + だ！”

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This lesson is over!

...but I still want to talk about a bit of Japanese.

So, while writing this lesson, I was googling various uses of もうごめんだ, and I came across a post on Yahoo! Questions by a Japanese guy asking to get a few Japanese sentences translated.

Normally people ask for translations of a phrase or two, or maybe a few random sentences.

Consequently, I couldn't help but laugh when I read the following. And then I felt a bit bad about laughing...

(Note: I'm not including kana or word-by-word breakdowns, as I don't expect you to learn/memorize all of these sentences. I just wanted to share some Japanese that I came across.)

英訳していただけますか？

もうごめんだ。もう君とは一緒にいれない。Facebookの友達覧からもDeleteしてやるよ。あぁもう何も言うな。何も聞きたくないんだよ。君があいつと手をつないでるところを見たよ。もう我慢の限界だ。どれだけ俺の心を傷つけたと思ってるんだよ。それでもバイバイはいやだって？いいかげんにしてくれ。そういうことは君の彼氏にでも言ってあげてくれ。君の優しさは剣となって俺の心臓を貫いているんだよ。

以上です お願いします

Could you translate this into English?

I've had enough. I can't be with you anymore. I'm deleting you from my friends list on Facebook. Don't even say anything. I don't want to hear anything from you. I saw you holding hands with him. I can't take this any longer. Do you have any idea how much you hurt me? And you're trying to tell me that you don't want to say goodbye? Give me a break. Why don't you go tell that to your boyfriend. Your kindness became a sword that pierced through my heart.

That's all. Thank you.

Poor guy. Although I'm curious as to how he managed to have a relationship with this person when he apparently can't speak English.

While being able to understand all of this Japanese is valuable, let's hope that none of us ever needs to use it!