[AJA] Akemi’s Japanese Adventure

Hello, everyone! This is the first installment in a series of posts that I am going to be calling “Akemi’s Japanese Adventure”, or AJA for short. In this series I will be logging my progress in Japanese through my persona, Akemi, with drawings, stats, and other things.  (´ω｀★)

In this first post, I’m just going to introduce Akemi with her stats and other info, and follow up hopefully with weekly progress reports as she makes her way from my desk to Japan!

Let’s meet…Akemi!

「はじめまして。あけみです。よろしくお願いします♡」
(Just a sketch for now.)

Current Rank: Lv. 16
･*☆Strength – 9 / The easiest foes to defeat are daily reviews (Anki and WaniKani), vocabulary, and grammar.
･*☆Magic (Real-time Recall) – 7
･*☆Skill – 7 / I have a good memory and a wonderful imagination to assist memorization, and I like to be organized, efficient, and productive.
･*☆Defense - 8 / Defense against discouragement and stronger foes, like application, critical thinking, and writing.
･*☆Stamina - 10 / Currently, I can intensively learn Japanese for ~1-2 hours at a time, or in 30 minute bursts.
･*☆Immersion – 18

･*☆Special Ability – I am an artist. I love to draw, write, and learn!

-Weekly Stats-

Crabigator Kanji Apprentice Lv. 17/50
Speaking – ✿✿✧✧✧
Reading – ✿✿✿✧✧
Listening – ✿✿✿✧✧
Writing - ✿✿✿✧✧ / Handwriting – ✿✧✧✧✧
Immersion – ✿✿✧✧✧✧

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Explanation

Now for the method to all of this! I’ll explain what I’m thinking so hopefully anyone reading can understand what the heck I’m talking about, and if you want to do a similar thing, go for it! (´ω｀★)

Strength/Attack: – [Strength]
The aspect of Japanese that you are best at, the “enemy” that you do more damage to when you are faced with it.

Magic: – [Real-time Recall]
In terms of Japanese, this stat could be used for “thinking in Japanese” or having to do with pulling Japanese out of your head to use in a conversation or writing or whatever (your recall ability). A higher level of this stat means that when you are in a live conversation, speaking Japanese, you can recall terms and phrases very quickly and don’t spend a lot of time having to think about what you’re going to say, whereas a beginner with a low “magic” stat would likely try to spend more time putting together sentences in his head before he speaks.

Skill
This stat refers to the things you do well that can help give you the edge in learning Japanese. For example, perhaps you have a supreme memory, great handwriting, or an excellent grasp of Japanese pronunciation. Or perhaps you have successfully learned another language and thus have an advantage because you are already familiar with how to learn a new language.

Defense
This is your ability to withstand hits/blows/attacks. In this case, your enemy can be elements of learning Japanese that aren’t your forte, other people, or even yourself if you’re too hard on yourself. This stat reflects the things you do on your own to reflect discouragement away from you, as well as when you bring in other people to help you (encouragement).

Stamina
This stat reflects how long you can last in intensive learning and during study sessions. Have fun in the process and it won’t feel like a chore!

Immersion
This stat goes up or down depending on how much Japanese surrounds you at any given time. If you live in Japan, this stat will be much higher than someone who is outside of Japan and does not have a lot of Japanese around her. But! If the person who doesn’t live in Japan (person A) surrounds herself with Japanese books, DVDs, audio, etc. and the person who lives in Japan (person B) spends most of her time interacting with other foreigners, most likely the one who will learn Japanese is person A, because she has made more effort! This is especially where your stamina, skill, and defense stats come into play.

Special ability (different from Skill)
This doesn’t have to have anything to do with learning Japanese; it’s just something that you’re good at and/or really enjoy doing.

How to calculate stat gain

1. Stat gain occurs upon level up. You level up when you have accomplished 90% or more of your mission for that level.
2. Each level has up to four mission goals (that is, objectives). The mission is considered a success when at least 90% of it has been reached.
3. The number of points you get per stat varies, depending on mission success, overall performance, and the individual’s strengths and weaknesses, of course. Akemi’s stat gain table is below:

(All max stats are 100 points. Minimum stats are 0 points.)
Strength – did well on mission (+2); did somewhat well (+1); slacked too much on weak points (+0)
Magic (Real-time Recall) -  did well on mission (+3); did somewhat well (+1); slacked too much on weak points (+0)
Skill – relative to progress
Defense – did well on mission (+2); did somewhat well (+0); slacked too much on weak points (+0)
Stamina – did well on mission (+3); did somewhat well (+1); slacked too much on weak points (+0)
Immersion – relative to surroundings, but try to keep this stat fairly high!

Special Ability – no stat information

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Additional info

Partially inspired by JALUP (Japanese Level-Up). The Level Guide is here. Also check out the walkthrough.

Daily Routine (for now)

Inspired by other language learning diaries/journals!

At first, I froze up a bit because something in the back of my mind screamed, “This stuff will take up too much of your day! You’ll have no time for anything else!” So I calmly told myself that the majority of the things on the list I already do as a part of my daily routine, and that since I read so fast, going through a section of x, y, and z won’t take me very long at all–and I don’t even necessarily have to take notes unless I really feel compelled to. I still feel apprehensive, but hopefully success will squash the fear!

These things aren’t done in any order; just whenever I feel like doing them (except for WaniKani; I review that multiple times a day):

1. WaniKani reviews (already doing daily)
2. Anki reviews (already doing daily)
3. one section of Nihongo Resources grammar
4. one section of Tae Kim’s grammar + exercises
5. one podcast while doing AIS assignment (already doing almost daily)
6. a few minutes of Shadowing: Let’s Speak Japanese! Beginner-Intermediate, first repeating after the girl, then the guy; alternate between listening and following along with the book (currently done a few days a week)
7. spend at least 30 minutes reading Japanese (already doing daily, though not in a concentrated effort)

I’ll add TextFugu back in once Koichi pushes out the next big update… Though I think for the moment I’ll skip ahead to Season 8 and go over the time and date stuff since I’ve already made Anki decks for those things and I’ve been reviewing them (also because I really do want to get back to TextFugu lol). I don’t know. Still trying not to freak myself out with the volume of stuff that really isn’t all that much… It’s a matter of dealing with and in Japanese all day, but not feeling as though it’s “taking time away” from other things.

Two more things to include would be the translations I’m doing (again, already doing almost daily! Lol)  as well as writing entries on Lang-8, both of which happen as I feel like it, though the translations happen far more often since I have to put out at least three a week. It’s very good reading practice though! I’ve noticed on several occasions that I understood what I read without even converting it to English in my head first. That’s pretty exciting.  (*≧▽≦)

Maybe Youtube videos with a lot of talking or audio dramas would be good to listen to while drawing. I do need to get more listening practice in, anyway… Anime isn’t really ideal for that because I end up watching the anime instead of drawing. (/ω＼)

Figuring it out

Another update of how my Japanese learning adventure is going! (｀・ω・´)”

I realized yesterday that I’d caught up to my reviews in Anki (or, more specifically, the giant TextFugu decks I’d downloaded) because I had set the number of new cards to be added every day to zero. So…I set it to 10 to see where it goes. So far, it’s giving me 1-3 items and several of their related cards all together. XD For example, it asks me what the reading + meaning is, then (for verbs) if it’s intransitive or transitive, then an English > Japanese recognition question, and then maybe a new item. So maybe I need to increase the level again. ^^;

I also increased the number of new cards on my sentence deck. Since I’m caught up now, it should be easier to handle the new stuff, also because of reviewing with WaniKani. ^o^ My sentence deck is the 8547 Sentence Deck that is available as a shared download on Anki. I haven’t checked to see if it’s still available or not… But yeah. I think Koichi recommended it in his 30 Days ebook. It’s definitely been helpful so far, and I realized that I really do need to make my own personalized sentence deck too. ^^; I guess my only concern is slight mistranslation by me. Maybe I can use corrected sentences from Lang-8 or something! o.o

I’ve slacked off on my grammar learning again too… ^^; (Using this emoji a lot in this post lol) I need to be more aggressive with that! I had some general goals with it and technically I’m still on par, but I need to get back into it now or come December I’ll headdesk.

Good thing is I am doing more reading! I’m also rounding up things to read for the Tadoku contest in June, so that’s pretty exciting~

Hm~ I want to write a post about my methods for putting everything together, but the truth is I’m still sort of figuring that out myself. I’ve figured out a lot of what works for me, but not completely, which is obvious as I mentioned above that I slacked off on grammar learning and such. Of course, a method does need to be able to adapt and evolve as better ways to do things are discovered, so I’ll just keep doing my best.

At the moment, a lot of my Anki decks are premade, but I do have some that I made myself. One is a general deck made up of various words and phrases with definitions mostly in English but some in Japanese; one deck covers date and time; and one is titled “番号と数える事”, which contains numbers and counters.

I’m finding that now, more than before, the Japanese definitions are more useful in solidifying my understanding of certain vocab, which is both exciting and amusing, because I’m partially like “Yay! I can actually read that definition!” and partially like “Why didn’t I look at that/realize that before?”

I feel like I’m just rambling, and I’m hungry and need to brush my hair…and we need to go to the store, so I guess I’ll stop writing for now lol;; Thanks for reading this weird post.  (´ω｀★)

Why I Am Interested in Japanese Culture and Language (Essay)

This is the essay I wrote to enter into the JREF 2012 essay contest, the prize of which was one month of studies at GenkiJACS. It had to be between 600 and 1200 words, in English, on the topic listed in the title of this post. I didn’t win, but writing the essay really helped me to realize my real reasons for wanting to go in the first place…along with giving me plenty of ideas for more blog posts.

I thought I would share this essay because a) I spent a lot of time on it; and b) it sums up in five paragraphs how my interest started, which is something not currently found on my profile. It gives a bit of my history, so I thought it would be interesting to share.

Without further ado, my essay:

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Why I Am Interested in Japanese Culture and Language

“Why are you interested in Japanese culture?” If you had asked me this question in an impromptu interview, I would have

What’s Holding Back and What’s Pushing Forward

Over and over again I keep revisiting this post by Joshua Greenwood of Sake and Geishas about the power of decisions. It really spoke to me, because I have been afraid to choose one path; afraid that by going through one door all the others would close; afraid that I had to either seize ALL the opportunities…or none of them. But now I understand that that’s not how it works. As Joshua says in his post,

“But possibilities aren’t solutions. Decisions are.”

When doors are opened, it is up to me to walk through them. It’s amazing to me how closed-minded I have been about this until now. I’ve felt that if I focused too much on one thing, I would never again me able to do the other things. (For example, Japanese vs. art, rather than Japanese + art working together harmoniously.) But living everything at once is extremely tiring and takes the joy out of a lot of it, I think. It’s hard to imagine not looking forward to drawing, but when boxed in so tightly by things like deadlines I’ve set myself to complete something that actually takes longer to complete, it becomes very difficult–even painful–and that’s what accounted for a lot of the procrastination that occurred within those time frames.

While this is sort of a continuation of another post, it stands on its own as another post where I’m realizing things and reflecting on things…

There are always many facets to everything, and with going to study at a Japanese language school in Japan, it is no different. Along those lines, I think there have been things both holding me back as well as things pushing me forward.

My First Attempt at Tadoku (^^)ゞ

Here’s the deal.

When I signed up, I thought for some reason that the half round was actually the period for signing up for the month-long round. I was sorely mistaken, for immediately I saw how others were already reading and reading and suddenly my “modest” 75-page goal became invalid in my eyes. Why this happened I’m not sure, because I now know that had I been 100% committed to my modest goal, I would have easily passed it! *rolls eyes*

I can read a 75-page English book in one hour; yet I only amassed around 19 pages of Japanese, according to Tadoku, in fifteen days. I didn’t do so well, huh? But it was good practice I guess. :3

Instead of reading 75 pages, I reached 77th place with 19.71 pages read.

The next round will be a full-month round! Having learned my lesson with this half-round, I think I now have a better idea of what to do and I’ll try harder with a much larger goal! The schedule has been changed, so instead of May, this next round will be in June. I look forward to it!

なんか面白い事を書きたい。

こんばんわ〜

 

今日はね、
やりたい事が決められなっかたので、
何だかんだをやってしまいました。(/・・)ノ

 

そして、
外はとっっってもキレイのに、
また寒いです。
先日は暖かいのに（笑）

 

面白い事を書きたいけど、
面白い事がありません (⌒_⌒;)
これだけでいいですか？
とにかく、外はきれいだから、私は嬉しいです。 ヽ(*≧ω≦)ﾉ
晴れた日ですっ♡

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（私の文を改めてくださいね。失敗があったら教えてください♡）

Keep Learning

Today I posted some translations I had in drafts. There are still plenty more to do, but I’m glad to get those out of the way. (*´・ｖ・) Doing this definitely encourages me to keep learning, because every time I come across some line of text that challenges me, it makes me think, “Ahh, I have to get better at Japanese!!”

It will be nice when I can say these sorts of things in Japanese, you know.

その感じです。

Also, I’m fighting the inferiority complex I’ve had for a long time. (´∀｀) First conversations aren’t always easy;;; But I have a lot of support and with God’s guidance and grace I will do my best!

それでは、おやすみなさい♡

Lang-8, 多読, and Grammar!

I’m going to ramble a bit with this, so each topic will go into a bullet point!

• The difficulty I have with Lang-8 at present is not so much posting as it is responding to the helpful corrections and comments…when they are written in Japanese. For some reason, my brain flags it as something to be dealt with later, and I close the window and procrastinate replying and utilizing the corrections. ><
• I came across the 多読 (Read or Die) website again, and after seeing the results of Round 1, I am inspired to join Round 2! Round 2 runs from May 1-31. You set a reading goal in your target language, and submit your progress to the 多読 bot on Twitter, which keeps track for you. It looks fun, definitely.
• When I started using WaniKani, I said “I know basic grammar; all I need now is the vocab to fill my sentences with.” Now that I’m at Level 13 on WK, and reading more “real world” Japanese daily, I’m now saying the opposite! I’ve been looking for a good place to learn Japanese grammar, and have come up basically with Tae Kim and TextFugu. TextFugu I’ve not been using since I was going through it too quickly thinking I already knew the info (and didn’t bother reinforcing my knowledge with practice), and also because Koichi is going to revise it soon. Tae Kim’s guide is good, but not all-inclusive, and I’m wondering if I should go through it from beginning to end as I would a textbook, or look up only the grammar point I have in mind.

…In other news, I am thirsty and thus require water. o_o

Update on Japanese Studies!

One of the things I want to write about more this year is how my Japanese learning is going and what I’m doing. I enjoy following others’ progress and I realized blogging about my own progress would be a very good way to actually keep track of it. (I knew that before, but it didn’t sink in until just recently. Lol!) So today I’m going to start by talking about what I’ve been doing most recently in regards to this.

I review WaniKani daily, and am currently at Level 11. I anticipate leveling up sometime next week. At the WK community forums, a member started a thread called “Community Translation Project”, which lists a translation challenge daily for beginner, intermediate, and advanced learners of Japanese. Beginners must translate a sentence or two, intermediate folks a paragraph, and the advanced people an entire page or selection of text. Generally they are all pulled from the same article. Participants are allowed to use dictionaries, but not translation services. The challenge ends 48 hours after the post, and participants are ranked according to how well they translated the piece they decided to translate. The goal is not to win (there isn’t a prize or anything like that), but to improve. You get feedback from a fellow WK user who is intermediate/upper-intermediate (the thread starter, who also participates and asks others to point out his own mistakes) and you get to see other people’s translations and how they might perceive differently the same section of text.

So…yesterday I tried my hand at translating in the beginner challenge. We’ll see how I did tomorrow, I think? Anyway, I think this is really good practice! It’s text set before you, so you don’t have to retrieve it yourself, and it’s broken up into manageable chunks for beginners and intermediate learners so that it isn’t an intimidating wall of text. In addition, since it’s a daily challenge, you can participate daily! I think this removes a lot of the excuses one would whip out to try to justify not trying.

It inspired me to look more closely at the Japanese text I encounter on a daily basis. It made me realize that I could do this on my own with sections of text I find. I don’t know if I could post it on Lang-8, but maybe I could? I also thought if I do it more often, the goal not necessarily being translation but to soon be able to read Japanese without having to translate it to English at all, then I could indeed pick up more quickly the nuances and grammar that I feel I am lacking at the moment, among other things.

Hm… As of late, that’s really all I’ve been doing in the Japanese-learning area, aside from reading Japanese Tweets and comments on Youtube and Hello!Project info and stuff like that~ I have plans for other things! We’ll see how I do. ^o^