Quote Originally Posted by Firestorm View Post
next word I'm unsure on "Umai" since i hear it for food, talet, and other things
It can be used to describe anything that's good or awesome - either something well done or tasty.

I suppose it has a broader meaning than お上手 or おいしい because お上手 refers to proficiency and おいしい just refers to flavour - whereas うまい covers both. So you can use うまい as a synonym for either じょうず or おいしい.

e.g.
アーシーさんのサンスクリット古語はじょうずですね
"Arcee's Classical Sanskrit is good, isn't it?"
アーシーさんのサンスクリット古語はうまいですね
"Arcee's Classical Sanskrit is good, isn't it?"
アーシーさんの料理はおいしいですね！
"Arcee's cooking is delicious, isn't it?"
アーシーさんの料理はうまいですね！
"Arcee's cooking is delicious, isn't it?"

Btw, the best way to improve your Japanese fluency is to just go hang out with Japanese speakers. The best kind are the ones who speak NO English. And if they try to speak to you in English, keep answering back in Japanese... I find in most cases they'll give up and switch over to Japanese. Although it's funny when they don't... some older members here may remember Tiger Convoy - the Japanese Transfan who lived in Australia for a while. At first he and I spoke to each other in Japanese, and sometimes at meets I would help translate for him -- but as his English got gooderer, he would start talking back to me in English (how dare he take my advice and turn it back on me! ) -- so we would end up having these weird bilingual conversations where I would talk to him in Japanese and he'd keep talking to me in English! Heh.