I don’t remember the exact day that I decided to study Japanese, but I think I’m approaching the two year anniversary at some point in the next couple of months. It’s been a lot of ups and a lot of downs, a lot of “I don’t know if I can do this” and a lot of “hey, this is starting to make a little sense now”. To be frank, I’m not entirely sure where I am at the moment. I think I could probably pass the JLPT N5 if I… Read More »Two Years In
Over the past week or two, I have found something happening, and I am not sure what to make of it. On multiple occasions, I have found myself nearly responding in Japanese to an English question – and I have to consciously correct myself. Sometimes that’s before it comes out of my mouth, and sometimes it’s not. Yesterday, I was at a Sushi restaurant, and the waitress came up to ask what I wanted to drink. I replied “Mi-er, I mean, Water, please”. I very nearly said “Mizu kudasai”. I’m… Read More »Thinking in Japanese
As I have been learning Japanese, one observation keeps coming to mind, one I can’t shake: Japanese is incredible, amazingly, spectacularly biased against beginners. What I mean is this: when you start learning Japanese, there is a hump. The hump seems almost insurmountable. You have to learn an entirely new way of thinking about language – the grammar is exactly backwards from English, there are several different writing systems that are completely unfamiliar, and (at least for any practical purpose) you have to learn them quickly, because you’re not going… Read More »Japanese is Biased Against Beginners
I have been learning Japanese now for a little over a year. One the one hand, I know more than I did. I can put together basic sentences, I know probably a thousand words (a hodgepodge of adjectives, nouns, verbs, and things I picked up from variety shows and songs), and I think a fair assessment of my skills right now is that I could probably find my way around Tokyo if I needed to. I am very familiar with hiragana and katakana, and I even know a few kanji,… Read More »Drinking From the Firehose
I just took my second Japanese test at ACC. And while I think I did okay at it, I’m feeling very discouraged and I’m very close to giving the whole thing up. I am pretty good at remembering kanji, pronunciations, and grammar, but it all falls apart when I need to actually put together coherent sentences. Perhaps I’m not getting enough practice, perhaps I’m just not good enough. But I really feel as if I have about hit the limit of how well I’m going to do if I keep… Read More »Throwing in the towel?
Every now and then, I take a step back and try to reassess where I am and what I’m trying to accomplish, but even more importantly, how to get where I want to be. And frankly, there’s a lot of noise, and not much of it is helpful. I’m on several sites. Each one of which claims that they all I’ll need to get fluent, which is essentially a lie with a little bit of truth. But they only teach the mechanics. Even if I were to be fluent mechanically,… Read More »The Most Important Thing
I’m sure there are many different motivations. Some people study Japanese because they love anime and manga. That is not why I study Japanese. Some people study Japanese because they want to go to Japan. That is not why I study Japanese. Some people study Japanese because they love the culture. That is not why I study Japanese. Some people study Japanese because they want to find a Japanese partner. This is not why I study Japanese. Some people study Japanese because it’s difficult. This is not why I study… Read More »Why Does One Study Japanese?
Learning Japanese has been frought with challenges – I mean it’s been really, really difficult. I think one of the reasons is the scattershot nature of the resources I’ve been using to learn. They all seem to emphasize something different, and each advertises itself as the only resource I’ll ever need. That is, of course, bull-pucky. But the word that is the title of this post is an example of why I feel this way. 大丈夫. Pronounced “daijoubu”, this word seems to be one of the most commonly used words… Read More »大丈夫
After all of the posts about Japanese culture I’ve been spewing forth, I thought I’d write one about actually learning Japanese. I finally found a tool that I actually like, and I finally feel like I’m actually learning things. Putting the effort into learning hiragana and katakana has been completely invaluable. I say this because it underpins absolutely everything else, and I think that this is probably the first thing that needs to be done – before kanji, before pronunciation, before everything. Because it makes everything past that so much… Read More »A Post About Actually Learning Japanese