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[Sitrus]

No experience, but I've heard good things. You can only try this stuff and see how it pans out. I think I may have already suggested this, but you could try to friend request a bunch of people on Lang-8 (totally free), write a blog post about wanting to speak to people in Japanese, and see what happens. In exchange you could also do a bit of English practice with them.

Question time. What's the difference between 学ぶ and 勉強する、 besides the obvious point that the 勉強 being used as part of a suru verb? I just learned 学ぶ as "to study" but like most people I have learned the standard phrase "日本語を勉強しています。" to say "I'm studying Japanese", but why is 学ぶ not used?

学ぶ can mean learning, study etc.

勉強する has the same meaning of study or learning, but it has also the extra meaning of diligence, to make an effort, to endeavour etc. You imply that you/someone worked hard at learning/studying, which sounds a lot more impressive right?

Check each kanji and you will learn a lot

 

[Porcile]

学ぶ can mean learning, study etc.

勉強する has the same meaning of study or learning, but it has also the extra meaning of diligence, to make an effort, to endeavour etc. You imply that you/someone worked hard at learning/studying, which sounds a lot more impressive right?

Check each kanji and you will learn a lot

Thanks. I guess I need to do more 勉強する'ing and less 学ぶ'ing!

 

[Deleted member 17706]

Thanks. I guess I need to do more 勉強する'ing and less 学ぶ'ing!

No. More like 学ぶ is the result of successful 勉強.

 

[shanshan310]

There's a secondhand bookshop near me which sells some Japanese novels. Sometimes I go in there and thumb through a couple to see if I recognize any of the kanji I've learned. I picked up one by random and it just so happened to be ヘンリー5世 by ウィリアム シェイクスピア.

How exactly do Shakespeare plays translate into Japanese (or any language besides English) anyhow?

Well, let us know!

Probably depends when it was translated.

 

[Resilient]

Porcile, how you tracking with your prep for N4 test? 4 months out, have you started picking up more grammar patterns?

For those that wanted N3 mock tests, give me another week! I can get some N4 tests to people in the next few days for those still interested.

 

[Porcile]

Porcile, how you tracking with your prep for N4 test? 4 months out, have you started picking up more grammar patterns?

For those that wanted N3 mock tests, give me another week! I can get some N4 tests to people in the next few days for those still interested.

I had a couple rough lessons where I was screwing up some basic stuff. I felt it would be more practical if I was able to speak basic things more consistently, rather than fumble through things I don't really know.

Within the last couple weeks I have doubled down on very basic speaking patterns. I have managed to squeeze in a little bit of informal verb conjugation, する verbs, and turning adjectives into their past tense forms. Hopefully, within the next couple weeks I'll be moving on to て form verbs. If I understand it correctly, as I can already kind of conjugate into the た form, I assume て form wont be too difficult to pick up. Is that right?

I had a look at the some detailed N5 and N4 grammar summaries, and while I have a fair amount of the N5 grammar down, I don't have any of the N4 grammar yet. Right now, I'm still debating about what test to take. I think registration for December opened the other day, and I believe there's still a month or so to register. I definitely think i'd be able to pass N5 by that time, but I don't know whether I'd be able to understand enough of N4 to think it was worth failing.

 

[Resilient]

I think you'll pass N5 if you study for it.

If you haven't started learning N4 grammar patterns, it might not be worth doing the test, because a lot of it you won't understand (like 90%) but it may still be worth doing just to see the format even if you fail.

But, if you take N5 you can still see the format, and gain some certification. Don't want to make you feel bad, but if you haven't gotten on to ~te forms yet it could be a bit of a stretch to do N4 and still have it be worth it.

 

[Darksol]

Within the last couple weeks I have doubled down on very basic speaking patterns. I have managed to squeeze in a little bit of informal verb conjugation, する verbs, and turning adjectives into their past tense forms. Hopefully, within the next couple weeks I'll be moving on to て form verbs. If I understand it correctly, as I can already kind of conjugate into the た form, I assume て form wont be too difficult to pick up. Is that right?

Not quite. Coverting to た form is easy enough because it converts pretty much the same regardless. て form is different. It converts differently depending on the ending of the verb in dictionary form. 話す (はな&#12377 becomes 話して (はなし&#12390, but 読む (よ&#12416 becomes 読んで (よん&#12391. There's a bit of a learning curve for a while until you're familiar with the rules of conjugation. I remember て form annoying me for a while.

 

[Porcile]

Not quite. Coverting to た form is easy enough because it converts pretty much the same regardless. て form is different. It converts differently depending on the ending of the verb in dictionary form. 話す (はな&#12377 becomes 話して (はなし&#12390, but 読む (よ&#12416 becomes 読んで (よん&#12391. There's a bit of a learning curve for a while until you're familiar with the rules of conjugation. I remember て form annoying me for a while.

Maybe I'm misunderstanding what た form is then? I understand it as the informal, past tense positive form of a verb, and it conjugates like that except it's just んだ, いだ, った, した depending on the verb ending.

 

[Zoe]

Yomu becomes yonda, so it's following the same pattern. It's class 1 vs class 2 verbs that you have to look out for.

But either way, -ta and -te are handled the same way.

 

[Darksol]

Maybe I'm misunderstanding what た form is then? I understand it as the informal, past tense positive form of a verb, and it conjugates like that except it's just んだ, いだ, った, した depending on the verb ending.

Sorry if I needlessly confused you! Yeah, it's similar (at least with class 1 verbs) . What I failed at expressing is...

Yomu becomes yonda, so it's following the same pattern. It's class 1 vs class 2 verbs that you have to look out for.

But either way, -ta and -te are handled the same way.

^ Yeah, that.

Be careful with class 2 verbs. And the few irregular verbs too obviously.

 

[Porcile]

Be careful with class 2 verbs. And the few irregular verbs too obviously.

Dumb question. What's a class 2 verb exactly? Do you mean a verb like 食べる which conjugates by dropping the る and adding the stem?

 

[RangerBAD]

Dumb question. What's a class 2 verb exactly? Do you mean a verb like 食べる which conjugates by dropping the る and adding the stem?

I think he might mean ru ending verbs that are really u verbs.

 

[Genki]

Porcile, how you tracking with your prep for N4 test? 4 months out, have you started picking up more grammar patterns?

For those that wanted N3 mock tests, give me another week! I can get some N4 tests to people in the next few days for those still interested.

You wouldn't be able to get N2 mock tests by any chance? Contemplating attempting N2 while in Japan. I passed N3 last year, but only just. I'm studying Japanese but I didn't study specifically for the test so I had gaping holes when it came to the vocab and kanji set.

Been doing a lot of Anki lately, namely Nayr's excellent Core5000 sentence deck with audio spoken by a native speaker. For a month I did 50 new sentences every day. Learned a ton, as most sentences had 1-3 elements new to me, but I started burning out on it. I was planning to play some Japanese games over the summer, but anki ate all of my free time, heh. Starting up studies again in Osaka soon so I reduced the amount of daily new cards greatly over the past week, though revision will be rough for a while I think. Still, I heartily recommend the deck if you're at an intermediate level.

 

[Resilient]

I'll see what I can come up with. N2 I'll see if I can get some next week. N3 peeps give me one more week. N4 peeps give me tomorrow/coming Monday.

 

[Genki]

Cool!

Playing some ゼルダの伝説 神々のトライフォース2, and I can't believe how indecipherable a lot of the kanjis are. It would be a big issue if it didn't have furigana. Are all 3DS games like this? If so I guess Vita games would serve me a lot better until I know all the 常用 kanji at least.

 

[TheSporkWithin]

Cool!

Playing some ゼルダの伝説 神々のトライフォース2, and I can't believe how indecipherable a lot of the kanjis are. It would be a big issue if it didn't have furigana. Are all 3DS games like this? If so I guess Vita games would serve me a lot better until I know all the 常用 kanji at least.

I don't know about ALBW, but I know that Majora's Mask also uses a very stylized font. That's definitely not the norm - most games will tend to a more clean, gothic style font (and ones that use funky fonts are usually for children and include furigana). This can still be difficult if you don't do a lot of reading or don't know the kanji at a glance because the rendering is often very small (especially in Monster Hunter, for some reason), but it becomes much easier as you become more familiar and comfortable with the joyo kanji.

If you kanji knowledge is really lacking, you'd probably do better to stick to games with furigana until you're more comfortable and put some serious time into learning to recognize the joyo kanji. Playing games can be a great way to reinforce reading skills and learn new words, but it's a comparatively painful way to learn new characters, due to the font issues.

That was my experience anyway. I tried Persona Q last July, knowing about 400 kanji and it was extremely frustrating. I stopped playing it, doubled down on kanji studies, and played Yokai Watch and Animal Crossing instead. Picked PQ back up again last week and it's unbelievable how much easier it is for me to read now. I remember ranting to my wife about the font rendering and how terrible it was last year, but now I don't even think about it (It's actually better than some games I've played in the interim).

 

[Resilient]

Persona Q was my first import after learning Japanese. And it was early on too. Needless to say, I gave up and decided it's best to get more Kanji under my belt before I tackled it again. I don't know how many Kanji I've learned, I could be nearing 500 but it pisses me off lol. I'm gonna start Cyber Sleuth soon.

 

[urfe]

Any tips for N1 grammar study? I don't think I use most/any of it at work, and find memorizing set phrases in a book cumbersome.

Is it just a matter of rote memorization?

 

[Aizo]

Do you like Kanzen master? It's probably mostly rote memorization or reading a lot. Mostly book words and grammar usage, it seems.

 

[maniac-kun]

So how do I even start? Got me the book "Japanese From Zero! 1".

Any recommended ANKI files for learning vocabulary for a beginner?

 

[Deleted member 17706]

Any tips for N1 grammar study? I don't think I use most/any of it at work, and find memorizing set phrases in a book cumbersome.

Is it just a matter of rote memorization?

Read more newspapers and books.

That's more time consuming, though, so just pick up an N1 study guide or two and couple of mock exams and cram for it.

 

[Porcile]

So how do I even start? Got me the book "Japanese From Zero! 1".

Any recommended ANKI files for learning vocabulary for a beginner?

I use the Japanese from Zero series. They are nice books. The setup for learning is hiragana and katakana is kind of a pain though, because it uses a progressive system where it slowly introduces them. Number one tip right off the bat with that series is to spend a week or so learning hiragana and katakana. You can still do the lessons inbetween obviously.

I use Houhou which is a dictionary application with an SRS flash card system built in. You can enter in vocabulary as you go. People swear by Anki, but I find it super dull. Either way, you're going to need to learn hiragana and katakana to be able to use them effectively.

Also, it's an extra expense, but I think it's absolutely necessary to sign up to the website so you can access the audio files and the videos. George's Yes Japan Daily series is awesome, and there's a bunch of other stuff on there. He is my unofficial sensei, along with GAF - haha.

One thing I would say about Book 1 is that by the end of it, you won't be able to string much together. For me, that book served more as Japanese fundamental course. It will teach the basic building blocks you need to say more complex things. Don't get discouraged though. I've just finished Book 2 and now I can say A LOT more.

 

[shanshan310]

Do you like Kanzen master? It's probably mostly rote memorization or reading a lot. Mostly book words and grammar usage, it seems.

I'm using it at the moment and finding it alright, although I also found this series really good:

http://www.amazon.co.jp/dp/4757419090/

clear explanations of which answers are correct or not and why, and the layout is nice too.

So how do I even start? Got me the book "Japanese From Zero! 1".

Any recommended ANKI files for learning vocabulary for a beginner?

There are usually vocab lists for each chapter in textbooks so you could use those (+random words you find) as a basis to make your own. I find it sticks better making up my own with the words I want

Here's the vocab list for minna no nihongo anyway though https://ankiweb.net/shared/info/235604533
I remember the vocab in this book being really useful back when I was in high school in Japan flailing with my poor Japanese skills.

 

[beanman25]

First Japanese class is Wednesday evening for me! Very excited to break through the barriers. I'm familiar with most of the beginning of the lesson plan, but with bits and pieces I'm not so great at.

So I'm excited to have proper direction!

 

[RangerBAD]

First Japanese class is Wednesday evening for me! Very excited to break through the barriers. I'm familiar with most of the beginning of the lesson plan, but with bits and pieces I'm not so great at.

So I'm excited to have proper direction!

Have fun.

 

[Desmond]

JLPT results up online for anyone who can view them that way. Scraped by in reading and grammar, full marks in the listening portion. JLPT N2 passed!

 

[Darksol]

JLPT results up online for anyone who can view them that way. Scraped by in reading and grammar, full marks in the listening portion. JLPT N2 passed!

Congrats!

 

[TheSporkWithin]

JLPT results up online for anyone who can view them that way. Scraped by in reading and grammar, full marks in the listening portion. JLPT N2 passed!

Congrats! I didn't take anything this round, but I'm planning on attempting (and likely failing) the N2 myself in December.

 

[Mozz-eyes]

N2 passed!

Pretty evenly spread across the board with reading being my weakest section.

Annoyed that I lost a few on the listening, but unfortunately I sort of zoned out a bit in the test haha!

 

[ethanny2]

羨ましい～　Everyone who passed the N2! I will be taking the N3 this December as my last couple of months in Study abroad wind down. As for my Japanese ability I feel like grammar is my best point with the weakest being vocabulary, I can have conversations but sometimes I hear a word and don't know what it means =p Of course I can always ask them to explain it in other words and I can probably understand it.

Right now I am done with Genki 1 and Genki 2, on CH4 of Tobira 上級　,but for vocabulary other than Anki and Wanikani, what do you guys do? I am working through these N3 vocabulary and its crazy how many words I've never heard.

 

[TheSporkWithin]

羨ましい～　Everyone who passed the N2! I will be taking the N3 this December as my last couple of months in Study abroad wind down. As for my Japanese ability I feel like grammar is my best point with the weakest being vocabulary, I can have conversations but sometimes I hear a word and don't know what it means =p Of course I can always ask them to explain it in other words and I can probably understand it.

Right now I am done with Genki 1 and Genki 2, on CH4 of Tobira 上級　,but for vocabulary other than Anki and Wanikani, what do you guys do? I am working through these N3 vocabulary and its crazy how many words I've never heard.

At this point you likely have enough foundational grammar to start diving into children's novels, games or TV shows. I just started reading books about halfway through Tobira and made an Anki deck for each book. Every time I found a word I didn't know (which was extremely often at first) I'd add it to the deck, along with the sentence it came in. I generate cards for Kanji -> meaning (with toggle-able kana for reading), and meaning -> word.

I recommend childrens' novels and books over manga or games for vocabulary acquisition for several reasons. First, you get a lot of exposure to grammar and phrasing that you'll need to internalize, which you simply won't see in games or manga which are comprised solely of spoken dialogs. Second, the vocabulary is much more restricted, because you don't have a visual accompaniment so the author has to strive to keep things simple and clear, they're writing for children after all. Third, you can do a lot of reading on a Kindle (or the Kindle app on another device) which makes looking up words a great deal easier.

 

[Kilrogg]

JLPT results up online for anyone who can view them that way. Scraped by in reading and grammar, full marks in the listening portion. JLPT N2 passed!

N2 passed!

Pretty evenly spread across the board with reading being my weakest section.

Annoyed that I lost a few on the listening, but unfortunately I sort of zoned out a bit in the test haha!

Congratulations to both of you!

Mozz-eyes, I can totally relate. My reading was and still is so bad. Even at my peak and even though kanji was my forte, I was really slow. When I took N2 I actually couldn't manage to read everything before the end of the exam, so I just filled something like 20 or 30 questions at random. Thankfully it made me aware of the time restriction so I didn't have that problem with N1 (but my reading still sucked and I barely managed to pass).

 

[blurr]

Sadly there's no JLPT exam center where I live but I just study as per JLPT levels anyway. I have no idea if I'd even qualify for N4 but I'm currently studying N3 stuff.

My sources, if anyone's interested:

renshuu.org for grammar, this website has an excellent grammar section
Tagaini Jisho is a desktop app for marking off vocabulary and kanji, really boosted my vocabulary.

 

[bigmit3737]

Any tips for N1 grammar study? I don't think I use most/any of it at work, and find memorizing set phrases in a book cumbersome.

Is it just a matter of rote memorization?

Check out nihongomori on YouTube.
They have really good videos that go through the JPLT 1 grammar and even do practice tests with you.

 

[Resilient]

Big congrats to everybody who passed N2!! Must be a good feeling, I think that's the test I'm fearing the most, I'm a slight way off at the moment tho.

 

[upandaway]

Congrats you guys

I've been looking at reading material that the internet says is N3 level, and it looks more than doable, but then I look at N2 and it's a complete other level. Pretty scary

 

[soc]

Does anybody have experience buying Kindle books from outside of Japan? It looks like a VPN and Japanese address are required, but a foreign credit card should work? I've been using the BOOK WALKER app for light novels lately, but the OCR checking has been pretty poor and it doesn't have a built-in dictionary, so it gets annoying having to Google new vocab.

Edit: Okay, that was pretty simple to set up. For anyone curious, I used a free VPN from here (http://www.vpngate.net/en/).

 

[Deleted member 17706]

Why would you need a VPN? I'm in the U.S. and I can just log into Amazon.co.jp and buy books from the store with my non-Japanese credit card.

 

[Aizo]

I was watching the new indigo la end music video, and someone commented "突然の顎くいに草" about this romantic dialogue with the lead singer lifting a girl's chin and talking to her.
Does "に草" just mean it looked disingenuous or rough? Is it always に, or can it be "____は草"? Is it net slang? I have never heard someone say that.

Edit: Okay, that was pretty simple to set up. For anyone curious, I used a free VPN from here (http://www.vpngate.net/en/).

I bought lots for the Kindle with my Japanese account without a VPN. The real hassle is trying to buy music from the Japanese amazon outside of Japan. So annoying.

 

[Kurita]

I was watching the new indigo la end music video, and someone commented "突然の顎くいに草" about this romantic dialogue with the lead singer lifting a girl's chin and talking to her.
Does "に草" just mean it looked disingenuous or rough? Is it always に, or can it be "____は草"? Is it net slang? I have never heard someone say that.

I think it's just short for 草生える which is net slang when something is funny. It refers to "wwww" that people usually write, cause it looks like grass, hence "Grass is growing/grew". And yes you use に between this and what you think is funny.

 

[Resilient]

Lol at the above. When 笑笑 just ain't enough.

 

[stump sock]

isn't wwww just an analogue for ハハハハ?

so then that gets spun out into grass growing?

I'm getting a headache

 

[Gacha-pin]

　　　　　　　∧,,∧
　　　　　　 (；`・ω・）　　,
　　　　　　 /　ｏ={=}ｏ , ', ´
､､､､､､､､､､しー-Ｊミ(.@)ｗｗｗｗｗｗｗｗｗｗｗｗｗｗｗｗｗ

 

[stump sock]

　　　　　　　∧,,∧
　　　　　　 (；`・ω・）　　,
　　　　　　 /　ｏ={=}ｏ , ', ´
､､､､､､､､､､しー-Ｊミ(.@)ｗｗｗｗｗｗｗｗｗｗｗｗｗｗｗｗｗ

(&#31505

 

[Kurita]

isn't wwww just an analogue for ハハハハ?

so then that gets spun out into grass growing?

I'm getting a headache

Net slang 2hard4me
The explanation I always find is that "www" looks like grass hence the expression.

 

[Resilient]

Gacha-pin, is that a cat mowing the wwwwwww grass?

I've asked this before but I can't find any podcasts that are current/continuously running. Just want something to listen to at work, that I can grab off either the Internet or from the Podcast app in iTunes. Anybody listening to something cool at the moment?

 

[Kilrogg]

Gacha-pin, is that a cat mowing the wwwwwww grass?

I've asked this before but I can't find any podcasts that are current/continuously running. Just want something to listen to at work, that I can grab off either the Internet or from the Podcast app in iTunes. Anybody listening to something cool at the moment?

I haven't listened to it much yet, but a friend of mine is listening to ひいきびいき　http://hkbk.fm/

 

[Jintor]

i listen to the hotcast but i don't understand any of it

 

[Resilient]

Thanks, I'll look into it!

Jintor, surely you understand some of it.