So i'm still trying to learn Japanese. I purchased a couple of books this summer - book 1 : to help me learn the alphabet (hiragana and katakana) and that worked pretty well but getting past that to book 2 : sentence structure, grammars, etc. was difficult - seems i need to invest a good chunk of time to sit down and read book 2 and listen to the tracks. I don't have that much time these days so i wasn't getting very far. it's also a little discouraging when you try to read the book but you don't have the hiragana mastered completely so then you keep having to go back to book 1. instead of making progress, i was going backwards - ARGH!
While I was in Japan this summer, I had to rely on my 10 yr old friend to guide me through Yokohama and Tokyo. I would often point to some characters and asked her to translate. I think she got fed up with me becuase after a day or two, she gave me her DS and said, "here, look it up yourself". I was amazed!! nintendo had come out with a "game" that allowed you to write the characters you wanted to translate, look up the translation for you and allow you to listen to the characters being pronounced in Japanese. I would have bought the game in Japan but it was essentially just a dictionary - it didn't teach you how to speak it. When I got back to the USA, I did a search to see if there was such a game available here but unfortunately, there was none... until a few weeks ago! Ubisoft released My Japanese Coach a month ago. I bought the game (a little bit compulsively) and with 15-20 minutes a day, I am able to make simple sentences. For example, yesterday I asked Hmma this question:
Anata wa minikui desu ka?
(Are you ugly?)
He was impressed. :D
Subscribe to:
Post Comments (Atom)
4 comments:
anata wa minikui desu ka?
kekekeke.
hai. watashi wa minikui desu.
oh. ames.
i wish i had your time to study for leisure. hehehehhee...
but that DS japanese coach is awesome. i'm really considering getting a DS for Christmas this year. hehehehe
oh yeah. speaking of Christmas... will you be coming home???
Yeesssss!!! i'm home on the 24th of Dec if all goes right and well. I'm leaving jan 2 so we should meet up while i'm in town!!! :D
You speak japanese too!!!!!!!
and seriously, i don't have time to study for leisure. if i did, i wouldn't be learning japanese on my DS!!!! that's ridiculous! hahaha. but i do like the fact that DS provides these educational games...
yes. i took Japanese for two years at Waterloo.... i've actually retained quite a bit... there are a bunch of Japanese students at the academy where i work these days, and we sometimes converse... very sporadic conversations...
anyway. yes. we should meet. hm. but this will be a little tricky (as all our meetings tend to be)... I'm going on a retreat from the 28th-31st. so let me know if 26/27 is okay for you.
Post a Comment