Weeaboo post!

[spritechan]

For some reason, I got a jumpstart into practicing Japanese again. I think it had to do with the fact that after we got Black/White, Steve and I got into a discussion of the required mechanics to play the games.

On the back of the games, there's a rather long explanation of the requirements in order to be able to play Pokemon, and the rules about transferring Pokemon between games, and other generational topics relevant. This then led to a discussion of how old one must be in order to play Pokemon. It says "Basic Reading Ability." Was that true? I mean, I started the Pokemon games at like age 10 or something, which would then make Bethany 6, and she also started the games then. Adam started younger I'm sure. I don't know if a kindergartener/1st grader qualifies as being able to read whole conversations, or at least, understand them. With the original games especially, I think that you can get through without having to ACTUALLY be told where to go, though it obviously helps.

Children are incredibly determined, and haven't developed that impatience and adult sense of instant gratification. I remember playing Yellow without Flash, every time. Fuck flash! I can get through the cave ON MY OWN! XD When we were waiting in line to pick up our pre-ordered copies, a teenage boy between 13 and 15 struck up a conversation with me about Pokemon. Steve and I had brought our DSes so we could get Celebi via wireless. This boy had brought his DS too. Now, a normal teenage boy, with a fair amount of acne and a slightly deep voice would usually have a hard time striking up a conversation with a strange female, especially one who's standing next to a much more approachable-looking boy. After showing me his game time (211 hours), Pokemon caught (246), his current levels (At least 3 were level 100), and telling me a step-by-step approach to his battle system and how he likes to complete as much as possible when he plays games, I determined he HAD to be autistic. Which of course made him welcome kin instead of weird kid (I am sooo socially awkward and I hate small talk), and I enjoyed his lack of social cues until we left. The funny part was that I didn't say ANYTHING or make faces or any sort of hints to Steve - normally when strange people talk to me I'll give him "looks", whether exasperated or uncomfortable or awwwwkwarrrrd - and he went, "That kid? SOOOOO autistic!" XD He reminded me A LOT of one of my former students.

Aaaanyway, after our discussion of the level of reading skill required from Pokemon, Steve was like, "Why didn't we just import your version? That would have been so cool and you'd have been able to read SOME of it!" Which is true! Not a lot, though... I can't remember kanji for CRAP but I've started sentence structure and particles, as well as some vocab. I ordered a few cheap books (seriously, shipping was more than the cost of the books) off of Amazon, and I'm super excited to use them. I'll post what they are when I get them.

I'm starting to get subject-object-verb down okay, but it's hard when I don't even remember how English sentence structure goes. At least, not formally. Obviously I know how to write, but I feel like we can write however the hell we want. Some ways make less sense than others but fucking context helps you figure it out. Context in Japanese is like whaaaaaaat? Wait, in the sentence たろがりんごをたべた, if you think that the context in implied, you only have to write "ate"?! Omguhhhhh. So confusing. XD I know I'm ahead of myself here, but it's still mind-boggling.

I'm thinking about that email Athena wrote me where she included a small bit of talk in Japanese, and I pretty much died from being lost.

じゃまたね！メールはちょっとながいですけど、いいんですね。＾。＾

Okay! Far improved from last time - I could at least decipher/read the whole thing (only needing to double-check the katakana, and I have never encountered the phonetic spelling before but I remembered from last time about "mail." I still have no idea how it works), but I only was able to get the gist of "some sort of greeting! Something is something...something" and I've worked a little on isn't, but only as an actual negative, as in, "That isn't red," not "isn't it?" Now that I know what the sentence reads, and after staring at it a bit, I got a blip of inferring that last part of "isn't it", like in the Giver with seeing Red. XD Sooo, progress I guess, but I'm far from understanding sentences!

Still, I'm super determined. I ALMOST got into the lesson plan the U of MN teaches for the Japanese major, but all I was able to access is that they use the Genki books at least for the first year, and study chapters 1-6 in the first semester and work on learning 58 kanji. But I was thwarted from viewing the actual lesson plan (or which kanji they teach), even though I can still get into my U of MN account from going to school in Duluth like 4 years ago XD I considered buying the Genki books in place of the three I just bought in order to self-teach, but the books I bought got way higher ratings than Genki. I might buy them or another teaching tool book/workbook set (like Irasshai, but I can only find volume 2 on Amazon, and I can't remember what an internet search yielded) in a month or two. I like the idea of the instruction a workbook provides. But I'm happy with my purchase at the moment.

Comments

[silver-tiamat.livejournal.com]

It's a far, far away thing at the moment, but I promise you that eventually you will come to understand Japanese context. Not as well as English context, but you WILL be able to go, "Okay, from context, I gather that such-and-such must mean such-and-such, so...this unfamiliar word here is probably something to do with that other thing." In fact, eventually you'll get to the point where you can learn new sentence structures by reading unfamiliar ones. It'll happen. It'll just take a longer while.

And remember to focus on understanding, especially verbally, through things like anime (WITH the translation, don't turn off the subtitles yet! xD), or Japanese dramas. The more familiar you are with the vocab you're reading, the easier it will be to start understanding sentences and interchanging words. Plus, Japanese is a very easy language to pick up verbally, so you'll make a lot of progress pretty quickly. Just don't neglect the reading/writing (the harder part), or practicing speaking, and you'll do fine.

Also, since you're musically inclined, it's probably safe to say that you have a decent ear, so try doing things like finding a clip of Japanese (like on YouTube or whatever), and then using a voice recorder like Vocaroo record yourself saying the same thing, and play it back, and compare it to the first one. This will REALLY help improve your accent, because you'll be able to better hear where you're going wrong.

Just don't give up, and keep trying! =)

[miss-ljv.livejournal.com]

Yay! I'm excited. My biggest issue, really, is discipline. Without a classroom or guideline, my dedication has peaks and valleys, which is probably detrimental overall (as I figure it should be like learning... what? 5 new vocab or other such points per day? Or week?).

That's really funny because I learned Spanish better by listening to songs (and studying the lyrics - mostly for vocab purposes obvs.) and watching people talk, but chochajin insisted on a previous entry that listening only goes so far! D: Maybe we have different learning styles.

On Tumblr someone JUST posted a link to free streaming of dramas with subs! K-drama, J-drama, and Taiwanese! ^_^ I SHOULD start watching those. *sweat*

When you were learning katakana and hiragana, did you learn them in tandem, or one and then the other? I'm finding I'm not so keen on the katakana, but I'm pretty confident in my hiragana.

[silver-tiamat.livejournal.com]

Listening will only take you so far in ANY language. But, in Japanese, learning how to read takes on a new level because of the kanji. In fact, even though you may know the vocab already, sometimes your understanding of the meaning of the word (or why it's used the way it is) can be deepened by learning the kanji for it. In French, for instance, being able to listen and speak will also only get you so far--unlike katakana/hiragana of Japanese or Spanish in general, French is not written the way it sounds (though they are completely consistent, unlike English, so "ouais" always sounds the same, regarldess of whether it's "ouais" or part of a word like "jouais").

I only just learned katakana this past year, for the JLPT. I mean, I knew some basic ones, but when I'd studied to learn how to read before (hahah, for another placement test), I only managed to get down hiragana, and then, as I was running out of time, jumped straight into kanji. This is a mistake. Learn the katakana, even if you have to force yourself. What I ended up doing was forcing my brain to start thinking in katakana, by copying sentences in my books down...in katakana. Entirely in katakana. Eventually, they'll start to stick.

[miss-ljv.livejournal.com]

That's very true, and I really would like to learn kanji. It's just terrifying! You make me feel a bit better about the katakana, and I really like the strategy you employed for learning it - it would likely be effective for me as well!