Japanese Characters

[chisai kame]

I have been emailing my friend in Japan and we are now starting to talk in Japanese writing. We used to talk like this "watasi wa susi ga suki desu" but now she tried to talk in Japanese but this is all I saw "¤³¤ó¤Ë¤Á¤ï¡Ë". I already downloaded Japanese font because I can read sites that are in Japanese. why can't I read this?

Also, I have that toolbar installed where I can switch from Japanese to English typing, but I can't figure out how to use it. My friend also has that and he said you type in english like this "konnichiwa" and when it reconizes a character, it will replace the english with that character. And he said it should give you a menu where you can choose if you want it in hiragana, katakana, or kanji. I can't figure out how to do that! I just put up the "soft keyboard" but that takes FOREVER.

 

[dyserq]

That is because although we may read english characters, her computer settings are configured for japanesse and all she reads are codes as they can not interpret english characters
You actually need a translator, it won't work if you just type it in
You can use worldlingo at:
http://www.worldlingo.com/en/products_services/worldlingo_translator.html
Hope that helps

 

[kof2000]

what about babelfish.

 

[chisai kame]

How do I use the IME(I think that's what it's called)correctly? That website translated it, but I don't think it was correct. I know the word was konnnichiwa, but I read "heneo".
I know she can read English characters. She said she could and we have been emailing in english characters for a long time. If they send it in a word document, I can read it, but I don't think they have Microsoft Word in Japan (and I don't know enough japanese to ask)
I am using Yahoo!