So, I have like 500 sentences from Tae Kim.  And I’m getting awfully tired of it.  I need to start reading, but I can’t since I don’t want start reading till I’m done with learner resources.  It’s just that…college and life are stealing time from the Japanese project, and, once I start reading, I want to focus fully on that.  I don’t really have time to split learning resources from reading right now.

To alleviate the boredom from Tae Kim, I’m only putting in one or two sentences max (if any) for each grammar point—and even then it’s only if there are kanji that I want to know.  I’m hoping to finish that soon.  Then, since I do actually own the Japanese in Mangaland books, I’ll grudgingly skim those too and see if I can grab some interesting sentences with some good Kanji.  In the end, the goal seems to be to fill in any grammatical gaps (within reason) with learner resource sentences before I head over to real Japanese.

That being said, the semester is pretty darn near over.  My goal for this summer is to learn to read manga.  However, that means learning resources are soon going to come to an end.  Like, right now, they’re on life-support and on death row at the same time.  I am seriously ready to pull the plug and slit their throats.  They have until the end of May to be over.

That means that I’ll have June, July, and August to learn to read manga.  Is that unreasonable?  The only other main project I’ll have going is working 30-ish hours per week (and I may have another English blogging project that I’ll be trying and investing 1 hour per day in…), so I’ll try and go for 3 hours of reading per day.  Mind you, that is a huge guesstimate.  Some days, like Sundays, I definitely won’t be reading 3 hours with Church in the morning and work till 8 at night.  If I’m successful, I’ll start reading light novels and drama scripts in September (maybe I’ll start monodictionaries here also?).  If I totally own that, then maybe I’ll be able to start watching the news and reading news articles next spring semester.  As always, however, no battle plan actually survives contact with the enemy (?).

This also means that I’ll need some stuff to read.  I’ll be reading quite of bit of manga on the internet, and I’m also thinking of getting a manga magazine subscription.  Which one?  I’m not sure.  If you have any recommendations, I’d gladly take them.  I’m just not into insane violence, gore, nudity, or anything really racy.  In fact, I recently came across this site for all kinds of stuff reading-related.

Hmm.  This also means I’ll be doing real sentences.  I think I said in an earlier post that I was gonna get a Nintendo DS dictionary.  Let’s scratch that idea.  The Japanese project is a huge project, and I’m serious about it, so I’m just gonna go all the way and get a Canon Wordtank.  What do you think about the V90?

Also, in the pursuit of efficiency, I’m going to find a way to “whitelist” my internet usage.  By that, I mean that I’m going to find out a way to block the entire internet except for a few websites that are productive/essential (i.e. manga websites, etc.).  Maybe this’ll free up more time for drama, anime, and other things that encourage conscious listening.

While we’re on the topic of computer/internet usage, I’ve found a way to switch the operating system language on my windows vista even though I don’t have the ultimate version, so have at ‘er.  And it’s totally free.  And it works.  And I tried it.  So do it (unless you’re going to wait a few months like I am J).

Hmmm…one last thing.  The general topic of this post seems to be reading.  I’ve been reading some stuff by that Alyks chap, and I’m definitely taking his approach to reading.  That being said, I think I read somewhere in one of his posts something where he talks about using monodictionaries.  In it, he says that at some point we should stop using dictionaries.  He also quotes some random polyglot who says that we should come to a point where know like 4 out of 5 words, so we drop the dictionary, bite the bullet, and read without looking up words for several months to watch our vocabulary snowball.

Right?  So to me, this means that when I’m going through this phase, I’m not gathering sentences.  That means several months without any new sentences.  Hmmm.  Okay.  Well, that may be a great thing.  I’ve recently been struggling with boring English-keywork—kanji reviews (don’t we all?), and I’ve been reading some stuff about Japanese keywords. While I don’t think I’ll be going through RTK1 again for Japanese keywords anytime soon, maybe that not-so-soon time could be while I’m reading and not gathering sentences?

I could totally do that next summer.  I hope to have done a ton of reading by then, and maybe I’ll be able to undertake this project.  My kanji reviews will have dwindled.  It’ll be pure ownage.

  I’m learnin’ real Japanese BE-LARCH!!!!  Yee-ah.  I have exactly 250 sentences in Anki.  That’s like, what, 1/40th of the way to fluency/10,000?  I’m exciiiiiiittted.   It took me roughly 2 weeks-ish to get that far, so that means I should be finished in…80 weeks?  Whatever.  If I keep it up I should be “finished” by the end of next year.  My pace is about 20 new sentences per day for each weekday, and I take a break on the weekend.  So, I do about 100 sentences a week.  That’s not bad.  The math really doesn’t add up somewhere in there, huh?  My inability to adhere to a schedule and randomness is probably to blame for that.  I guess that’s why I’m an English major and not a math major  But I think I’m gonna need a fair amount of luck there, too…

I’m going through Tae Kim’s grammar guide, and then I’m going through the Japanese in Mangaland books.  I don’t wanna stay on learner stuff for very long, but, since I already have them, I’m going to mine them anyways.  I promised myself that I was going to start reading right away, but that’s just gonna have to wait, now, in’nit!  I tried reading some manga, but that was really difficult (duh, I don’t do it that often, that’s why it’s difficult…).  Ironically, I found Death Note easier to understand than other random high school-drama-type manga.  Although, Khatzumoto’s Dick and Jane comics were Hilarious.  But, I still think I’m going to focus on finishing Tae Kim and Mangaland for now before I really jump into manga.  And as far as RTK3 is concerned, that ain’t happenin’ any times soon.  I’ve already learned quite a few RTK3 and BEYOND Kanji while doing sentences.  Weird, eh?…

Also, I’m planning on getting a new Nintendo DS and the DS dictionary for when I start reading and mining from authentic sources.  There’s also this really cool game on training you to write Kanji with good penmanship. Cuz mah Kanjis ahe UUUUUGLY.  Yeah.  I’m pretty excited.  

Umm, okay, I think that’s it.  Oh yeah, I forgot.  I just discovered this Cellist.  A friend introduced me to her music, and she’s CRAZY/AWESOME!  Just watch the videos.  You’ll thank me later Kanon Wakeshima:

Though I must say, I don’t listen to as much music anymore.  I found that listening to any sort of normal dialogue is almost always better.  I usually listen to ripped sound from dramas or anime or whatever.  In fact, I als0 found that when reviewing Kanji (ugh) and sentences it’s better to have the video of whatever you’re playing in a window in the upper right hand corner of the screen while working.  It’s nice because it distracts me once in a while and actually makes me feel like I’m listening to it, unlike when I have itunes on in the background for hours but don’t feel like I’ve listened to anything.

First off, I found Densha Otoko–the entire series, including the specials and movie–brand new and unopened for 40 dollars on Ebay. 

!!!!!!!!!

That’s insane!!!!!  That show usually costs like 23 times that much brand new!!!  Dude.  It was the deal of the century, and I had to get it.  Like, I’m having doubts that it’s actually professionally pirated or something, but, if that’s the case, then it’s really SUPER PROFESSIONAL.  Like, you have no idea.  The discs and case look original.  And they come with JAPANESE SUBS.  

Greatest TV Show of ALL TIME.

AP

I.  PEED.  MY.  PANTS.

Several times.  I’m so excited.  The only thing that might point to them being professionally pirated is the fact that they are also completely region-free.  Which isn’t a bad thing.  So whatever.  I’m happy.  

I feel kind of terrible though because I’ve already watched the series 1 and 1/2 times-ish since I got it, and I didn’t even tell you.

 Sorry.

As it turns out, the Densha Otoko movie SUCKS.  Yeah.  It sucks major BOOKS.  Like totally.  You have no idea.  I realize I had a bias from watching the drama going into it, but it just sucked so bad.  The girl is kind of pretty, but she’s old.  And the guy sucks compared to the Densha Otoko in the drama.  The whole thing just did NOT get me as emotional as the drama–I couldn’t feel it.  And they left out SOOOOO MUCH that was in the drama.  Like, I don’t think there was a single character in the Drama that I didn’t LOVE.  And like half the characters and subplots were cut out for the movie.  Yeah.  It sucked.  End of rant.

When I was in the living room the other night watching the series special, though, something interesting happened.  My mom got up from her nap and came and sat down while I was watching it.  She actually sat through the whole thing with me.  Since there were no english subs, I had to make feeble attempts at translating.  It was pathetic, but fun.  

Um, can you feel the randomness?  I’m watching Bleach as I’m writing this so that’s why I’m all over the place.  What’s next?…

Ah.  I also found out that I really like the director of the person who does Densha Otoko.  I’m kinda watching Nodame Cantabile on the side, which he also directed,  and it turns out that I like that drama for the same reasons that I like Densha Otoko.  Weird.  Maybe that’s why I like the Densha Otoko drama but not the movie.

Speaking of Nodame Cantabile, I just bought that entire series and Tiger and Dragon from the same place on Ebay.  They’re in the mail right now  I can’t wait to watch them.  I got Nodame Cantabile because, well, I like that show.  I got Tiger and Dragon because I’ve made feeble attempts at watching the first episode in the past but always failed.  When I found out that Itoh Misaki (of Densha Otoko fame )  is in that drama, I decided to go with Khatzumoto and everyone else’s gut instincts and buy it.  I hope it’s good.

That’s about it for now.  Stay tuned for the next episode of randomness.

BTW, here’s a picture of my library of authentic Japanese language materials so far (apart from some random manga laying somewhere else):

The current state of my library.

Kanji Beasthood

MWAHAHAHHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHHAAAAAA!!!

BWAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAAHA!!!!

I AM A KANJI BEAST!!!!!!! YEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEESSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSAAAAAAAAAAA!!!!

sdafjwlkerjalsdkfzj.x,mcvn.KLH!   asndfa sdfjkwes<?<CNv!ek~!leij2309QWi’u'/DJIFKLJSZCKLJCVKJXCNMS.’A[]E2]4W’[ER2[3'RWEFDS'FWA]’309

2QWUEIOAFDSJKLAW;LDSKJFZCVXHFTWLIhklfjshliewurdfs!!!

That was what happened Saturday night when I finished Remembering the Kanji by James Heisig.  Yeah.  I know.  It’s exciting.  In fact, I almost peed my pants.  Booyah.  Fo Rizzle.  2042 kanji = I am a Kanji Beast.  Flip yes.  RAAAAARRRRRRRGGGHHHHHH!!!!  ~~WSHICCICJCCICICICICCI!~~  <–that’s the sound of a snarl.  RAR.

Alas! It was an unnecessarily long 5.5 month struggle.  If I would have only been a patient little Gelfling and done a reasonable/small fixed amount of Kanji everyday instead of random, monster-sized chunks of Kanji every few days/weeks, I would have been done A LOT sooner.  Whatever.  Lesson learned.  I’m going to apply that to sentences and only do a certain amount each day.

Anyways, sorry for the late update.  I couldn’t wait any longer so I postponed RTK3 and started sentences yesterday .  I’M LEARNIN’ REAL JAPANEEEEEEEEEEEEEESE!  I’m pretty excited.  For starters I’m getting my sentences from Tae Kim’s grammar guide, the Japanese in Mangaland books, and Khatzumoto’s Dick and Jane comics (<—these are hilarious).  I already encountered an RTK3 kanji on the first day of sentences, and today I encountered a Kanji that isn’t in it either of the Heisig books.  Sounds like I’m already well on my way to Kanji Dragonhood!  And if I learn more Kanji outside RTK3?  Maybe I’ll skip the dragon stage and go straight to Kanji Titan!

And, finally, you’ll be happy to know that I’ve discovered a new Japanese musical group/band: Halcali  Four of their songs have pretty much been the soundtrack of my life for the past week or two, so I figured I curse you with them, too.  The first one is the first song that I heard by them, and it was my favorite for a while.  However, the second one actually gets better each time I listen to it (seriously), so I’m thinking it’s giving the first one a run for its money.  Whatev.  Enjoy:

http://www.michaeljohngrist.com/2009/02/ikebukuro-jingle-key-chain/

PS.  I feel like a tard, but do you any of you know how to type the little dot to separate certain words (in katakana, etc.) when you’re typing Japanese?  I can’t figure it out for the life of me…

I can’t believe I’m not done yet!  I’m so impatient–I just want to start learning real Japanese already!

…just had to get that out of my system Thoughts like that have been plaguing me 4EVER.  But, thanks to some cool kids over at Twitter, I’m feeling all better now.  I just pretty much stopped learning new Kanji for a while (a week/a bit more-ish) because I was frustrated and overworked with school.  I’ve started learning again now though since the folks over at Twitter had some AMAZING encouragement waiting for me.  So, enough of the sappy stuff.  The end is in sight.  I am approaching the next stage of Kanjibeast!  Soon, those puny little Kanjis will all bow before the mighty Kanjiwulf!

Anyways, I also think I forgot to mention something in my last post where I talked about the podcasts.  If you’re into this sort of thing, I found a few Christian podcasts on iTunes Japan.  My favorite one is one that has the words Bible in rainbow colors over a white backdrop for the picture.  I don’t really know the name.  I think it’s 礼拝の聖書メッセージ(説教)〜音声ポッドキャスト 毎週更新–if that helps.  I can’t really read it.  I can Heisig quite a bit of it, but that’s about it.  But it’s easy to find.  Just look for the bright colors.  Even if you’re not into the Bible or whatever, still listen to the opening part of the podcast.  It’s so cute!  They have this cute music and voice that comes on to introduce it.  Yeah, it’s pretty awesome.

That brings up another thing.  For the past few weeks/month I kind of left the world of drama and (mostly) anime for news, news podcasts, and other podcasts (like the JUNK one).  I really can’t understand anything.  I can pick up a few words, word endings, and sounds, but it’s mostly strange to me.  I think I’ve hit a wall that I won’t be able to pass until I graduate Heisig and start sentences because I just don’t have enough vocabulary.  And the vocabulary that’s used in the news and random podcasts isn’t as reccurring (if that makes sense) as the vocabulary in anime.  

So, here I am, happily marching down the hallway, completely oblivious to everything around me (in many ways).  Suddenly, I decide that I’m tired of listening to podcasts so I put the music on random shuffle.  You know what comes on?  The ripped track of the second episode of Bleach the anime.

Holy.  Moley.  I could understand like 60%.  WTHeck?  I quickly put on RahXephon, another anime that I hadn’t listened to in a long time.  Same thing.  My understanding seems to have skyrocketed.  Or maybe I just notice my understanding more?  I think it may have to do with that whole idea of taking a break in another language that Khatz talked about.  For me, news podcasts were like another language.  When I returned, wow.  That was incredible.  

Granted, that still implies ignorance of the other 40%.  And believe me, when I say ignorance, I mean complete ignorance.  Cluelessness.  But it’s still a great feeling to finally see how much I understand.  

I think I’m forgetting something…oh yeah!  Kanji!

1761

Fillin’ in nicely, ne?

Like, I know for a fact that they don’t speak English.  They can’t even say simply numbers correctly (no offense, Chinese people, you’re still awesome ).  It’s just that, the other day, I started having suspicions.  Like, what if they think I’m a creeper.  Or what if they think I’m stalking them or something.  I mean…am  I?

Of course I’m not.  I just like their food.  But I swear, when I walked in the other day, I heard the guy tell the woman, “It’s that guy again.”  Do any of you know any Chinese that sounds remotely like that (I don’t know if it’s Mandarin or some other version)?  I’m pretty sure it’s not English.  But you never know…

Whatev.  Time to put my paranoia to rest.

***

Wicked.  Wicked.  Wicked.  I saw Wicked.  It was on tour in English, and I saw it.  Wicked.  It was in wicked.  I mean, I already had half the songs memorized before I went, but it was Wicked.  Wicked.  Wicked.  Wicked.  The most Wickedly Wickedest musical named Wicked you’ll ever Wickedly have the Wicked pleasure of Wickedly seeing.  Wicked.

I felt kind of bad for breaking out of my immersion environment.  Though, that’s a bit a weird since I break out of it all the time anyways…but, regardless, I still had this huge guilt trip.  Then I remembered that when I was in Japan I saw a bunch of posters on the train advertising Wicked. 

It turns out they released a Japanese version of the Wicked soundtrack on iTunes Japan.  I listened to the little 30 second clips and was impressed, so I watched a few of them on YouTube.  Dude.  It was awesome.  It’s a little difficult to digest at first if you’re used to the Engrish version (like me), but some of the songs are pretty good.

***

I’ve also been poking around other parts of iTunes Japan.  It turns out that the podcasts section is really a thousand times more awesome than I originally thought.  Check out the video podcast section.  There’s this one called ワールド•リポート.  Flipping awesome.  5 minutes-ish, slightly educational, fun, and just plain awesome.  And the two host(esses?) are awesome.  After the end of one episode that was about some food/treat shop thingy, they commented on it.  I have never heard so many ね’s in my whole life.  Seriously.  This ne?  That ne?  おいしいね！ Wow, ne.  Ne, like, that was so cute, ne?!  Let’s count how many times we can say ne is a sentence, ne?  Ne, I could totally like beat you, ne.  Ne, like, I win ne, you silly ne!…

Wow.  Sorry.   But there are all kinds of different podcasts.  For me, I really wanted to watch the news for half an hour in the mornings, but, because my internet sucks, I was forced to find podcasts.

Anyways, that brings me to my next point.  Have you heard of that Steve Pavlina guy that Khatz always talks about?  Well, I read a few of his articles on waking up early.  I never thought I could do it, but I’ve been waking up at 6am ever since.  I have anki reps done w/o fail by 7:30 am.  The discipline and other benefits gained from waking up early everyday are just awesome.  I love them.  I can get all kinds of things done.  You should do it, too.  I had always generally ignored advice on getting up early to do stuff on a regular basis because “I’ve tried that and me and mornings just don’t mix.”  Ignore that feeling and just do it.  It’s pure exhilaration.

***

I’ve read that a few other people use Anki for school stuff, so I started doing that for two classes at the beginning of this semester.  It worked for a while, and I was really getting a kick out of whipping out random dates in history class to impress my classmates (that’s a big motivational boost).  But…it didn’t work out.  I’ve quit doing it.  They’re in separate decks than my kanji, and I don’t have enough motivation to keep up with it.  Every day, I’m like “hmm, looks like I have a bit of history and weather/climate to do…PSYCHE!  Let’s do Kanji!”  So I quit.  Plus, I had a lot of trouble trying to format information into questions, etc.  Whatev.  I’ll just study stuff the “normal” way and review my notes every week or something.  It was an interesting trial run.

I’ll give you an update on “the kanjiposter” later.  I’m in History class right now, so I don’t really have access to my camera or poster

The first is an awesome song by Namie Amuro.  I’m pretty sure I have a huge 3rd grade crush on her.  Officially, I can’t officially recommend any of her other videos since sometimes she’s a bit….indecent?  Maybe that’s too strong of a word.  She’s still awesome.

I got the idea from Khatz to look up that one song from Mulan (“I’ll make a man out of you…”) in Japanese.  I watched the Cantonese one too (by Jackie Chan?!).  They’re good.  My favorite part is near the end.where he goes “むりだ。つよくなれぬーーー！”  (I’m sorry for the romaji…)

There are other cool disney songs in Japanese, too.  You should check ‘em out.  BTW, I couldn’t find the opening sequence to Disney’s Robin Hood in Japanese.  Major brownie points to anyone who can find it.

And now for the best Japanese artist on the face of the planet.  YUI.  This song was already awesome, but this video made even awesomer (<—–I retain the copyrights to the word I just invented).  And yes.  I can wholeheartedly recommend any video by YUI.  She is awesomeness incarnate.  

Prepare for the drum roll:

*!*!*!*!*!*!*!*!*!*!*!*!*!*!*!*!*!*!(this is the drum roll)!*!*!*!*!*!*!*!*!*!*!*!*!*!*!*!*!*!*!*!*!*!*!*!*!*!*!*!*!*!*!*!*…

…DA-DA-DUM! (<——grand finale)

The Matrix

It finally came.  This movie has been on back order for me since around Christmas/New Year’s-ish, and it finally came.  Oh.  My.  Gosh.  I love this movie so much.  Like, Morpheus and Neo are cool and all, but they could totally make a movie just about Mr. Smith.  He’s awesome.  

The sad thing is, this movie came in the mail over a week ago, and I’ve been too lazy to blog about it or anything else (sorry >_<).

Anyways, I’ve already watched it somewhere around 3-4 times-ish, and I’ve ripped the audio and listen to it on my mp3 player iPod.  Yeah, I’m pretty psyched.  The only problem is that, surprise, surprise, the subs aren’t exact (sad face), so it’ll be sort of useless once I start sentences.  Whatev.

Wake up neo…the matrix has you…

I can’t wait until I can say that and quote the rest of the movie in Japanese　：）