🍎🧬📚 queenofthegods' N2 and grad school grind (pls social pressure me into studying)

[GolyBidoof]

@queenofthegods

Well, in Japan they have Sushida which is a kaitenzushi themed typing game.

have you heard of バトル&ゲット！ポケモンタイピングＤＳ? I had the one with the physical keyboard ^^

the game did get an english localization, but i had the most fun attempting to learn katakana with this one, even though i never finished it as the difficulty just drove me away back at that time ^^

Also, on the note of kaiten sushi games, 超回転 寿司ストライカー, nobody ever played it, i loved it, im just letting you know its cool and would recommend, even if there’s no typing in this one xddd

@queenofthegods

Kids also get really giggly over any variation of the word six because it sounds like sex I guess, which I don’t remember being a thing when I was in school.

i have a feeling that if you’re surrounded with germanic/romance languages then there’s no way to escape the stem of the word “six” because it’s so encompassing in the culture and the last time you’d find it funny is at the age of 2 xdddd

@queenofthegods

He called me “bro” all the time which is hilarious.

Bro Learn English from the Hood | Chat Music

[queenofthegods]

@GolyBidoof

have you heard of バトル&ゲット！ポケモンタイピングＤＳ? I had the one with the physical keyboard ^^

I have in fact not heard of that one! My DS didn’t have a keyboard though so that could be part of the problem XD.

超回転 寿司ストライカー sounds like another one of those games that was lost to time but very popular with some who played it. The title says ストライカー so I assume it involves hitting things more than making things such as Overcooked, for example.

@GolyBidoof

i have a feeling that if you’re surrounded with germanic/romance languages then there’s no way to escape the stem of the word “six” because it’s so encompassing in the culture and the last time you’d find it funny is at the age of 2 xdddd

Honestly I had never made the connection until the kids started getting all giggly. To me they sound entirely different but I guess sharing two of three letters is similar. Being an adult and knowing more slang just makes me aware that even more of the things kids say sound rather questionable, especially when adults who make the English education here lack that sort of knowledge. The day a teacher made a worksheet involving a character named “Dick” who was “taking the bus with Sarah” (but often misheard as “taking a bath with Sarah”) was almost too much to handle.

My boyfriend refers to my English as “cool English” because it has become very slangy as the only English I use is with young friends or reading out of a textbook. His English was fine before meeting me but obviously you don’t learn how to talk like that in textbooks. A lot of his learning is from me road raging at drivers where he learned phrases like “what the f*ck are you doing bro?!” Also taught him useful (well, “useful”) words like “food coma” which apparently made his foreign coworkers laugh. I’ve heard him speak in meetings and he definitely has the corporate English down. Hearing him use “would you kindly…” like a pro was fantastic.

[Sunnydodge]

@queenofthegods

I am not the only ALT who is thinking “wtf???” as they have to sing “balls, balls, how many balls?” and “strokes, strokes, how many strokes?” over and over again.

I was thinking the same thing when I first heard that song! Like, the writers must know… surely?

[queenofthegods]

I feel like it was put in to entertain ALTs who have to teach it over and over again. Or the one foreign collaborator decided to see how far he could go. Explaining this to non-elementary ALTs they always are super super confused, but this is our life lol.

However, it may not be intentional? A couple weeks ago we were teaching in on under by and the teacher found a song with hand movements but for the “in” part she was double finger up to the knuckle in her fist going “IN! IN!” at the students while some of the boys were raising eyebrows and giggling. Like girl, I know some of us aren’t into that kind of thing, but I beg of you to know what this looks like

On In Under By Song

[queenofthegods]

November 28th/29th/30th

5 lessons 190 reviews
appeased the owl
finished ATLA: The Search

Not making much progress lol

If I am understanding the Libby app correctly, it only took me 32 minutes to read The Search. Like it is a graphic novel but that seems REALLY fast. Earlier this year I read Lab Girl in I think 8-9 hours which is much shorter than the 11 hour audiobook. Like I know I’m a fast reader in English but that’s almost too fast. Guess that’s good news for me since I still need to read the books my dad got me for Christmas last year and I’m supposed to go visit my parents in less than a month.

Also damn I really need to book my flights ahhhhh

And only one week to the N2 AAAAAAHHHHHHHH

14 of my 17 goshuincho

Today was fun because I got to film a tutorial video at a shrine in my city about how to get goshuin. Did my research during deskwarming and made a script, storyboard, all the things to make things go smoothly. Recruited a friend with film experience in exchange for lunch and a trip to Costco. Handed him the storyboard and GoPro and let him have at it . Generally speaking I hate seeing videos of myself but doing professional or semi-professional filming is actually really fun. Last year I got recruited into modeling for the National Tourism Board (I did not know this before, my friend just called me and said “can you wear a kimono on this day?”) and it was really fun to work with a professional crew like that. My friend isn’t a professional just yet but he was talking about different types of camera angles, so I know I was in good hands.

Of course filming at a shrine required a lot of Japanese. The workers there know me as “that crazy foreign girl that collects goshuin from all over the country” but I still had to email them asking for permission to film on shrine grounds, ask more questions about how much of the shrine itself we can film (generally speaking you aren’t allowed to photograph the inside of shrines or temples), explain what we were doing, ask them to ignore us when taking 5 attempts to film me walking up to the front desk, answering their questions about what we are going to do with the footage, etc. My brain is really not braining and trying to do all this in Japanese was a struggle, but we managed to communicate enough that the workers seemed happy with us. Honestly the head guy put a ton of trust in us to let us run around and film for what ended up being 3 hours. Letting two foreigners with a camera run around your family shrine is definitely a risk, but I have been going there monthly for a couple years so he took a leap of faith when I asked if I could use his shrine to film a tutorial video.

Since I was in town I decided to try looking for some gifts for my family. Bookstore wasn’t exactly successful but I did get to look at a lot of dictionaries. I have a basic Japanese-Japanese dictionary but my sister requested a “kanji dictionary” so I set about my quest trying to figure out what she means. The closest I found to what she described is an elementary school kanji dictionary, with the slight problem of my sister doesn’t know much Japanese yet. Like I can manage a Japanese-Japanese dictionary, but maybe not yet for her. Some of those dictionaries are so cute. The tiny ones really caught my attention. However, I usually use Jisho.org and Japanese (dictionary app).

My mom asked for a specific gardening tool from Japan so more wandering around stores. I did find the special gardening knife she wants but also some weeding tools I’ve never seen before. Pretty sure we tried all available options in the US, including the one that shoots fire. This section also has a bajillion sizes of scythes which is cool af because those are rare in the US. Can you tell I grew up on a farm yet hahahaha.

[GolyBidoof]

@queenofthegods

If I am understanding the Libby app correctly, it only took me 32 minutes to read The Search. Like it is a graphic novel but that seems REALLY fast. Earlier this year I read Lab Girl in I think 8-9 hours which is much shorter than the 11 hour audiobook.

can relate to that feeling, and also it’s preventing me reading in different languages too xdd

if i read a book in english in 4 hours and then an audiobook for that book is 8 hours long then i just launch my best sully-faced mike wazowski impression and go like “i never want to hear an audiobook of this book im sorry”

but where it affects me in other languages is “i could either read this book in 4 hours in english, 7 hours in german or 13 hours in japanese, guess which one i’ll choose” xddd

@queenofthegods

Generally speaking I hate seeing videos of myself but doing professional or semi-professional filming is actually really fun.

tiktok career literally when xdddd

@queenofthegods

Can you tell I grew up on a farm yet hahahaha.

silver spoon protagonist spotted

ah yeah, just a week until N2, what a concept
good luck to the both of us ^^

[queenofthegods]

@GolyBidoof

if i read a book in english in 4 hours and then an audiobook for that book is 8 hours long then i just launch my best sully-faced mike wazowski impression and go like “i never want to hear an audiobook of this book im sorry”

Time wise, yes, but many audiobooks have fantastic voice actors to read them so it’s super fun. The people who read the Discworld novels are fantastic and one section of Daughter of the Deep by Rick Riordan has music and I can’t really imagine music when described, so adding in the music was really helpful to me. Literal chills too, it was so good.

To me, some books are better as audiobooks and some books are better to read. Like fantasy books with lots of fun characters is great to have someone with an animated voice reading but something more serious like Lab Girl or intense like Whip Smart are more reading friendly in my opinion. As for other languages I have yet to try an audiobook in Japanese, but reading them takes a long time. For example I could probably finish Prisoner of Azkaban in one day in English but it takes at least a month in Japanese.

@GolyBidoof

tiktok career literally when xdddd

I have a bunch of GoPro footage I never did anything with because editing is a pain the the butt XD

@GolyBidoof

ah yeah, just a week until N2, what a concept
good luck to the both of us ^^

Terrifying . My motivation to study is basically zero but still going to take it. Missed by four points last time but that absolutely does NOT mean I will be that close again lol. My goal is to get exactly 90 points XD. Good luck to you as well!

[pocketcat]

@queenofthegods

To me, some books are better as audiobooks and some books are better to read

Strong agree on this. I finished a book this year (教団X) that I honestly would have DNF’d if I’d just been reading it, but the audiobook was so well done I kinda just flowed along with it despite the content being, well, awful

@queenofthegods

As for other languages I have yet to try an audiobook in Japanese

If you ever opt to get into the them, audiobook.jp’s 聞き放題 is such a bargain. I swear the majority of the site is 放題 eligible

[queenofthegods]

December 1st

4 lessons and 170 reviews
appeased the owl
N2 practice test section

Getting closer

But they keep coming lol

Honestly pretty happy with this. Like obviously I should want a higher score but my goal is to get exactly 90 points so a 64% is more than enough for me. That’s even with me getting up in the middle to look at the firefighters with my coworkers. One person noticed that they had arrived for their presentation and all us ladies got up to go look out the window. Great minds think alike

Japanese fire drills are different than fire drills in the US. In the US, if the alarm goes off you get up and file outside no matter when it is or if you think it is real or not. This training means when the fire alarm went off at 5am in my college dorm, every single person got up and left the building without any sort of hesitation. Like I didn’t even realize I was still holding my stuffed owl until I got outside, that’s how programed we are to do it . In Japan, if a fire alarm goes off the students have to wait, some teacher goes and checks in, THEN they tell everyone to evacuate or not. Apparently the reason for this is to make sure it isn’t a kid pulling the fire alarm but from an American perspective this seems like unneccessary potentially endangering steps that remove any sort of urgency from reacting to alarms. Now I will say that I have had many a class interrupted and been woken up by fire alarms a number of times, but to me it’s one of those things where I would rather be annoyed a few times and be safe when I need it. There was a story when I was a kid of a fire alarm going off at a school and all the kids just filing out assuming it was a drill and the whole school burned down behind them. Everyone left immediately and calmly because it is so normal for us. Not sure if the extra minute or three to investigate is going to make a huge difference, but I think it is more of a taking alarms seriously kind of thing.

Oh, and also Americans solved the “did someone pull the fire alarm?” problem ages ago. Our pulls shoot ink onto your hands so if someone pulls it erroneously, you will know who it is. However I do think someone pulled a fire alarm one time in college because three classes in the building had a midterm at the same time and the fire alarm went off with no clear cause

Student nonsense:
We have a little quiz challenge at the beginning of class so I asked the question “how do you spell school?” and when I called on a kid to answer it, the kid next to him rushed to cover the word “school” on the answerer’s and his own uniform . Pretty sure all surrounding students did the same. Kids do stupid funny things without hesitation and I love it.

At the grocery store I ran into the parents and younger brother of a student of mine. Kiddo ran up to me to hold hands and tell me what he learned at school today. My heart . He isn’t old enough to have English classes yet but any person their older sibling likes is good in the eyes of little kids.

[queenofthegods]

@pocketcat

I honestly would have DNF’d if I’d just been reading it, but the audiobook was so well done I kinda just flowed along with it despite the content being, well, awful

Oh no hahaha. Generally speaking I like all the audiobooks I listen to, but it is hard to go wrong with Terry Pratchett novels. Weirdly enough I didn’t like the radio drama production of Mort. You would think a multi actor, built for radio performance would be like audiobooks on steroids but actually I didn’t like it . Sounds are fun and all but I need more words to explain to me what is happening.

@pocketcat

audiobook.jp’s 聞き放題

I’ve never heard of this before! I’ll go check it out. Thanks for the recommendation!

[queenofthegods]

December 2nd

4 lessons and 271 reviews
N2 vocab/grammar/reading section
emailing the government
writing about myself for the school newsletter

and of course as soon as I go back to the dashboard

Wanikani truly is a marathon

Both my speed and accuracy went up. Again, ideally I would be getting above 65% but you only need 50% to pass so I will take it.

According to one of those score calculator things that’s 77 points out of the first two sections, so 77/120. That means I would just need to pass the listening section to pass the test. Listening is historically my best section, so things are looking up.

I got confirmation today that I cannot continue my job beyond this summer, so now I feel better about my decision to apply to graduate school. I get the results next Thursday, which is before the meeting with the government, so I can tell them then. Things are going to accelerate beyond that and if I have time, I also want to help my fellow ALTs figure out what comes next.

Two years ago in late October, I got went to a meeting where the government told us to beg for our jobs. It was scary and stressful, and it felt like things were going wrong. Through a variety of small town politics, we were able to keep our jobs for more than just the fourth year they promised and retracted but for the full five years the JET Programme allows. My day-of prepared paragraph to be read to the mayor as he left a city hall meeting I was mysterously nominated for was probably one of the most influential and important things I will ever do. At the time, the idea of losing my job was terrifying and I felt completely unprepared and unwilling to move on. Now I find myself in a similar position (was told we could stay, found out that has been retracted), but I am completely at peace with it. I feel ready to move on. Many would argue that two years ago was a better time to move on and I shouldn’t have spent so many years in a dead end job. Maybe that’s true, but we can’t change the past and I am here now more sure of what I want for the future. This isn’t what I imagined for myself when I applied more than five years ago now. However, as my mom always says, “life is what happens between the plans.” I feel good, I feel ready, I don’t feel like I’ve picked the perfect path but I feel like I picked a promising one.

Aaaaaaand I passed out at the kotatsu until work the next day so studying got cut short

[queenofthegods]

December 3rd

1 lesson and 167 reviews
appeased the owl

The horrors persist but so do I.

This is one of those words that may be like “why would I need to know that?” but I’m a knitter and a yarn snob so I actually would like to know this hahaha. 厚切り is another one I think is important. Thick cut bacon and thick cut chips are where it’s at.

Yesterday one of my coworkers saw me studying and saw the word 共産党 pop up on the screen. She asked “why do you need to know that..?” and laughed before saying “I guess they do come up a lot,” presumably in reference to all the political vans screaming in the valley.

As for my blurb about myself for the school newsletter, I took it to one of the English teachers today for editing. Despite doing this all the time for my students it is pretty daunting/vulnerable to have someone check your work. It’s not like I don’t write stuff in Japanese with some level of frequency I just don’t usually have people checking it lol. Every time someone checks my Japanese it is always a very humbling experience because my idea of how good I am meets the reality of how good I actually am. However I am glad that the second round of edits transcended grammar mistakes to trying to pick different verbs for every sentence. Like my job requires a lot of 伝える but you can’t use that for every sentence so we had to brainstorm other verbs to use.

[queenofthegods]

December 4th

3 lessons and 105 reviews
appeased the owl

Fun fact but I learned this one off of all the Christian cult posters in my neck of the woods. Black background with yellow text always telling you to repent your sins or how the end is nigh etc.

Today was one of the rare occasions where I actually worked all day at work. Between having classes all morning and making a two Christmas activities, it actually ate up most of my afternoon and I was so in the zone that I stayed late at work. One of those activities was about prices and in doing that I found out that pre-prepared mashed potatoes are more per 100g than ham OR whole turkey?!? Not that I bought mashed potatoes to begin with, but damn note to self to always make them myself.

One of my friends is going to defend their PhD thesis tomorrow so I’m going to wake up early and watch. Time zone difference isn’t fantastic but gotta support our friends in grad school, right?

[queenofthegods]

December 5th

6 lessons 266 reviews
appeased the owl
Bunpro Listening section of N2

Will I get to level 35 before the N2 this Sunday? Who knows. So close but so far…

Decided to take a listening test section this time and even in a mostly quiet office it is really hard to focus. But, a 74% is good. According to one of those calculator things that equates to about a 42, meaning I only need to get 28 in the other sections. One of the questions was about a teacher having a wheat allergy. As a teacher with a wheat allergy, I feel very seen.

Woke up at 5am to watch a friend of mine’s thesis defense. She is a doctor now! How exciting. We took biology together back in first year of university and now she has a PhD in biochemistry. We definitely went different paths lol. Not sure what that says about my use of the last 8 years but it is always helpful to have successful friends, so this is a win for me as well .

I need your help everyone: Next week is the beginning of Christmas event season so I decided to dress up as a Christmas tree. Ended up going with “ornaments” on a green t-shirt with a star stuck in my bun. The star turned out FANTASTIC but need to figure out how to make myself look less like polka dots and more like a Christmas tree.

• Beads on top of circles for the hanger part of the ornamets
• Gold garland-zig zag across
• Gold garland-wrapped around
• Glitter
• Other ornaments
• 50cm Christmas lights
• More circles

Or any other suggestions you might have!

One of my favorite things about learning more Japanese is all the hot gossip I get to hear around the office. My coworkers also appreciate this because I work at both schools and now I know enough to answer their questions about said gossip. Two of my coworkers were gossiping about something in the empty office and I heard my name a couple times so I tuned in. The decided to give it a shot of asking me, in this case about how I get my paychecks. Given their reaction, they got the information they wanted lol.

[shitsurei]

@queenofthegods

Or any other suggestions you might have!

Tinsel! It can even get everywhere and be a nuisance

[queenofthegods]

I did actually buy some but one English teacher already hates me and banned me from wearing a Santa hat so can’t go too crazy . Maybe if I can find a way to make it less insane than 3m of tinsel around me hahahaha.

[GolyBidoof]

@queenofthegods

Today was one of the rare occasions where I actually worked all day at work.

oh lord definitely cannot relate xddd

@queenofthegods

Decided to take a listening test section this time and even in a mostly quiet office it is really hard to focus.

the examination room will definitely have some issues with acoustics, so maybe that’s a good environment that you were doing the test in ^^

@queenofthegods

Woke up at 5am to watch a friend of mine’s thesis defense. She is a doctor now! How exciting.

OOO CONGRATS TO HER :DDDD

@queenofthegods

how to make myself look less like polka dots and more like a Christmas tree.

if you had any dot stickers or something, you can attach them at the top of the polka dots and make them look as if they’re the hangers for the ornaments on the tree ^^

but this is a sweet outfit and we do stan C:

you can also wear something like heavier earrings with ornaments so that you ARE an actual ornament christmas tree wearing something from the ears, I had those reindeers in my ears today C:

[queenofthegods]

@GolyBidoof

you can also wear something like heavier earrings with ornaments so that you ARE an actual ornament christmas tree wearing something from the ears, I had those reindeers in my ears today C:

OMG THAT’S A FANTASTIC IDEA! It’s time for my three ear holes to shine.

[queenofthegods]

December 6th and 7th

JLPT N2
appeased the owl
opened a grammar textbook

Good luck on test Kitkats? I raise you good luck on test yogurt drinks.

I did absolutely ZERO studying on Saturday. Literally the most I did was open my grammar workbook and use it as a pillow, hoping to learn by diffusion or something. Just a whole lot of doomscrolling and こたつむり (kotatsu snailing).

With the JLPT being in the morning now I got up at 5:15am and went to go pick up my friend. In total it takes over two hours to get to the test center, but definitely could be worse. Honestly I kind of prefer the morning tests because you can just wake up and get it over with then have the afternoon to play.

Chibi-chan has moved in with a different neighbor even closer to my house so she came running for wet food both when I left and when I got home. She’s a smart lady and we support smart ladies of all species in this house.

Now for the JLPT itself! It was at a university this time which is my favorite. Lecture halls are much better set up for tests than hotel ballrooms. This may be a niche thing to notice but this was the most ethnically diverse N2 crowd I have ever seen. Usually it is almost exclusively east/southeast Asians but there was a lot more of a mix this time. Happy to see more people living here and studying Japanese. The mix of languages in the waiting areas makes me so happy.

Usually one person gets kicked out at some point but I don’t think anyone got kicked out of my room. Some of my friends had 1 or 2 people kicked out actually, all for phone related issues. This year they made us put our phones on the tables for several minutes then put them in SEALED envelopes that we weren’t allowed to open until the end of the whole test. Had to use my eyeballs to look around for my friends during the break. We were scattered around the 8 classrooms so the timing was a bit バラバラ.

How do I feel about how I did on the test? Pretty good actually. This is my 6th JLPT overall so am very familiar with the format at this point. Usually vocab and grammar is my biggest struggle with it usually taking only a question or two to get into the “wow I have no idea” point but this time around we all felt it was easier than usual and I noticed many of the words/kanji in my current Wanikani Reviews mountain. However, listening kicked our butts. For those living in Japan, we usually don’t even study for the listening section and it is always the highest score, so this threw us for a loop. Not the highest of notes to end the test on, but the fact that I finished the first section 20min early gives me some confidence that I at least passed. My goals aren’t to get high scores, just to get an exact 90 so I can put N2 on my resume (and my visa change application…).

Now for the fun stuff: post test day out in Niigata city! My carpool friend and I stood outside the test center and collected some friends then picked up a couple more at the station to hit the town. Our afternoon included fancy kaitenzushi, Christmas market, Uniqlo, bookstore, and bubble tea. A completely unsucessful Christmas shopping day for me but lots of good talk with friends I haven’t seen in a while. It was raining like crazy with thunder and lightening when it was time to go home, a typical storm in Niigata city. My friend and I had to huddle under a 7-11 umbrella together. Not sure how long until that rain turns to snow but probably only a few days.

Talked to a friend last night and told him I want to take a bit of a break from studying Japanese after the JLPT. He said I can’t do that lol. He’s a current graduate student in not his home country and the reality of going to graduate school abroad is taking classes in another language so if I want to survive come April, need to keep pushing. Perhaps I will shift my studying a little, maybe to more books and perhaps cut down a little on WaniKani reviews? However given the pile I have that may simply not be an option. Ideally I can get to zero zero then put it on vacation mode for a bit, but not sure how long that will take me given that I currently have around 400 reviews to do…

Anyhow, お連れ様 to everyone that took the JLPT and have fun with your post JLPT plans!

[queenofthegods]

December 8th and 9th

5 lessons and 120 reviews, 296 reviews
appeased the owl

Just frantic reviewing waiting for my one class of the day.

Leveled up but holy moly so many reviews incoming

Apparently there was a pretty strong earthquake and tsunami in Japan last night but I slept through it?!? Hopefully everyone is okay up in Aomori.

I was feeling pretty good about my JLPT until my friend sent me the answers so I could go check. From what I can tell, the listening absolutely kicked my butt. I also had the right answer on the last question but overthought it so now that’s 3 points I could have had, and according to my calculations I got a 88 so that really sucks. This year the listening section seemed exceptionally difficult so I hope that the curve saves me. Not sure if having the failing depression now or later is better hahahahaha.

Today in class we got asked about 撮影 which I thought meant pictures for the school newsletter which I will be featured in this month, but I was mistaken because a huge TV camera got carried into the classroom to take some in class footage. Really glad it was today because I actually dressed nice for once (anticipating the school newsletter pictures). Normally I look crazy XD.

In more “wait, what did they mean?!” news, I got my car back. Got a call from the shop at like 5pm (which is pitch black here) and didn’t recognize the guy’s voice but he said my car was ready so I got the 代車 ready and went to the shop. When I got there I figured out who called me but I guess he hasn’t called me before so I didn’t know what his voice sounded like over the phone. Even if I can’t understand what a person is saying, I try my best to remember people’s voices. First of all the other people didn’t know if my car was ready so they had to go find him again and when I got my car back he said 「してみたい」and for those who aren’t familiar with that grammar point, that 「みたい」 means “to try.” What do you mean 「みたい」?!? That is not the grammar you want to hear when someone says they fixed your car lol.

Oh, and I decided what I want to do post JLPT! I want to read the books my dad got me, which are in English of course.